Instructional Design:

Concepts, Methodologies,
Tools, and Applications

Information Resources Management Association

USA

INFORMATION SCIENCE REFERENCE

Hershey • New York
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Instructional design : concepts, methodologies, tools and applications / Information Resources Management Association, Editor.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-60960-503-2 (hardcover) -- ISBN 978-1-60960-504-9 (ebook) 1.
Instructional systems--Design. I. Information Resources Management
Association.
LB1028.38.I558 2011
371.33'4--dc22
2011003218

British Cataloguing in Publication Data

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Editor-in-Chief
Mehdi Khosrow-Pour, DBA
Editor-in-Chief
Contemporary Research in Information Science and Technology, Book Series

Associate Editors
Steve Clarke
University of Hull, UK

Murray E. Jennex
San Diego State University, USA

Annie Becker
Florida Institute of Technology USA

Ari-Veikko Anttiroiko
University of Tampere, Finland

Editorial Advisory Board

Sherif Kamel
American University in Cairo, Egypt

In Lee
Western Illinois University, USA

Jerzy Kisielnicki
Warsaw University, Poland

Keng Siau
University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA

Amar Gupta
Arizona University, USA

Craig van Slyke

University of Central Florida, USA

John Wang
Montclair State University, USA

Vishanth Weerakkody
Brunel University, UK
 Additional Research Collections found in the
“Contemporary Research in Information Science and Technology”
Book Series
Data Mining and Warehousing: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications
John Wang, Montclair University, USA • 6-volume set • ISBN 978-1-60566-056-1

Electronic Business: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

In Lee, Western Illinois University • 4-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-943-4

Electronic Commerce: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

S. Ann Becker, Florida Institute of Technology, USA • 4-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-943-4

Electronic Government: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Ari-Veikko Anttiroiko, University of Tampere, Finland • 6-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-947-2

Knowledge Management: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Murray E. Jennex, San Diego State University, USA • 6-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-933-5

Information Communication Technologies: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Craig Van Slyke, University of Central Florida, USA • 6-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-949-6

Intelligent Information Technologies: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Vijayan Sugumaran, Oakland University, USA • 4-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-941-0

Information Security and Ethics: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Hamid Nemati, The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, USA • 6-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-937-3

Medical Informatics: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Joseph Tan, Wayne State University, USA • 4-volume set • ISBN 978-1-60566-050-9

Mobile Computing: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

David Taniar, Monash University, Australia • 6-volume set • ISBN 978-1-60566-054-7

Multimedia Technologies: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Syed Mahbubur Rahman, Minnesota State University, Mankato, USA • 3-volume set • ISBN 978-1-60566-054-7

Virtual Technologies: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications

Jerzy Kisielnicki, Warsaw University, Poland • 3-volume set • ISBN 978-1-59904-955-7

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List of Contributors

Abrami, Philip C. \ CSLP, Concordia University, Canada................................................................ 789

Ahmed, Ali \ University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, USA.................................................................... 972
Angel, Roma \ Appalachian State University, USA............................................................................ 679
Anolli, Luigi \ CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy........................................................ 1245
Aworuwa, Bosede \ Texas A&M University-Texarkana, USA.............................................................. 95
Baek, Eun-ok \ California State University, San Bernardino, USA..................................................... 18
Baggio, Bobbe \ Advantage Learning Technologies, USA................................................................ 1755
Barnett, Marion \ Buffalo State College, USA................................................................................... 888
Barrón, Ángela \ University of Salamanca, Spain............................................................................... 71
Bartsch, Robert A. \ University of Houston - Clear Lake, USA....................................................... 1237
Belanich, James \ U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA............... 464
Beldarrain, Yoany \ Florida Virtual School, USA............................................................................ 1755
Bernsteiner, Reinhard \ University for Health Sciences, Austria...................................................... 583
Bethel, Edward C. \ Concordia University, Canada.......................................................................... 789
Blake, Adam \ University of Auckland, New Zealand........................................................................ 817
Bodie, Graham \ Purdue University, USA........................................................................................ 1689
Boot, Eddy \ TNO Human Factors, The Netherlands....................................................................... 1793
Bowman, Joseph \ University at Albany/SUNY, USA....................................................................... 1472
Brinthaupt, Thomas M. \ Middle Tennessee State University, USA................................................ 1228
Bronack, Stephen C. \ Appalachian State University, USA............................................................... 679
Browning, Christine \ Western Michigan University, USA.............................................................. 1847
Byrd, C. Noel \ Virginia Tech, USA.................................................................................................... 620
Caeiro-Rodríguez, Manuel \ University of Vigo, Spain..................................................................... 718
Caladine, Richard \ University of Wollongong, Australia............................................................... 1, 41
Calinger, Manetta \ Center for Educational Technologies®, Wheeling Jesuit University,
USA.............................................................................................................................................. 1880
Cannon-Bowers, Jan \ University of Central Florida, USA.............................................................. 431
Cargil, David \ Louisiana Tech University, USA................................................................................ 870
Carroll, Malissa Marie \ University of Maryland – Baltimore County, USA.................................... 880
Cartelli, Antonio \ University of Cassino, Italy.................................................................................... 34
Casimiro, Lynn \ University of Ottawa, Canada................................................................................ 998
Chandran, Ravi \ National University of Singapore, Singapore..................................................... 1892
Chen, Irene \ University of Houston – Downtown, USA.................................................... 80, 162, 1259
Chen, Ching-Huei \ Center for Educational Technologies®, Wheeling Jesuit University,
USA.............................................................................................................................................. 1880
Cheney, Amy \ Appalachian State University, USA............................................................................ 679
Chylinski, Renata \ Monash University, Australia............................................................................. 840
Cicciarelli, MarySue \ Duquesne University, USA.......................................................................... 1514
Clariana, Roy B. \ Pennsylvania State University, USA.................................................................... 238
Clayton, Maria A. \ Middle Tennessee State University, USA......................................................... 1228
Coleman, Susan \ Intellignet Decision Systems, Inc., USA................................................................ 431
Costagliola, Gennaro \ University of Salerno, Italy........................................................................... 742
Côté, Roger \ Concordia University, Canada..................................................................................... 789
Cummins, Carrice \ Louisiana Tech University, USA....................................................................... 870
Dadam, Y. \ Cardiff University, UK.................................................................................................. 1899
Dahl, Laura B. \ University of Utah, USA........................................................................................ 1771
Davis, Rita \ Eastern Kentucky University, USA................................................................................ 101
De Faveri, Daniela \ Università della Svizzera Italiana, Switzerland.............................................. 1793
Dede, Chris \ Harvard University, USA.............................................................................................. 480
Delfino, Manuela \ Institute for Educational Technology - Italian National Research Council,
Italy................................................................................................................................................ 359
Derntl, Michael \ University of Vienna, Austria................................................................................. 758
Diamond, Bruce J. \ William Paterson University, USA.................................................................. 1191
Dick, Martin \ RMIT University, Australia....................................................................................... 1341
Dielmann, Kim B. \ University of Central Arkansas, USA ............................................................. 1211
Doherty, Iain \ University of Auckland, New Zealand........................................................................ 817
Doolittle, Peter E. \ Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, USA........................... 620, 1564
Douglas, Ian \ Florida State University, USA................................................................................... 1537
Draude, Barbara J. \ Middle Tennessee State University, USA....................................................... 1228
Driskell, Shannon O. \ University of Dayton, USA.......................................................................... 1847
Dubbels, Brock \ Center for Cognitive Studies, Literacy Education, University of Minnesota,
Department of Curriculum & Instruction, USA.......................................................................... 1104
Dybkjær, Laila \ NISLab, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark............................................. 541
Edmundson, Andrea L. \ eWorld Learning, Inc., USA.................................................................... 1159
Eldukhuri, E.E. \ Cardiff University, UK......................................................................................... 1899
Elfessi, Abdulaziz \ University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, USA......................................................... 972
Emurian, Henry H. \ University of Maryland – Baltimore County, USA.......................................... 880
Fang, Houbin \ The University of Southern Mississippi, USA......................................................... 1487
Feldmesser, Kim \ University of Brighton, UK................................................................................ 1039
Felicia, Patrick \ University College Cork, Ireland.......................................................................... 1282
Fernandez, Felix \ ICF International, USA...................................................................................... 1472
Ferraris, Christine \ Université de Savoie, France............................................................................ 403
Ferrucci, Filomena \ University of Salerno, Italy.............................................................................. 742
Feurzeig, Wallace \ BBN Technologies, USA..................................................................................... 431
Fitch-Hauser, Margaret \ Auburn University, USA......................................................................... 1689
Frizell, Sherri S. \ Prairie View A&M University, USA..................................................................... 114
Galloway, Jerry P. \ Texas Wesleyan University, USA & University of Texas at Arlington,
USA.............................................................................................................................................. 1840
García, Francisco J. \ University of Salamanca, Spain....................................................................... 71
Gardner, Joel \ Utah State University, USA....................................................................................... 330
Gibbons, Andrew S. \ Brigham Young University, USA................................................................... 1921
Gilman, Regis M. \ Appalachian State University, USA.................................................................... 679
Graff, Martin \ University of Glamorgan, UK................................................................................. 1553
Grant, Michael \ University of Memphis, USA.................................................................................. 375
Greene, Courtney \ DePaul University, USA..................................................................................... 963
Hai-Jew, Shalin \ Kansas State University, USA.............................................................................. 1364
Hanewald, Ria \ La Trobe University, Melbourned, Australia........................................................... 840
Hao, Yungwei \ National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan............................................................ 607
Hartsell, Taralynn \ The University of Southern Mississippi, USA................................................. 1487
Hasen, Maurie \ Monash University, Australia................................................................................ 1341
Herner-Patnode, Leah \ Ohio State University, Lima, USA................................................................ 18
Herron, Sherry S. \ The University of Southern Mississippi, USA.................................................. 1487
Hewett, Stephenie \ The Citadel, USA............................................................................................... 192
Hill, Janis \ Louisiana Tech University, USA...................................................................................... 870
Hokanson, Brad \ University of Minnesota, USA.................................................................... 389, 1520
Holland, Janet \ Emporia State University, USA.............................................................................. 1806
Holsanova, Jana \ Lund University, Sweden.................................................................................... 1667
Hooper, Simon \ Penn State University, USA................................................................................... 1520
Horn, Daniel B. \ U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA................ 464
Hostetter Shoop, Glenda \ Pennsylvania State University, USA....................................................... 238
Howard, Bruce C. \ Center for Educational Technologies®, Wheeling Jesuit University,
USA.............................................................................................................................................. 1880
Huang, Wenhao David \ University of Illinois, USA....................................................................... 1586
Hübscher, Roland \ Bentley College, USA......................................................................................... 114
Hussain, Talib \ BBN Technologies, USA........................................................................................... 431
Hutchinson, Richard \ Kennesaw State University, USA.................................................................. 870
Inan, Fethi \ Texas Tech University, USA........................................................................................... 375
Inoue, Yukiko \ University of Guam, Guam..................................................................................... 1183
Jagman, Heather \ DePaul University, USA...................................................................................... 963
Jain, Pawan \ Fort Hays State Univerysity, Hays, USA..................................................................... 255
Jain, Smita \ University of Wyoming, Hays, USA............................................................................... 255
James, Christopher L. \ Russellville City Schools, USA................................................................. 1085
Jeon, Tae \ Utah State University, USA............................................................................................... 330
Jin, Putai \ University of New South Wales, Australia.............................................................. 496, 1393
Joeckel III, George L. \ Utah State University, USA......................................................................... 330
Johnson, Mark \ University System of Georgia, USA........................................................................ 928
Johnson, Tristan \ Florida State University, USA............................................................................ 1586
Johnston, Catherine \ Harvard University, USA............................................................................... 480
Joia, Luiz Antonio \ Rio de Janeiro State University, Brazil........................................................... 1465
Jones, Paula \ Eastern Kentucky University, USA.............................................................................. 101
Juelich-Velotta, Elizabeth \ Walsh University, USA........................................................................ 1446
Kawachi, Paul \ Open Education Network, Japan........................................................................... 1744
Kenyon, Melaine \ Buffalo State College, USA.................................................................................. 888
Kidd, Terry T. \ University of Texas School of Public Health, USA........................................ 936, 1169
Kimbell-Lopez, Kimberly \ Louisiana Tech University, USA........................................................... 870
King, Kathleen P. \ University of South Florida, USA....................................................................... 527
Koenig, Melissa \ DePaul University, USA........................................................................................ 963
Koenig, Alan \ National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing
(CRESST), USA............................................................................................................................. 431
Koszalka, Tiffany A. \ Syracuse University, USA.............................................................................. 984
Laforcade, Pierre \ Université du Maine, France.............................................................................. 135
LaPointe, Deborah K. \ Unviersity of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, USA............................ 302
Lasnik, Vincent Elliott \ Independent Information Architect, USA................................................... 270
Le Pallec, Xavier \ Université de Lille, France.................................................................................. 135
Lee, Hea-Jin \ Ohio State University, Lima, USA................................................................................. 18
Lee, John \ National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing (CRESST),
USA................................................................................................................................................ 431
Léonard, Michel \ Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada................................. 697
Linder-VanBerschot, Jennifer Ann \ University of New Mexico, USA............................................ 302
Liu, Min \ University of Texas at Austin, USA...................................................................................... 51
Low, Renae \ University of New South Wales, Australia.......................................................... 496, 1393
Lowerison, Gretchen \ Concordia University, Canada..................................................................... 789
Lundgren-Cayrol, Karin \ Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada................... 697
Lusk, Danille L. \ Virgina Tech, USA................................................................................................. 620
Ma, Yuxin \ University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA.......................................................... 1023, 1069
MacDonald, Colla J. \ University of Ottawa, Canada....................................................................... 998
MacKinnon, Gregory \ Acadia University, Canada........................................................................ 1714
Mantovani, Fabrizia \ CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy, & ATN-P LAB, Istituto
Auxologico Italiano, Italy............................................................................................................ 1245
Marcinkiewicz, Henryk R. \ Aramco Services Company, USA......................................................... 207
Mariano, Gina J. \ Virginia Tech, USA.............................................................................................. 620
Marinho, Robson \ Andrews University, USA.................................................................................. 1607
Martel, Christian \ Pentila Corporation and Université de Savoie, France..................................... 403
Mathews, Susann M. \ Wright State University, USA...................................................................... 1847
McGrath, Leticia L. \ Georgia Southern University, USA................................................................. 928
McNeill, Andrea L. \ Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, USA................................. 1564
Meaux, Julie \ University of Central Arkansas, USA....................................................................... 1211
Menaker, Ellen \ Intelligent Decision Systems, Inc., USA.................................................................. 431
Mike, Dennis \ Buffalo State College, USA........................................................................................ 888
Miller, Susan M. \ Kent State Universtiy, USA................................................................................... 342
Miller, Charles \ University of Minnesota, USA............................................................................... 1520
Miller Vice, Sharon \ University at Albany/SUNY, USA.................................................................. 1472
Mitchell, Rebecca \ Harvard University, USA.................................................................................... 480
Moffitt, Kerry \ BBN Technologies, USA........................................................................................... 431
Morales, Erla M. \ University of Salamanca, Spain............................................................................ 71
Morrow, Jean \ Emporia State University, USA............................................................................... 1806
Mortillaro, Marcello \ CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy, & CISA - University of
Geneva, Switzerland.................................................................................................................... 1245
Motschnig-Pitrik, Renate \ University of Vienna, Austria................................................................. 758
Mumford, Jacqueline M. \ Walsh University, USA......................................................................... 1446
Murphy, Curtiss \ Alion Science and Technology, AMSTO Operation, USA.................................... 431
Mustaro, Pollyana Notargiacomo \ Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil....................... 173
Navarro, Emily Oh \ University of California, Irvine, USA............................................................ 1645
Nelson, Jon \ Utah State University, USA......................................................................................... 1793
Niess, Margaret L. \ Oregon State University, USA......................................................................... 1847
Nodenot, Thierry \ Université de Pau et des pays de l’Adour, France.............................................. 135
Nordstrom, Patricia A. \ Pennsylvania State University, USA.......................................................... 238
O’Shea, Patrick \ Harvard University, USA....................................................................................... 480
Offutt, Ronald D. \ Northrup-Grumman Information Technology, USA........................................... 317
Ole Bernsen, Niels \ NISLab, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark........................................ 541
Olson, Bradley \ SUNY Upstate Medical University, USA................................................................. 984
Orvis, Karin A. \ Old Dominion University, USA.............................................................................. 464
Oskorus, Anna \ TiER 1 Performance Solutions, USA..................................................................... 1880
Ostermann, Herwig \ University for Health Sciences, Austria.......................................................... 583
Owen, Robert S. \ Texas A&M University-Texarkana, USA................................................................ 95
Owens, Emiel \ Texas Southern University, USA.............................................................................. 1169
Packiananther, M.S. \ Cardiff University, UK................................................................................. 1899
Paquette, Gilbert \ Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada............................... 697
Parrish, Patrick \ University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, USA................................... 1904
Persico, Donatella \ Institute for Educational Technology - Italian National Research Council,
Italy................................................................................................................................................ 359
Pham, D.T. \ Cardiff University, UK................................................................................................. 1899
Pham, P.T.N. \ Cardiff University, UK.............................................................................................. 1899
Pitt, Ian \ University College Cork, Ireland...................................................................................... 1282
Polese, Giuseppe \ University of Salerno, Italy.................................................................................. 742
Pounds, Kelly \ i.d.e.a.s. Learning, USA............................................................................................ 431
Powell, Tamara \ Kennesaw State University, USA............................................................................ 870
Powers, William \ Texas Christian University, USA........................................................................ 1689
Prejean, Louise \ University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA................................................. 1023, 1069
Pugalee, David \ University of North Carolina, USA....................................................................... 1847
Raftery, Damien \ Institute of Technology Carlow, Ireland............................................................... 665
Rakes, Christopher R. \ University of Louisville, USA................................................................... 1847
Ranieri, Maria \ University of Florence, Italy................................................................................. 1504
Rathod, Avinash \ The University of Southern Mississippi, USA..................................................... 1487
Richard, Charles \ University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA.............................................. 1023, 1069
Riedl, Richard E. \ Appalachian State University, USA.................................................................... 679
Roberts, Bruce \ BBN Technologies, USA.......................................................................................... 431
Rockett, Danika \ University of Maryland Baltimore County, USA................................................... 870
Ronau, Robert N. \ University of Louisville, USA........................................................................... 1847
Routledge, Helen \ Freelance Instructional Designer, UK................................................................. 288
Russo-Converso, Judith A. \ CSC, USA............................................................................................ 317
Sales, Gregory C. \ Seward Incorporated, USA..................................................................................... 8
Salmons, Janet \ Vision2Lead, Inc., USA & Capella University, USA............................................. 1730
Saltsman, George \ Abilene Christian University, USA..................................................................... 566
Sanders, Robert \ Appalachian State University, USA...................................................................... 679
Saner, Raymond \ Centre for Socio-Eco-Nomic Development (CSEND), Switzerland................... 1413
Santos, Antonio \ Universidad de las Americas Puebla, Mexico....................................................... 219
Scanniello, Giuseppe \ University of Basilicata, Italy........................................................................ 742
Scheer, Stephanie B. \ University of Virginia, USA.......................................................................... 1564
Scheiter, Katharina \ University of Tuebingen, Germany................................................................ 1667
Schmidt-Weigand, Florian \ University of Kassel, Germany............................................................ 944
Seeney, Matt \ TPLD Ltd., UK............................................................................................................ 288
Seip, Jason \ Firewater Games LLC, USA.......................................................................................... 431
Seitz, Sheila \ Windwalker Corporation, USA.................................................................................. 1006
Setchi, R. \ Cardiff University, UK.................................................................................................... 1899
Sheard, Judithe \ Monash University, Australia.............................................................................. 1341
Shelton, Kaye \ Dallas Baptist University, USA................................................................................. 566
Shreve, Gregory M. \ Kent State Universtiy, USA........................................................................... 1191
Silva, Luciano \ Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil........................................................ 173
Silveira, Ismar Frango \ Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil......................................... 173
Snelbecker, Glenn E. \ Temple Universtiy, USA................................................................................. 342
Solberg, Jennifer L. \ U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences,
USA................................................................................................................................................ 464
Song, Holim \ Texas Southern University, USA................................................................................ 1169
Soroka, A. \ Cardiff University, UK.................................................................................................. 1899
Souders, Vance \ Firewater Games LLC, USA................................................................................... 431
Staudinger, Roland \ University for Health Sciences, Austria........................................................... 583
Stein, Richard A. \ Indiana University-Bloomington, USA................................................................ 511
Stodel, Emma J. \ Learning 4 Excellence, Canada............................................................................ 998
Stone, Alex \ VLN Partners, LLC., USA............................................................................................. 861
Strobel, Johannes \ Purdue University, USA...................................................................................... 789
Stubbs, S. Todd \ Brigham Young University, USA.......................................................................... 1921
Subramony, Deepak Prem \ Utah State University, USA................................................................ 1133
Sweller, John \ University of New South Wales, USA......................................................................... 496
Switzer, Deborah M. \ Clemson University, USA............................................................................ 1817
Tan, Ivy \ University of Saskatchewan, Canada............................................................................... 1892
Tashner, John H. \ Appalachian State University, USA..................................................................... 679
Terry, Krista P. \ Radford University, USA...................................................................................... 1564
Thomas, A. \ Cardiff University, UK................................................................................................. 1899
Thomson Maddox, Teri \ Jackson State Community College, USA................................................ 1320
Tomei, Lawrence A. \ Robert Morris University, USA....................................................................... 809
Toprac, Paul \ Southern Methodist University, USA............................................................................ 51
Truesdell, Kim \ Buffalo State College, USA..................................................................................... 888
Uram, Courtney \ James Madison University, USA........................................................................ 1006
van der Hoek, André \ University of California, Irvine, USA......................................................... 1645
Vescovo, Antonietta \ CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy............................................ 1245
Vessel, Amy Massey \ Louisiana Tech University, USA..................................................................... 870
Vignollet, Laurence \ Université de Savoie, France.......................................................................... 403
Wagener, Lauren \ University of Tennessee, USA............................................................................ 1847
Wainess, Richard \ National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing
(CRESST), USA............................................................................................................................. 431
Walimbwa, Michael \ Makerere University, Uganda......................................................................... 914
Wang, Xinchun \ California State University, Fresno, USA............................................................ 1300
Warren, Scott J. \ University of North Texas, USA............................................................................ 511
Weaver, Lynda \ SCO Health Service, Canada.................................................................................. 998
Wiebe, Eric \ North Carolina State University, USA........................................................................ 1667
Williams, Douglas \ University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA............................................ 1023, 1069
Williams, Sean D. \ Clemson University, USA................................................................................. 1817
Wright, Vivan H. \ University of Alabama, USA............................................................................. 1085
Yiping, Lou \ Louisiana State University, USA.................................................................................. 904
Yiu, Lichia \ Centre for Socio-Eco-Nomic Development (CSEND), Switzerland............................ 1413
Yuen, Timothy T. \ University of Texas at Austin, USA....................................................................... 51
Yukawa, Joyce \ St. Catherine University, USA................................................................................. 639
Zheng, Robert Z. \ University of Utah, USA............................................................................ 342, 1771
Zimmer, Bob \ The Open University, UK......................................................................................... 1423
Zlatanov, V. \ Cardiff University, UK................................................................................................ 1899
Zurloni, Valentino \ CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy.............................................. 1245
Contents

Volume I
Section I. Fundamental Concepts and Theories

This section serves as the groundwork for this comprehensive reference book by addressing central
theories essential to the understanding of instructional design. Chapters found within these pages pro-
vide a tremendous framework in which to position instructional design within the field of information
science and technology. Insight regarding the critical integration of global measures into instructional
design is addressed, while crucial stumbling blocks of this field are explored. The chapters comprising
this introductory section, the reader can learn and choose from a compendium of expert research on the
elemental theories underscoring the instructional design discipline.

Chapter 1.1. Taxonomies for Technology................................................................................................ 1

Richard Caladine, University of Wollongong, Australia

Chapter 1.2. Preparing Teachers to Teach Online.................................................................................... 8

Gregory C. Sales, Seward Incorporated, USA

Chapter 1.3. Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy....................................................................................... 18

Leah Herner-Patnode, Ohio State University, Lima, USA
Hea-Jin Lee, Ohio State University, Lima, USA
Eun-ok Baek, California State University, San Bernardino, USA

Chapter 1.4. Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus................... 34
Antonio Cartelli, University of Cassino, Italy

Chapter 1.5. Learning Activities Model................................................................................................. 41

Richard Caladine, University of Wollongong, Australia
Chapter 1.6. What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging: A Case Study........ 51
Min Liu, University of Texas at Austin, USA
Paul Toprac, Southern Methodist University, USA
Timothy T. Yuen, University of Texas at Austin, USA

Chapter 1.7. Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design......................................................... 71

Erla M. Morales, University of Salamanca, Spain
Francisco J. García, University of Salamanca, Spain
Ángela Barrón, University of Salamanca, Spain

Chapter 1.8. Instructional Design Methodologies................................................................................. 80

Irene Chen, University of Houston – Downtown, USA

Chapter 1.9. Contemporary Instructional Design.................................................................................. 95

Robert S. Owen, Texas A&M University-Texarkana, USA
Bosede Aworuwa, Texas A&M University-Texarkana, USA

Chapter 1.10. Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology............................ 101

Paula Jones, Eastern Kentucky University, USA
Rita Davis, Eastern Kentucky University, USA

Chapter 1.11. Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design.................................................. 114

Sherri S. Frizell, Prairie View A&M University, USA
Roland Hübscher, Bentley College, USA

Chapter 1.12. Visual Design of Coherent Technology-Enhanced Learning Systems: A Few

Lessons Learned from CPM Language................................................................................................ 135
Thierry Nodenot, Université de Pau et des pays de l’Adour, France
Pierre Laforcade, Université du Maine, France
Xavier Le Pallec, Université de Lille, France

Chapter 1.13. History of Distance Learning Professional Associations.............................................. 162

Irene Chen, University of Houston Downtown, USA

Chapter 1.14. Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics................................. 173
Pollyana Notargiacomo Mustaro, Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil
Luciano Silva, Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil
Ismar Frango Silveira, Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil

Chapter 1.15. Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males........................................... 192
Stephenie Hewett, The Citadel, USA
Section II. Development and Design Methodologies

This section provides exhaustive coverage of conceptual architecture frameworks to endow with the
reader a broad understanding of the promising technological developments within the field of instruc-
tional design. Research fundamentals imperative to the understanding of developmental processes
within instructional design are offered. From broad surveys to specific discussions and case studies
on electronic tools, the research found within this section spans the discipline while offering detailed,
specific discussions. From basic designs to abstract development, these chapters serve to expand the
reaches of development and design technologies within the instructional design community.

Chapter 2.1. Planning for Technology Integration............................................................................... 207

Henryk R. Marcinkiewicz, Aramco Services Company, USA

Chapter 2.2. Bringing Reality into the Classroom............................................................................... 219

Antonio Santos, Universidad de las Americas Puebla, Mexico

Chapter 2.3. Model-Facilitated Learning Environments: The Pedagogy of the Design...................... 238
Glenda Hostetter Shoop, Pennsylvania State University, USA
Patricia A. Nordstrom, Pennsylvania State University, USA
Roy B. Clariana, Pennsylvania State University, USA

Chapter 2.4. Developing Learning Communities: Improving Interactivity of an Online Class.......... 255
Pawan Jain, Fort Hays State Univerysity, Hays, USA
Smita Jain, University of Wyoming, Hays, USA

Chapter 2.5. Developing Prescriptive Taxonomies for Distance Learing Instructional Design.......... 270
Vincent Elliott Lasnik, Independent Information Architect, USA

Chapter 2.6. Drawing Circles in the Sand: Integrating Content into Serious Games.......................... 288
Matt Seeney, TPLD Ltd., UK
Helen Routledge, Freelance Instructional Designer, UK

Chapter 2.7. A Model for Knowledge and Innovation in Online Education........................................ 302
Jennifer Ann Linder-VanBerschot, University of New Mexico, USA
Deborah K. LaPointe, Unviersity of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, USA

Chapter 2.8. A Large-Scale Model for Working with Subject Matter Experts.................................... 317
Judith A. Russo-Converso, CSC, USA
Ronald D. Offutt, Northrup-Grumman Information Technology, USA

Chapter 2.9. Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through
a Learning Management System by Subject Matter Experts............................................................... 330
George L. Joeckel III, Utah State University, USA
Tae Jeon, Utah State University, USA
Joel Gardner, Utah State University, USA
Chapter 2.10. Functional Relevance and Online Instructional Design................................................ 342
Glenn E. Snelbecker, Temple Universtiy, USA
Susan M. Miller, Kent State Universtiy, USA
Robert Z. Zheng, University of Utah, USA

Chapter 2.11. Self-Regulated Learning: Issues and Challenges for Initial Teacher Training.............. 359
Manuela Delfino, Institute for Educational Technology - Italian National Research
Council, Italy
Donatella Persico, Institute for Educational Technology - Italian National Research
Council, Italy

Chapter 2.12. Individualized Web-Based Instructional Design........................................................... 375

Fethi Inan, Texas Tech University, USA
Michael Grant, University of Memphis, USA

Chapter 2.13. The Virtue of Paper: Drawing as a Means to Innovation in Instructional Design........ 389
Brad Hokanson, University of Minnesota, USA

Chapter 2.14. LDL for Collaborative Activities.................................................................................. 403

Christine Ferraris, Université de Savoie, France
Christian Martel, Pentila Corporation and Université de Savoie, France
Laurence Vignollet, Université de Savoie, France

Chapter 2.15. Development of Game-Based Training Systems: Lessons Learned in an Inter-

Disciplinary Field in the Making......................................................................................................... 431
Talib Hussain, BBN Technologies, USA
Wallace Feurzeig, BBN Technologies, USA
Jan Cannon-Bowers, University of Central Florida, USA
Susan Coleman, Intellignet Decision Systems, Inc., USA
Alan Koenig, National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing
(CRESST), USA
John Lee, National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing
(CRESST), USA
Ellen Menaker, Intelligent Decision Systems, Inc., USA
Kerry Moffitt, BBN Technologies, USA
Curtiss Murphy, Alion Science and Technology, AMSTO Operation, USA
Kelly Pounds, i.d.e.a.s. Learning, USA
Bruce Roberts, BBN Technologies, USA
Jason Seip, Firewater Games LLC, USA
Vance Souders, Firewater Games LLC, USA
Richard Wainess, National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student
Testing (CRESST), USA
Chapter 2.16. Bridging Game Development and Instructional Design............................................... 464
James Belanich, U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA
Karin A. Orvis, Old Dominion University, USA
Daniel B. Horn, U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA
Jennifer L. Solberg, U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social
Sciences, USA

Chapter 2.17. Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities.............................................. 480

Patrick O’Shea, Harvard University, USA
Rebecca Mitchell, Harvard University, USA
Catherine Johnston, Harvard University, USA
Chris Dede, Harvard University, USA

Section III. Tools and Technologies

This section presents an extensive treatment of various tools and technologies existing in the field of in-
structional design that practitioners and academics alike must rely on to develop new techniques. These
chapters enlighten readers about fundamental research on the many methods used to facilitate and
enhance the integration of this worldwide phenomenon by exploring software and hardware develop-
ments and their applications—an increasingly pertinent research arena. It is through these rigorously
researched chapters that the reader is provided with countless examples of the up-and-coming tools
and technologies emerging from the field of instructional design.

Chapter 3.1. Cognitive Architecture and Instructional Design in a Multimedia Context.................... 496
Renae Low, University of New South Wales, Australia
Putai Jin, University of New South Wales, Australia
John Sweller, University of New South Wales, USA

Chapter 3.2. Simulating Teaching Experience with Role-Play............................................................ 511

Scott J. Warren, University of North Texas, USA
Richard A. Stein, Indiana University-Bloomington, USA

Chapter 3.3. Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning: Teacher Created, Student Created, and
Professional Development Podcasts.................................................................................................... 527
Kathleen P. King, University of South Florida, USA

Chapter 3.4. Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems.................................................... 541

Niels Ole Bernsen, NISLab, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
Laila Dybkjær, NISLab, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

Chapter 3.5. Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction......................................................... 566

Kaye Shelton, Dallas Baptist University, USA
George Saltsman, Abilene Christian University, USA
Chapter 3.6. E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums: An Emmpirical Survey
about the Past, the Presence and the Future......................................................................................... 583
Reinhard Bernsteiner, University for Health Sciences, Austria
Herwig Ostermann, University for Health Sciences, Austria
Roland Staudinger, University for Health Sciences, Austria

Chapter 3.7. Integrating Blogs in Teacher Education.......................................................................... 607

Yungwei Hao, National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan

Chapter 3.8. iPods as Mobile Multimedia Learning Environments: Individual Differences and
Instructional Design............................................................................................................................. 620
Peter E. Doolittle, Virginia Tech, USA
Danille L. Lusk, Virgina Tech, USA
C. Noel Byrd, Virginia Tech, USA
Gina J. Mariano, Virginia Tech, USA

Chapter 3.9. Telementoring and Project-Based Learning: An Integrated Model for 21st
Century Skills...................................................................................................................................... 639
Joyce Yukawa, St. Catherine University, USA

Volume II
Chapter 3.10. Developing Educational Screencasts: A Practitioner’s Perspective.............................. 665
Damien Raftery, Institute of Technology Carlow, Ireland

Chapter 3.11. Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World:

The Evolution of Online Instruction.................................................................................................... 679
Richard E. Riedl, Appalachian State University, USA
Regis M. Gilman, Appalachian State University, USA
John H. Tashner, Appalachian State University, USA
Stephen C. Bronack, Appalachian State University, USA
Amy Cheney, Appalachian State University, USA
Robert Sanders, Appalachian State University, USA
Roma Angel, Appalachian State University, USA

Chapter 3.12. The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design.................... 697
Gilbert Paquette, Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada
Michel Léonard, Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada
Karin Lundgren-Cayrol, Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada

Chapter 3.13. poEML: A Separation of Concerns Proposal to Instructional Design........................... 718

Manuel Caeiro-Rodríguez, University of Vigo, Spain
Chapter 3.14. SEAMAN: A Visual Language-Based Tool for E-Learning Processes......................... 742
Gennaro Costagliola, University of Salerno, Italy
Filomena Ferrucci, University of Salerno, Italy
Giuseppe Polese, University of Salerno, Italy
Giuseppe Scanniello, University of Basilicata, Italy

Chapter 3.15. coUML: A Visual Language for Modeling Cooperative Environments........................ 758
Michael Derntl, University of Vienna, Austria
Renate Motschnig-Pitrik, University of Vienna, Austria

Chapter 3.16. Modeling Learning Units by Capturing Context with IMS LD.................................... 789
Johannes Strobel, Purdue University, USA
Gretchen Lowerison, Concordia University, Canada
Roger Côté, Concordia University, Canada
Philip C. Abrami, CSLP, Concordia University, Canada
Edward C. Bethel, Concordia University, Canada

Section IV. Utilization and Application

This section discusses a variety of applications and opportunities available that can be considered by
practitioners in developing viable and effective instructional design programs and processes. This
section includes over 30 chapters which review certain utilizations and applications of instructional
design, such as Internet citizenship and expanded access for the visual and auditory impaired. Further
chapters show case studies in Africa and Australia, and the impact of globalization and standardizing
languages for instructional design. The wide ranging nature of subject matter in this section manages
to be both intriguing and highly educational.

Chapter 4.1. Wireless Computer Labs................................................................................................. 809

Lawrence A. Tomei, Robert Morris University, USA

Chapter 4.2. Personalised Learning: A Case Study in Teaching Clinical Educators Instructional
Design Skills........................................................................................................................................ 817
Iain Doherty, University of Auckland, New Zealand
Adam Blake, University of Auckland, New Zealand

Chapter 4.3. Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy................................. 840
Renata Chylinski, Monash University, Australia
Ria Hanewald, La Trobe University, Melbourned, Australia

Chapter 4.4. Learning Object Based Instruction.................................................................................. 861

Alex Stone, VLN Partners, LLC., USA
Chapter 4.5. Teaching Technology to Digital Immigrants: Strategies for Success.............................. 870
Danika Rockett, University of Maryland Baltimore County, USA
Tamara Powell, Kennesaw State University, USA
Amy Massey Vessel, Louisiana Tech University, USA
Kimberly Kimbell-Lopez, Louisiana Tech University, USA
Carrice Cummins, Louisiana Tech University, USA
Janis Hill, Louisiana Tech University, USA
Richard Hutchinson, Kennesaw State University, USA
David Cargil, Louisiana Tech University, USA

Chapter 4.6. Internet Citizenship: Course Desing and Delivery Using ICT........................................ 880
Henry H. Emurian, University of Maryland – Baltimore County, USA
Malissa Marie Carroll, University of Maryland – Baltimore County, USA

Chapter 4.7. The Real World Buffalo: Reality TV Comes to a Charter School.................................. 888
Marion Barnett, Buffalo State College, USA
Kim Truesdell, Buffalo State College, USA
Melaine Kenyon, Buffalo State College, USA
Dennis Mike, Buffalo State College, USA

Chapter 4.8. Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education........................ 904
Lou Yiping, Louisiana State University, USA

Chapter 4.9. Application of E-Learning in Teaching: Learning and Research in East

African Universities............................................................................................................................. 914
Michael Walimbwa, Makerere University, Uganda

Chapter 4.10. Asynchronous Online Foreign Language Courses........................................................ 928

Leticia L. McGrath, Georgia Southern University, USA
Mark Johnson, University System of Georgia, USA

Chapter 4.11. The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning.............................. 936
Terry T. Kidd, University of Texas School of Public Health, USA

Chapter 4.12. The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention: Evidences
from Eye Tracking............................................................................................................................... 944
Florian Schmidt-Weigand, University of Kassel, Germany

Chapter 4.13. Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology............................................... 963

Heather Jagman, DePaul University, USA
Melissa Koenig, DePaul University, USA
Courtney Greene, DePaul University, USA
Chapter 4.14. Student Decision Making in Technology Application.................................................. 972
Ali Ahmed, University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, USA
Abdulaziz Elfessi, University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, USA

Chapter 4.15. Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction................................... 984

Tiffany A. Koszalka, Syracuse University, USA
Bradley Olson, SUNY Upstate Medical University, USA

Chapter 4.16. A Collaborative Approach for Online Dementia Care Training.................................... 998
Colla J. MacDonald, University of Ottawa, Canada
Emma J. Stodel, Learning 4 Excellence, Canada
Lynn Casimiro, University of Ottawa, Canada
Lynda Weaver, SCO Health Service, Canada

Chapter 4.17. Gaming and Simulation: Training, and the Military................................................... 1006
Sheila Seitz, Windwalker Corporation, USA
Courtney Uram, James Madison University, USA

Chapter 4.18. Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional

Goals.................................................................................................................................................. 1023
Yuxin Ma, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA
Douglas Williams, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA
Charles Richard, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA
Louise Prejean, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Chapter 4.19. A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language................. 1039
Kim Feldmesser, University of Brighton, UK

Chapter 4.20. Narrative Development and Instructional Design....................................................... 1069

Douglas Williams, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA
Yuxin Ma, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA
Charles Richard, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA
Louise Prejean, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Chapter 4.21. Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers.................................................................. 1085

Christopher L. James, Russellville City Schools, USA
Vivan H. Wright, University of Alabama, USA

Chapter 4.22. Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage............................................................ 1104

Brock Dubbels, Center for Cognitive Studies, Literacy Education, University of
Minnesota, Department of Curriculum & Instruction, USA
Section V. Organizational and Social Implications

This section includes a spacious range of inquiry and research pertaining to the behavioral, emotional,
social and organizational impact of instructional design around the world. From case studies in Africa
to studies of gaming on developmentally disabled and learning disabled children to plagiarism and
community collaboration, this section compels the humanities, education, and IT scholar all. Section
5 also focuses on hesitance in some faculty members’ integration with instructional design, a growing
issue among those involved with education who are already forced to “wear many hats” at the higher
education level. With more than 20 chapters, the discussions on hand in this section detail current and
suggest future research into the integration of global instructional design as well as implementation of
ethical considerations for all organizations. Overall, these chapters present a detailed investigation of
the complex relationship between individuals, organizations and instructional design.

Chapter 5.1. Culturally Negotiating the Meanings of Technology Use............................................. 1133

Deepak Prem Subramony, Utah State University, USA

Chapter 5.2. Cross-Cultural Learning Objects (XCLOs)................................................................... 1159

Andrea L. Edmundson, eWorld Learning, Inc., USA

Chapter 5.3. Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context: Implications

for Educational Disparities and Teacher Preparation......................................................................... 1169
Holim Song, Texas Southern University, USA
Emiel Owens, Texas Southern University, USA
Terry T. Kidd, University of Texas School of Public Health, USA

Chapter 5.4. Assistive Technology for Individuals with Disabilities................................................. 1183

Yukiko Inoue, University of Guam, Guam

Chapter 5.5. Cognitive-Adaptive Instructional Systems for Special Needs Learners....................... 1191
Bruce J. Diamond, William Paterson University, USA
Gregory M. Shreve, Kent State Universtiy, USA

Chapter 5.6. Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD: Evaluating
Their Development and Effectivenes as Instructional Tools............................................................. 1211
Kim B. Dielmann, University of Central Arkansas, USA
Julie Meaux, University of Central Arkansas, USA

Chapter 5.7. Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT................................................ 1228
Thomas M. Brinthaupt, Middle Tennessee State University, USA
Maria A. Clayton, Middle Tennessee State University, USA
Barbara J. Draude, Middle Tennessee State University, USA

Chapter 5.8. Social Psychology and Instructional Technology......................................................... 1237

Robert A. Bartsch, University of Houston - Clear Lake, USA
Chapter 5.9. Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems........................................................ 1245
Valentino Zurloni, CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy
Fabrizia Mantovani, CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy, & ATN-P LAB,
Istituto Auxologico Italiano, Italy
Marcello Mortillaro, CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy, & CISA -
University of Geneva, Switzerland
Antonietta Vescovo, CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy
Luigi Anolli, CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy

Chapter 5.10. Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology................. 1259
Irene Chen, University of Houston Downtown, USA

Chapter 5.11. Harnessing the Emotional Potential of Video Games................................................. 1282

Patrick Felicia, University College Cork, Ireland
Ian Pitt, University College Cork, Ireland

Chapter 5.12. Students’ Attitudes toward Process and Product Oriented Online Collaborative
Learning............................................................................................................................................. 1300
Xinchun Wang, California State University, Fresno, USA

Volume III
Chapter 5.13. Plagiarism and the Community College...................................................................... 1320
Teri Thomson Maddox, Jackson State Community College, USA

Section VI. Managerial Impact

This section presents contemporary coverage of the social implications of instructional design, more
specifically related to the corporate and managerial utilization of information sharing technologies
and applications, and how these technologies can be facilitated within organizations. Section 6 is espe-
cially helpful as an addition to the organizational and behavioral studies of section 5, with diverse and
novel developments in the managerial and human resources areas of instructional design. Typically,
though the fields of industry and education are not always considered co-dependent, section 6 provides
looks into how instructional design and the business workplace help each other. The interrelation-
ship of such issues as educational design, quality improvement, work ecology, teacher self-confidence,
technology skills, and professional development are discussed. In all, the chapters in this section offer
specific perspectives on how managerial perspectives and developments in instructional design inform
each other to create more meaningful user experiences.

Chapter 6.1. Prevention is Better than Cure: Addressing Cheating and Plagiarism Based on the IT
Student Perspective............................................................................................................................ 1341
Martin Dick, RMIT University, Australia
Judithe Sheard, Monash University, Australia
Maurie Hasen, Monash University, Australia
Chapter 6.2. Structuring a Local Virtual Work Ecology for a Collaborative, Multi-Institutional
Higher Educational Project: A Case Study........................................................................................ 1364
Shalin Hai-Jew, Kansas State University, USA

Chapter 6.3. Motivation and Multimedia Learning........................................................................... 1393

Renae Low, University of New South Wales, Australia
Putai Jin, University of New South Wales, Australia

Chapter 6.4. Making E-Training Cost Effective through Quality Assurance.................................... 1413
Lichia Yiu, Centre for Socio-Eco-Nomic Development (CSEND), Switzerland
Raymond Saner, Centre for Socio-Eco-Nomic Development (CSEND), Switzerland

Chapter 6.5. Using the Interpersonal Action-Learning Cycle to Invite Thinking, Attentive
Comprehension.................................................................................................................................. 1423
Bob Zimmer, The Open University, UK

Chapter 6.6. Synergy: Service Learning in Undergraduate Instructional Technology Courses........ 1446
Jacqueline M. Mumford, Walsh University, USA
Elizabeth Juelich-Velotta, Walsh University, USA

Chapter 6.7. Knowledge Transfer in G2G Endeavors....................................................................... 1465

Luiz Antonio Joia, Rio de Janeiro State University, Brazil

Chapter 6.8. Policy Issues Regarding the Instructional and Educational Use of
Videoconferencing............................................................................................................................. 1472
Joseph Bowman, University at Albany/SUNY, USA
Felix Fernandez, ICF International, USA
Sharon Miller Vice, University at Albany/SUNY, USA

Chapter 6.9. Improving Teachers’ Self-Confidence in Learning Technology Skills and Math
Education through Professional Development................................................................................... 1487
Taralynn Hartsell, The University of Southern Mississippi, USA
Sherry S. Herron, The University of Southern Mississippi, USA
Houbin Fang, The University of Southern Mississippi, USA
Avinash Rathod, The University of Southern Mississippi, USA

Section VII. Critical Issues

Section 7 details some of the most crucial developments in the critical issues surrounding instructional
design. Importantly, this refers to critical thinking or critical theory surrounding the topic, rather than
vital affairs or new trends that may be found in section 8. Instead, the section discusses some of the
latest developments in cognitive load, social constructivist and pedagogy theories, as well as new ap-
proaches in faculty development, learning with visualizations, and implications of anonymity online.
This section also asks unique questions about the role of business intelligence in developing countries
and in linguistic confusion across cultures. Within the chapters, the reader is presented with an in-
depth analysis of the most current and relevant issues within this growing field of study.
Chapter 7.1. Theories and Principles for E-Learning Practices with Instructional Design............... 1504
Maria Ranieri, University of Florence, Italy

Chapter 7.2. Humanistic Theories that Guide Online Course Design............................................... 1514
MarySue Cicciarelli, Duquesne University, USA

Chapter 7.3. Commodity, Firmness, and Delight: Four Modes of Instructional Design Practice..... 1520
Brad Hokanson, University of Minnesota, USA
Charles Miller, University of Minnesota, USA
Simon Hooper, Penn State University, USA

Chapter 7.4. Performance Case Modeling......................................................................................... 1537

Ian Douglas, Florida State University, USA

Chapter 7.5. Can Cognitive Style Predict How Individuals Use Web-Based Learning
Environments?................................................................................................................................... 1553
Martin Graff, University of Glamorgan, UK

Chapter 7.6. Multimedia, Cognitive Load, and Pedagogy................................................................. 1564

Peter E. Doolittle, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, USA
Andrea L. McNeill, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, USA
Krista P. Terry, Radford University, USA
Stephanie B. Scheer, University of Virginia, USA

Chapter 7.7. Instructional Game Design Using Cognitive Load Theory........................................... 1586
Wenhao David Huang, University of Illinois, USA
Tristan Johnson, Florida State University, USA

Chapter 7.8. Faculty Development in Instructional Technology in the Context of Learning

Styles and Institutional Barriers......................................................................................................... 1607
Robson Marinho, Andrews University, USA

Chapter 7.9. On the Role of Learning Theories in Furthering Software Engineering Education...... 1645
Emily Oh Navarro, University of California, Irvine, USA
André van der Hoek, University of California, Irvine, USA

Chapter 7.10. Theoretical and Instructional Aspects of Learning with Visualizations...................... 1667
Katharina Scheiter, University of Tuebingen, Germany
Eric Wiebe, North Carolina State University, USA
Jana Holsanova, Lund University, Sweden

Chapter 7.11. Teaching Social Skills: Integrating an Online Learning System into Traditional
Curriculum......................................................................................................................................... 1689
Graham Bodie, Purdue University, USA
Margaret Fitch-Hauser, Auburn University, USA
William Powers, Texas Christian University, USA
Chapter 7.12. Conversation Design in the Electronic Discussion Age.............................................. 1714
Gregory MacKinnon, Acadia University, Canada

Chapter 7.13. E-Social Constructivism and Collaborative E-Learning............................................. 1730

Janet Salmons, Vision2Lead, Inc., USA & Capella University, USA

Chapter 7.14. Ethics in Interactions in Distance Education............................................................... 1744

Paul Kawachi, Open Education Network, Japan

Chapter 7.15. Implications of Anonymity in Cyber Education......................................................... 1755

Bobbe Baggio, Advantage Learning Technologies, USA
Yoany Beldarrain, Florida Virtual School, USA

Chapter 7.16. An Ontological Approach to Online Instructional Design.......................................... 1771

Robert Z. Zheng, University of Utah, USA
Laura B. Dahl, University of Utah, USA

Chapter 7.17. Lost In Translation: Improving the Transition Between Design and Production of
Instructional Software........................................................................................................................ 1793
Eddy Boot, TNO Human Factors, The Netherlands
Jon Nelson, Utah State University, USA
Daniela De Faveri, Università della Svizzera Italiana, Switzerland

Chapter 7.18. Pask and Ma Join Forces in an Elementary Mathematics Methods Course................ 1806
Jean Morrow, Emporia State University, USA
Janet Holland, Emporia State University, USA

Chapter 7.19. Assessing 3D Virtual World Learning Environments with the CIMPLe System:
A Multidisciplinary Evaluation Rubric1............................................................................................ 1817
Sean D. Williams, Clemson University, USA
Deborah M. Switzer, Clemson University, USA

Section VIII. Emerging Trends

The final section explores the latest trends and developments, and suggests future research potential
within the field of instructional design while exploring uncharted areas of study for the advancement
of the discipline. Introducing this section are chapters that describe some of the most recent issues in
technology-assisted education, followed by new topics on adult education and virtual inquiry. Of spe-
cial note to those looking for the design portion of instructional design, two of the final chapters discuss
aesthetics and new practices in instructional design. These and several other emerging trends and sug-
gestions for future research can be found within the final section of this exhaustive multi-volume set.

Chapter 8.1. Contemporary Issues in Teaching and Learning with Technology............................... 1840
Jerry P. Galloway, Texas Wesleyan University, USA & University of Texas at
Arlington, USA
Chapter 8.2. New Directions in the Research of Technology-Enhanced Education.......................... 1847
Robert N. Ronau, University of Louisville, USA
Christopher R. Rakes, University of Louisville, USA
Margaret L. Niess, Oregon State University, USA
Lauren Wagener, University of Tennessee, USA
David Pugalee, University of North Carolina, USA
Christine Browning, Western Michigan University, USA
Shannon O. Driskell, University of Dayton, USA
Susann M. Mathews, Wright State University, USA

Chapter 8.3. Emerging Edtech: Expert Perspectives and Design Principles..................................... 1880
Ching-Huei Chen, Center for Educational Technologies®, Wheeling Jesuit
University, USA
Manetta Calinger, Center for Educational Technologies®, Wheeling Jesuit
University, USA
Bruce C. Howard, Center for Educational Technologies®, Wheeling Jesuit
University, USA
Anna Oskorus, TiER 1 Performance Solutions, USA

Chapter 8.4. Rapid E-Learning in the University.............................................................................. 1892

Ivy Tan, University of Saskatchewan, Canada
Ravi Chandran, National University of Singapore, Singapore

Chapter 8.5. The Innovative Production Machines and Systems Network of Excellence................ 1899
D. T. Pham, Cardiff University, UK
E. E. Eldukhuri, Cardiff University, UK
A. Soroka, Cardiff University, UK
V. Zlatanov, Cardiff University, UK
M.S. Packiananther, Cardiff University, UK
R. Setchi, Cardiff University, UK
P.T.N. Pham, Cardiff University, UK
A. Thomas, Cardiff University, UK
Y. Dadam, Cardiff University, UK

Chapter 8.6. Aesthetic Decisions of Instructors and Instructional Designers.................................... 1904

Patrick Parrish, University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, USA

Chapter 8.7. The Pervasiveness of Design Drawing in ID................................................................ 1921

S. Todd Stubbs, Brigham Young University, USA
Andrew S. Gibbons, Brigham Young University, USA
 xxvii

Preface

Instructional design integrates the burgeoning field of Information Technology with the global develop-
ment of educational theory and practice. Through development and analysis of cognitive load and learn-
ing design theories, and ADDIE, Gagne, and constructivist models, instructional design has advanced
greatly since its inception during World War II.
The constantly changing landscape of instructional design makes it challenging for experts and practi-
tioners to stay informed of the field’s most up-to-date research. That is why Information Science Reference
is pleased to offer this three-volume reference collection that will empower students, researchers, and
academicians with a strong understanding of critical issues within instructional design by providing both
extensive and detailed perspectives on cutting-edge theories and developments. This reference serves
as a single, comprehensive reference source on conceptual, methodological, technical, and managerial
issues, as well as providing insight into emerging trends and future opportunities within the discipline.
Instructional Design: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools and Applications is organized into eight
distinct sections that provide wide-ranging coverage of important topics. The sections are: (1) Funda-
mental Concepts and Theories, (2) Development and Design Methodologies, (3) Tools and Technologies,
(4) Utilization and Application, (5) Organizational and Social Implications, (6) Managerial Impact, (7)
Critical Issues, and (8) Emerging Trends.
Section 1, Fundamental Concepts and Theories, serves as a foundation for this extensive reference
tool by addressing crucial theories essential to the understanding of instructional design. Chapters such as
Contemporary Instructional Design by Robert S. Owen and Bosede Aworuwa and Instructional Design
Methodologies by Irene Chen lay a foundation to some of the more basic and essential fundamentals of
the field. Other chapters such as History of Distance Learning Professional Associations, also by Irene
Chen, give detailed, yet brief summaries of the history of the instructional design developments. Also of
note, the final two chapters in section 1, Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics
by Pollyana Notargiacomo Mustaro, Luciano Silva, & Ismar Frango Silveira; and Using Video Games
to Improve Literacy Levels of Males by Stephenie Hewett give introduction to a few video and serious
game applications in the instructional design field.
Section 2, Development and Design Methodologies, presents in-depth coverage of the conceptual
design and architecture of instructional design, focusing on aspects including online course materials
and education, augmented and virtual realities architectures, and methodological frameworks for Web
based instruction. Designing and implementing effective processes and strategies are the focus of such
chapters as Planning for Technology Integration by Henryk R. Marcinkiewicz, and Lessons Learned
about Designing Augmented Realities by Patrick O’Shea, Rebecca Mitchell, Catherine Johnston, and
Chris Dede.
Section 3, Tools and Technologies, presents extensive coverage of the various tools and technolo-
gies used in the development and implementation of instructional design. This comprehensive section
includes such chapters as iPods as Mobile Multimedia Learning Environments by Peter E. Doolittle,
xxviii

which detail software and hardware developments (respectively) and their applications in the field of
instructional design. Additional chapters on MOT+Visual, poEML, SEAMAN, and coUML describe some
of the newest modifying languages and tools at the disposal of instructional designers. And perhaps of
the most vital note to higher educators is the broad discussion over a few chapters on videoconferencing
and its quintessential and technical role in pedagogy.
Section 4, Utilization and Application, describes how instructional design has been utilized and of-
fers insight on important lessons for its continued use and evolution. Due to the breadth of this section’s
subject matter, section 4 contains the widest range of topics, including chapters such as Application of
E-Learning in Teaching, Learning and Research in East African Universities by Michael Walimbwa
and Internet Citizenship by Henry H. Emurian and Malissa Marie Carroll. This section is also filled with
international case studies and applications of new technologies in higher learning institutions. Also of
note in section 4 is the treatment given to developments in course design for foreign language instruc-
tion, some of the most recent and relevant publication on the vital subject matter.
Section 5, Organizational and Social Implications, includes chapters discussing the organizational
and social impact of instructional design. Overall, these chapters present a detailed investigation of the
complex relationship between individuals, organizations and instructional design. The first 8 chapters of
section 5 are about the challenges of culture on the ever expanding and diversifying global higher educa-
tion system. Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology by Irene Chen, and
Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems by Valentino Zurloni, Fabrizia Mantovani, Marcello
Mortillaro, Antonietta Vescovo, and Luigi Anolli are examples of some of the psychological or behavioral
impacts on instructional learning, developing the influence emotion and mental response have on learn-
ing styles and pedagogy. And aside from cultural and psychological adaptations of instructional design,
there are also spots of interest in Plagiarism and the Community College by Teri Thomson Maddox.
Section 6, Managerial Impact, presents focused coverage of instructional design as it relates to
improvements and considerations in the workplace. In all, the chapters in this section offer specific
perspectives on how managerial perspectives and developments in instructional design inform each
other to create more meaningful user experiences. Typically, though the fields of industry and educa-
tion are not always considered co-dependent, section 6 provides looks into how instructional design and
the business workplace help each other. Examples include Structuring a Local Virtual Work Ecology
for a Collaborative, Multi-Institutional Higher Educational Project by Shalin Hai-Jew; and Improving
Teachers’ Self-Confidence in Learning Technology Skills and Math Education through Professional
Development by Taralynn Hartsell, Sherry S. Herron, Houbin Fang, and Avinash Rathod. Section 6 is
especially helpful as an addition to the organizational and behavioral studies of section 5, with diverse
and novel developments in the managerial and human resources areas of instructional design.
Section 7, Critical Issues, addresses some of the latest academic theory related to instructional de-
sign. Importantly, this refers to critical thinking or critical theory surrounding the topic, rather than vital
affairs or new trends that may be found in section 8. Instead, the section discusses some of the latest
developments in cognitive load, social constructivist and pedagogy theories, as well as new approaches
in faculty development, learning with visualizations, and implications of anonymity online. Within the
chapters, the reader is presented with an in-depth analysis of the most current and relevant issues within
this growing field of study. Chapters such as Commodity, Firmness, and Delight by Brad Hokanson,
Charles Miller, and Simon Hooper show stylistic and business-savvy industry improvements, while Ethics
in Interactions in Distance Education directs some of the latest scholarly publication on morality and
its online legislation and execution. This section also asks unique questions about the role of business
intelligence in developing countries and in linguistic confusion across cultures.
 xxix

Section 8, Emerging Trends, highlights areas for future research within the field of instructional
design, while exploring new avenues for the advancement of the discipline. Beginning this section is
Contemporary Issues in Teaching and Learning with Technology by Jerry P. Galloway, detailing some
of the most recent issues plaguing the IT side of online higher education. Closing out the book are two
fascinating chapters of recent developments. First, in Patrick Parrish’s Aesthetic Decisions of Instructors
and Instructional Designers comes a study of the effects of visual and graphic depiction on pedagogy
and effectiveness. Second and finally, The Pervasiveness of Design Drawing in ID by S. Todd Stubbs
and Andrew S. Gibbons closes out the book, with a last look at an instructional design topic that has
recently found trending importance. These and several other emerging trends and suggestions for future
research can be found within the final section of this exhaustive multi-volume set.
Although the primary organization of the contents in this multi-volume work is based on its eight
sections, offering a progression of coverage of the important concepts, methodologies, technologies,
applications, social issues, and emerging trends, the reader can also identify specific contents by utilizing
the extensive indexing system listed at the end of each volume. Furthermore to ensure that the scholar,
researcher and educator have access to the entire contents of this multi volume set as well as additional
coverage that could not be included in the print version of this publication, the publisher will provide
unlimited multi-user electronic access to the online aggregated database of this collection for the life
of the edition, free of charge when a library purchases a print copy. This aggregated database provides
far more contents than what can be included in the print version in addition to continual updates. This
unlimited access, coupled with the continuous updates to the database ensures that the most current
research is accessible to knowledge seekers.
As a comprehensive collection of research on the latest findings related to using technology to provid-
ing various services, Instructional Design: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools and Applications, provides
researchers, administrators and all audiences with a complete understanding of the development of
applications and concepts in instructional design. Given the vast number of issues concerning usage,
failure, success, policies, strategies, and applications of instructional design in organizations, Instruc-
tional Design: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools and Applications addresses the demand for a resource that
encompasses the most pertinent research in instructional design development, deployment, and impact.
 Section I
Fundamental Concepts
and Theories

This section serves as the groundwork for this comprehensive reference book by addressing central theories essential
to the understanding of instructional design. Chapters found within these pages provide a tremendous framework
in which to position instructional design within the field of information science and technology. Insight regarding
the critical integration of global measures into instructional design is addressed, while crucial stumbling blocks
of this field are explored. The chapters comprising this introductory section, the reader can learn and choose
from a compendium of expert research on the elemental theories underscoring the instructional design discipline.
 1

Chapter 1.1
Taxonomies for Technology
Richard Caladine
University of Wollongong, Australia

INTRODUCTION design. These three fields are not discrete and

some overlap occurs. For example, commenta-
For over 3000 years from Homer, Moses and tors in the field of instructional design state that
Socrates onwards, the teacher in direct, personal their designs are provided for learning in many
contact with the learner, has been the primary contexts including schools, higher education,
means of communicating knowledge…until the organizations, and government (Gagné, Briggs,
fourteenth century, when the invention of the & Wager, 1992; Reigeluth, 1983). In many cases
printing press allowed for the first time the large- the theoretical frameworks are intended to guide
scale dissemination of knowledge though books. the selection of learning technologies but often
(Bates, 1995) the conceptualizations have not kept pace with
technological change.
Today there is a range of technologies available There are many definitions of taxonomy and
to those who design learning events, from the most of them refer to systems for the classifica-
old and simple to the new and complex. Key tion and organization of things. Carl Linnaeus
attempts have been made to develop theoretical developed the most well known taxonomy during
frameworks of learning technologies and have the expansion of natural history knowledge in the
been reported in the literature of higher education, 18th century. It is the scientific system for the
human resource development, and instructional classification of living things and has the basic
structure of organism, domain, kingdom, phylum,
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch101
class, order, family, genus, and species.

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Taxonomies for Technology

It has been argued (Wikipedia, 2005) that the •. Human-based system (teacher instructor, tutor,
human mind uses organizational structures to role-plays, group activities, field trips, etc.)
naturally and systematically order information ◦◦ Print-based system (books, manuals,
received and hence makes sense of the world. A workbooks, job aids, handouts, ect.)
taxonomy is clearly an organizational structure and ◦◦ Visual-based system (books, job aids,
it follows that as the Linnaean taxonomy assists charts, graphs, maps, figures, trans-
those investigating the life sciences; a taxonomy parencies, slides, etc.)
of learning technologies can help users and in- ◦◦ Audiovisual-based system (video,
vestigators of learning technologies. Further it is film, slide-tape programs, live televi-
suggested that taxonomies of learning technolo- sion, etc.)
gies are appropriate tools to assist in the design of ◦◦ Computer-based system (computer-
learning events that include technologies. based instruction, computer-based in-
teractive video, hypertext, etc.)

BACKGROUND They state that the “systems” share the char-

acteristic of carrying “a message (information) to
The Linnaean taxonomy has a deep hierarchical a receiver (learner)” and that some “systems” can
structure which reflects the number and diversity “process messages from the receiver” (Leshin et
of living things. It is reasonable to expect that a al., 1992, p. 256). Writing in the field of instruc-
taxonomy for learning technologies will be smaller tional design, Leshin, Pollock, and Reigeluth use
due the smaller number of learning technologies. their classification as a starting point from which
Just as new species are added to the Linnaean technology-based learning events can be designed:
taxonomy as they are discovered, a taxonomy of “Now through the process of message design you
learning technologies must be adaptable to cater will tailor your instruction to a particular medium
for leaning technologies of the future. A taxonomy or set of media.” (Leshin et al., 1992)
of learning technologies is therefore a framework The approach taken to the classification of
that classifies or organizes learning technologies. learning technologies by Leshin, Pollock, and
There have been a number attempts to classify Reigeluth provides little or no insight into the
or organize learning technologies and while their application of the technology, and is not much
classification frameworks are logically sound they more than a labeling system. As they were writing
have not always been developed to assist in the prior to the development of the World Wide Web,
design of learning events that use technology in the the classification system did not include learning
most effective and efficient manner. Also, there is management systems or online technologies.
a considerable range in the depth of approach or They could easily be added to the last category
rigor. However, all of the approaches either divide of computer-based systems, but this adds little to
technologies into categories, either by intention the understanding of them or to their application
or as a result of categorization by other criteria. to learning in an appropriate way.
Leshin, Pollock, and Reigeluth (1992) present Also writing in the literature of instructional
a classification scheme for “media” that is based design, Romiszowski (1988) classifies “media”
on attributes in which learning technologies are by the sensory channels they support and provides
grouped into five “systems.” examples such as telephone for the auditory
channel, video for the “audio/visual” channel,
chalkboards for the visual channel, and devices

2
Taxonomies for Technology

or models for the “tactile or kinesthetic” channel. are many attempts in the literature to categorise and
Romiszowski’s approach is slightly more informa- classify the forms of media, none of which is very
tive than that of Leshin, Pollock, and Reigeluth illuminating for our purpose here” (pp. 77-78).
as he makes the conceptual connection between Laurillard continues with the argument that
technologies and “sensory channels.” However “educational media” should be classified in
his system of classification provides little insight terms of the categories and extent of learning
into the characteristics of the technologies which processes they support and provides the four
lead to the matching of them to learning activities categories: “Discursive, Adaptive, Interactive
in an appropriate manner. and Reflective.” Laurillard’s categories provide
Others in the field of instructional design take limited insight to the nature and characteristics of
an even less rigorous approach to the categoriza- learning technologies when used outside of the
tion or classification of learning technologies. “teaching strategy.”
Reiser and Gagné (1983) argue that a “number In a similar fashion to Leshin et al., Romiszows-
of kinds of categories can be devised for the clas- ki, and Reiser and Gagné, Bates classifies learning
sification of media” and that “frequently employed technologies in two ways. First, according to the
categories include audio, print, still visual and “medium they carry” and he states:
motion visual, and real objects.” They elaborate “In education the five most important media
that the reasons for categorizing “media” are gener- are:
ally associated with their selection and that their
application can be optimized through matching • Direct human contact (face-to-face)
their characteristics to the task: • Text (including still graphics)
• Audio
A particular type of medium can best present a • Television
task having a similar classification. For example • Computing” (Bates, 1995, p. 32)
the learning of a task that requires differentiation
of visual features can best be done with a visual Second, Bates distinguishes between tech-
medium (Reiser & Gagné, 1983, p. 13). nologies that are “primarily one-way and those
that are primarily two-way, in that they allow for
While Reiser and Gagné’s categorization of interpersonal communication” (Bates 1995).
“media” is appropriate for the selection of tech- Bates, writing about open learning and distance
nologies as adjuncts to classroom teaching from education in higher education, where in the past
the technologies available in the early 1980s, it communications between learners and between
does not have much to offer the selection of learn- learners and facilitators have been difficult due to
ing technologies as central elements of learning the absence or lack of face-to-face opportunities,
events and does not easily expand to address describes one and two-way technologies for four
technologies developed after their conceptualiza- of the “five most important media.”
tion was published. Other approaches to the classification of learn-
Some other commentators have taken a more ing technologies are designed for large distance
interpretive approach to the categorization of education institutions which have large instruc-
learning technologies. Contrary to the descrip- tional design resources.
tive classification approaches, Laurillard (2002) One approach by an organization with instruc-
categorizes learning technologies through the use tional design resources (Sun Associates, 2001) is
of “pedagogical categories” and argues that “there to divide technologies into the categories:

3
 Taxonomies for Technology

• Tutorial technologies nologies is that taken by Tomei (2005). The inten-

• Application uses of technologies tion of his work is to provide a “desktop reference
• Exploratory technologies for the analysis, design, development, implemen-
• Communications technologies tation and evaluation of technology based instruc-
tional materials” (Tomei, 2005, p. xx).
This approach is helpful but it does not provide Tomei expands upon the work of the educa-
an insight to the nature of the technology, rather, tional psychologists who developed the commonly
it is suggesting how the technologies should known “cognitive, affective and psychomotor do-
be used. For example, under communications mains of teaching” (Tomei, 2005). He argues that
technologies no differentiation is made between a technology domain exists as “the newest domain
videoconference, which is two-way, and Web for teaching [that] addresses technology first and
searching, which is one-way. foremost as its own viable content area” (p. 11).
Another approach (Bruce & Levin, 1997) The technology domain is a hierarchic structure
divides the technologies into the categories of: containing from the lowest to highest, five levels:
literacy, collaboration, decision making, infusion,
• Media for inquiry integration, and tech-ology (Tomei, 2005). The
• Media for communication taxonomy is not one of learning technologies
• Media for construction per se, rather it is a taxonomy of knowledge of,
• Media for expression skills with, and attitudes to technology. It serves
as an excellent framework within which curri-
Bruce and Levin’s taxonomy further subcat- cula may be developed to provide students with
egorizes technologies and while theoretically opportunities not only to become adept users of
helpful, could be confusing, as the basic differ- technology but critical thinkers about technology
entiation between one-way and two-way is not and its impact.
apparent. They include document preparation as Tomei’s is a rigorous work resulting in a theo-
a subcategory of media for communication. It retical as well as practical contribution to the field.
can be argued that all education is (or should be!) In many institutions teachers are often asked
communicative and this category does not help to design curricula for students who, by virtue of
to tease apart the appropriate uses of the different location or time constraints, will use technologies
technologies. for a significant proportion of their learning. These
By far the most exhaustive approach to the teachers need a simple yet robust tool to help
development of a taxonomy for learning tech- them understand the technologies they are being
asked to use in their teaching while maintaining
their research concentration in their own fields.
Table 1. Taxonomy for the technology domain
In 2006, the author presented a new organiza-
(Tomei, 2005)
tional structure, or taxonomy of learning technolo-
Level Taxonomy Classification gies at the Information Resources Management
1.0 Literacy Understanding Technology Association Conference (Caladine, 2006). This
2.0 Collaboration Sharing Ideas taxonomy of learning technologies divides learn-
3.0 Decision Making Solving Problems ing technologies into broad categories depending
4.0 Infusion Learning with Technology
on their communications channels. In the top layer
5.0 Integration Teaching with Technology
of the taxonomy, learning technologies are catego-
6.0 Tech-ology The Study of Technology
rized as one-way or two-way. More descriptive

4
Taxonomies for Technology

titles have been chosen and the one-way learning 1994). The taxonomy of learning technologies
technologies are labeled as “representational” as uses this division and adds subcategories to cre-
they represent things or materials. The two-way ate an organizational structure that is sufficiently
labeled as “collaborative” as they facilitate col- robust for general application to technologies used
laborations. in learning and simple enough to be accessible
The taxonomy of learning technologies to busy academics. The taxonomy is designed to
categorizes technologies as representational or provide designers of blended learning courses an
collaborative. Collaborative technologies are introduction to the appropriate uses of learning
then divided into the subcategories of “dialogic” technologies.
or “productive.” Within each of these categories The taxonomy of learning technologies was
individual technologies can be further described developed to describe the learning technologies
by their synchronicity or asynchronicity. available at the time of writing. It is difficult to
predict the near future and impossible to predict
the distant future in the field of learning technol-
CONCLUSION ogy. It is hoped that if the taxonomy does not
describe future technologies, it will be able to be
Many attempts and approaches to the categoriza- easily changed to do so.
tion of learning technologies are dated and are no
longer relevant to the technologies available to REFERENCES
those designing learning events.
The taxonomy for the technology domain Bates, A. W. (1995). Technology, open learning
(Tomei, 2005) departs from the other attempts and distance education.New York: Routledge.
as it is a hierarchy of knowledge of, skills with,
Bruce, B., & Levin, J. (1997). Educational
and attitudes to technology. As such it serves as
technology: Media for inquiry, communication,
a relevant and useful guide to the preparation of
construction and expression. Retrieved October
curricula that develop these attributes in students.
10, 2005, from http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/~chip/
A common characteristic of several of the at-
pubs/taxonomy/
tempts is the basic division of technologies into
one-way and two-way (Bates, 1995; Rowntree,

Figure 1. The taxonomy of learning technologies

5
 Taxonomies for Technology

Caladine, R. (2003). New theoretical frameworks Tomei, L. (2005). Taxonomy for the technol-
of learning activities, learning technologies and a ogy domain. Hershey, PA: Information Science
new method of technology selection. Unpublished Publishing.
doctoral thesis, University of Wollongong.
Wikipedia. (2005) Taxonomy. Retrieved 10 Oc-
Caladine, R. (2006). A taxonomy of learning tech- tober, 2005, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
nologies: Simplifying online learning for learners, Taxonomy
professors and designers. In M. Khosrow-Pour
(Ed.), Emerging trends and challenges in infor-
mation technology management. In Proceedings
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
of the 2006 Information Resources Management
Association, International Conference, Washing- Asynchronous: Not necessarily occurring
ton, D.C. Hershey, PA: IGI Global, Inc. at the same time. In asynchronous electronic
Gagné, R., Briggs, L., & Wager, W. (1992) Prin- communications it is reasonable to expect that
ciples of instructional design. Fort Worth, TX: all communicating parties are not at or near their
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College computer or communications technology. E-mail
is an asynchronous technology.
Laurillard, D. (2002) Rethinking university teach- Categorization: Grouping according to the
ing: A conversational framework for the effective role played.
use of learning technologies (2nd ed.). London: Classification: Grouping according to similar
Routledge or like characteristics.
Leshin, C., Pollock, J., & Reigeluth, C. (1992). Distance Learning (aka Distance Educa-
Instructional design strategies and tactics. tion): Education in which learners are geographi-
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology cally separated from facilitators.
Publications Education: A structured program of inten-
tional learning from an institution.
Reigeluth, C. (Ed.). (1983). Instructional-design Facilitator (aka Facilitator of Learning):
theories and models: An overview of their current The person who has prime responsibility for the
status. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum facilitation of the learning, rather than terms such
Reiser, R., & Gagné, R. (1983). Selecting media as “teacher,” “trainer,” or “developer.”
for instruction. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educa- Flexible Learning: An approach to learning
tional Technology Publications: Romiszowski, in which the time, place, and pace of learning
A. (1988). The selection and use of instructional may be determined by learners. In this chapter
media. London/New York: Kogan Page/Nichols this term is used to include the approaches taken
by distance learning and open learning.
Rowntree, D. (1994). Preparing materials for Higher Education: Intentional learning in
open, distance, and flexible learning. London: universities and colleges.
Kogan Page. Human Resource Development: Intentional
Sun Associates. (2001). Finding the right tool learning in organizations. Can include training
for the task: Four categories of technology use. and development.
Retrieved October 10, 2005, from http://www. Instructional Design: The process of is con-
sun-associates.com/resources/categories.html cerned with the planning, design, development,
implementation, and evaluation of instructional

6
Taxonomies for Technology

activities or events and the purpose of the disci- System and Managed Learning Environment):
pline is to build knowledge about the steps for A Web-based system for the implementation,
the development of instruction. assessment, and tracking of learners through
Interaction: Reciprocal between humans learning events.
and between a human and an object including a Learning Technologies: Technologies that are
computer or other electronic device that allows used in the process of learning to provide mate-
a two-way flow of information between it and a rial to learners, to allow learners to interact with
user responding immediately to the latter’s input. it, and/or to host dialogues between learners and
Learner: A generic term to describe the person between learners and facilitators.
learning, rather than terms such as “trainee” and Online Learning: Flexible or distance learn-
“student.” ing containing a component that is access via the
Learning: An umbrella term to include train- World Wide Web.
ing, development, and education, where training Representational Technology: A one-way
is learning that pertains to the job, development technology that supports interaction with the
is learning for the growth of the individual that material.
is not related to a specific job, and education is Synchronous: Occurring at the same time.
learning to prepare the individual but not related In synchronous electronic communications, it
to a specific job. is reasonable to expect that all communicating
Learning Activities: The things learners parties are at or near their computer or commu-
and facilitators do, within learning events, that nications technology. Telephone is a synchronous
are intended to bring about the desired learning technology.
outcomes. Taxonomy: A hierarchical structure within
Learning Event: A session of structured which related items are organized, classified, or
learning such as classes, subjects, courses, and categorized, thus illustrating the relationships
training programs. between them.
Learning Management System (aka Virtual
Learning Environment, Course Management

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Technology Curriculum Integration, edited by Lawrence
A. Tomei, pp. 833-838, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

7
8

Chapter 1.2
Preparing Teachers
to Teach Online
Gregory C. Sales
Seward Incorporated, USA

INTRODUCTION on the use of technology in education, research

on approaches to professional development, and
The vast majority of today’s teachers were never specific information on the competencies required
taught using computers. They have no firsthand to be an effective online teacher.
experience using computers for teaching and
learning and they may even believe computers
are a threat to their jobs. Helping these teachers BACKGROUND: TECHNOLOGY
to become effective online teachers requires a AND TEACHING
systematic multi-layered approach to profes-
sional development. First, teachers have to be Even in the world’s most advanced schools, com-
convinced of their institution’s commitment to puters have only been available for a few decades.
online instruction. Then, they need support and During that time, huge advances have been made in
guidance as they move through various levels the technologies available for use in schools, their
of understanding and concern about what online educational applications, and our understanding
learning is and its role and value in education. of how to use them to promote learning.
Finally, teachers need to develop competencies In the late 1970s and early 1980s, as comput-
that will enable them to be successful online ers were just beginning to appear in classrooms,
teachers. This chapter presents a brief background professional development focused on operating
the computer and running software packages.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch102
This included basic operation and maintenance,

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

programming, using productivity tools (e.g., an entirely different character. Online distance
word processors, databases, and spreadsheets) education courses created instructional environ-
and eventually the use of grade-level appropriate ments where teachers and students interacted in
curriculum-specific instructional programs. a digital world and where they might never meet,
By the late 1980s professional development speak, or even see each other in person.
had changed its focus. No longer was the goal to
simply make teachers competent users. Rather, it Overview
was to help them develop strategies to increase the
effective student use of technology for learning. Online distance education (also commonly
Teachers were exposed to concepts such as the referred to as distance education, online learn-
use of collaborative learning in technology-based ing, online teaching, and distributed learning),
learning environments. They also began requir- as the name implies, delivers instruction using
ing students to use technology for research, data a computer network, without requiring face-to-
collection, and presentation of findings. Teachers’ face meetings of students and faculty (Arabasz
roles shifted from using technology to teach, to & Baker, 2003). These online courses, taught in
using technology to facilitate learning. virtual classrooms, are often facilitated by use
The introduction of the Internet and online of the Internet (Spector & de la Tega, 2001), and
resources in the late 1990s presented another may be synchronous, asynchronous, or a combi-
change in the use of technology in education. nation thereof.
Teachers and students began to browse this virtual Online distance education offers exciting op-
library for information and resources heretofore portunities for learners, teachers, and educational
unavailable to them. Computers became a tool institutions. Internet technology allows distance
for searching, retrieving, manipulating, and education to make efficient, content-rich, interac-
sharing information. Teachers began to see the tive learning opportunities available to learners at
online environment as an information repository locations and in ways previously not possible. For
that contributed to student learning and through an increasing number of institutions, this capability
which students could contribute to the learning is broadening and extending their methods of de-
of others. Teaching strategies began to make use livering education. Consequently, online distance
of this rich resource by including online research education has been the focus of numerous research
and reporting activities. studies, position papers, standards documents, and
By the early 2000s, use of the Internet for com- guidelines. These documents (e.g., Sales, 2005;
munication had evolved beyond mere text mes- Smith, 2005; The Institute for Higher Education,
sages to include a full range of media — images, April, 2000; The Higher Education Program,
audio, and video. Online distance education began and Policy Council of the American Federation
to gain popularity. All levels of education began of Teachers, May, 2000; Twigg, 2003a, 2003b),
to see online learning as a vehicle for expanding address the relative instructional effectiveness of
the reach of institutions and by offering educa- online learning, educational quality, student needs,
tional services to potential students they could not institutional support, instructional strategies, costs,
previously reach. The concept of online education required teacher competency, and more.
presented yet another opportunity to change the One report, Quality On the Line (The Insti-
role of teachers. The personal relationship between tute for Higher Education, 2000), studied six
teachers and students, which was so often a criti- institutions actively involved in online education
cal component of classroom instruction, took on and constructed a list of 24 “benchmarks that

9
 Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

Figure 1. Preparing teachers to teach online

are essential for quality Internet-based distance
education” (p.25). These benchmarks represented
seven categories:

1. Institutional Support
2. Course Development
3. Teaching/Learning
4. Course Structure
5. Student Support
6. Faculty Support
7. Evaluation and Assessment

Across all levels of instruction, responsibil-

ity for achieving these benchmarks is shared by
institutions, teachers and their program areas,
and students. However, teachers are primarily
involved in the Course Development, Teaching/
Learning, Course Structure, and Faculty Support
benchmarks.

MAIN FOCUS: A MODEL FOR

PREPARING TEACHERS
TO TEACH ONLINE

Preparing teachers to participate effectively in

online instruction (e.g., Course Development, been addressed should teacher preparation focus
Teaching/Learning, Course Structure, and Faculty on developing their competencies to teach online.
Support) requires carefully structuring profes- The remainder of this chapter is devoted to
sional development. The model below (Figure 1) explaining and supporting the elements of this
illustrates the critical components such preparation model and the progression it suggests.
should address.
Functioning both as a model and a hierarchy, Readiness for Change: A
Figure 1 suggests online teacher training begin Concerns-Based Approach
by assessing and addressing teachers’ readiness
to change as indicated through their expressions For many teachers the transition from teaching in
of concern about the impact of online teaching a classroom, where they have direct and personal
and learning. It then moves into increasing their contact with all of their students, to online teaching,
comfort level with online technologies as they where interactions are often restricted to a virtual
relate to quality of instruction, correlation of environment, is a significant change. The process
online instruction with the values of the institu- of change often involves exposing teachers to and
tion, and the ease with which they can teach using integrating them in a number of technology-based
online instruction. Only after these issues have teaching and learning activities. The goal is to

10
Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

increase their knowledge, skill, and confidence simply chose to ignore the opportunity (Stage
in the use of educational technology over time. 0). Others expressed their concerns by asking
The level of teacher readiness for online dis- questions about the project’s purpose and the
tance education training should be assessed prior amount of time they would need to commit to it
to integrating teachers into any formal training ex- (Stages 1 and 2). Even further up the hierarchy,
periences. Loucks-Horsley (1996), while studying teachers expressed concern about the time it was
teacher acceptance of change in science curricula, taking away from other instructional approaches
proposed that teacher readiness for change can be and possible effects on students (Stages 3 and
determined by the types of questions or concerns 4). Within Oman’s Ministry of Education some
they express about the change or innovation being of the trainers participating in the project began
considered. This concerns-based approach identi- suggesting modifications and adaptation of the
fies a seven-level hierarchy of teacher readiness online learning to better reach learners and achieve
(see Table 1). desired outcomes (Stage 6).
Teacher concerns move from the lowest level, In some situations the full spectrum of concerns
Awareness, upward. At the lowest stages, stages may be represented within the population to be
0 through 2, the teacher is moving through levels trained. In these cases a series of training inter-
of considering the innovation as a teaching tool. ventions will likely be required to reach teachers
During stages 3 and 4 the teacher’s energy is at different levels of concern. Institutions, having
focused on using and refining use of the tool to limited resources for the integration of an innova-
optimize teaching and learning experiences. The tion, may need to make decisions about their abil-
highest two stages, 5 and 6, show teachers mov- ity to provide training to teachers at every level.
ing into the creative realm that extends the in-
novation further into unanticipated or developed Characteristics Influencing
areas. Naturally, different teachers will move Adoption of Technologies
through the hierarchy at different rates and many
may never reach the upper levels. There are many political, cultural, economic, ethi-
Training should be geared to the level of cal, and resource issues that impact teacher ability
readiness being expressed by a teacher. In a re- to prepare for and use online distance education.
cent project in Oman, Sales (2007) reports seeing For example, Sales and Emesiochl (2004) report
teachers express concerns from the lowest levels on a civil service retirement act in the Republic of
to the highest. Some teachers, although asked to Palau which forced technology-trained teachers
participate in a pilot of online teacher training, into retirement and flooded schools with untrained

Table 1. Typical expressions of concern about an innovation (from Loucks-Horsley, 1996)

Stages of Concern Expression of Concern

6. Refocusing I have some ideas about something that would work even better.
5. Collaboration How can I relate what I am doing to what others are doing?
4. Consequence How is my use affecting learners? How can I refine it to have more impact?
3. Management I seem to be spending all my time getting materials ready.
2. Personal How will using it affect me?
1. Informational I would like to know more about it.
0. Awareness I am not concerned about it.

11
 Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

teachers. Sales (2007) also reports how a number ability, relative advantage, and compatibility),
of teachers in the Sultanate of Oman resisted the Wilson, et. al. (2001) proposed a condition of
adoption of online training because they felt it support be added, thereby changing the acronym
required them to participate in training on their to STORCS (see Table 2).
own time, rather than being released from their The categories of characteristics in this ap-
teaching responsibilities, as they historically have proach may be independent of each other, or may
been, to participate in face-to-face training. have an influence on each other. However, they
Further, an individual’s level of readiness as do not have a hierarchical or ordinal relationship.
reflected in the concern-based approach (Loucks- Rather, the point Wilson and his co-authors make
Horsley, 1996) to teacher development discussed in their presentation of this approach is that the
above, is strongly influenced by his or her personal more characteristics present, the greater the like-
beliefs as well as the environment in which he or lihood an innovation will be successfully adopted.
she lives and works. Teachers’ perceptions of a Professional development programs must
specific educational technology and their beliefs consider teacher responses to each of the question
about their own ability to use it easily, success- types listed in the STORCS approach. Training
fully, and with better results, strongly influence interventions should help teachers understand and
their willingness to consider adoption of that generate thoughtful and positive answers to these
technology. questions. Their affirmation of these questions
In their chapter on the adoption of learning will significantly influence their approach to, and
technologies, Wilson, Sherry, Dobrovolny, Batty enthusiasm for, online teaching.
and Ryder (2001), argue in support of the validity
of the STORC approach (Rogers, 1995) when Instructional Design
applied to technology interventions in education.
STORC is an acronym for a set of characteristics The EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research
considered during adoption of innovations. These (ECAR) recently sponsored a study to examine the
characteristics represent attributes or conditions e-learning activities in higher education entitled,
that must be evaluated favorably before an in- Evolving Campus Support Models for E-Learning
novation has sufficient appeal to reach a given Courses. In a summary of the report’s findings,
level of adoption. In addition to the original set Arabasz and Baker (2003) identified major
of characteristics (simplicity, trialability, observ-

Table 2. An adaptation of the extended STORC approach to adoption of an innovation (as presented by
Wilson, et. al., 2001)

Category Characteristic
S Simplicity Is the innovation easy to understand, maintain, and use? Can it be easily explained to others?
T Trialability Can the innovation be tried out on a limited basis? Can the decision to adopt be revised?
O Observability Are the results of the innovation visible to others, so that they can see how it works and observe
the consequences?
R Relative Advantage Is the innovation seen as better than that which it replaces? Is the innovation more economical,
more socially prestigious, more convenient, and/or more satisfying?
C Compatibility Is the innovation consistent with the values, past experience, and needs of the potential adopters?
S Support Is there enough support to do this? Is there enough time, energy, money, and resources to ensure
the project’s success? Is there also administrative and political support for the project?

12
Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

concerns of online teachers related to distance documented plans for the production of the
education. online course materials. These plans provide an
The first concern cited was “lack of knowledge opportunity to carefully review content, sequence
to design courses with technology” (p.4). This methods and assessment to ensure the most in-
concern is supported by Siragusa (2000). He structionally sound course is being developed.
argues that online teachers who do not possess This documentation also serves as an excellent
the necessary skills in instructional design are resource when conducting maintenance evalu-
increasingly being encouraged to develop online ations or implementing revisions to the course
courses. He states: structure, content, or function.
Concerns are expressed among online teach-
Instructional design decisions that lead to the ers and distance education scholars regarding the
way in which students learn on the Internet are preparation of teachers to create courses for the
being placed in the hands of lecturers who are online environment. These concerns highlight
only just coming to grips with online learning and the need for professional development programs
the use of the Internet. … Research and develop- that emphasize the creation of instructional de-
ment for online learning has not yet caught up sign competencies among those responsible for
with the pace at which courses are appearing on course production.
the Internet. Instructional design principles that
were developed for computer-assisted instruction Facilitation
appear to be overlooked by those now developing
materials for the Internet. (p.1) Another significant concern of online teachers
identified by Arabasz and Baker (2003) was “a
Instructional design is the process of planning lack of confidence in use of technology in teach-
for the development and delivery of effective ing” (p.4). This concern is well founded given
education and training materials. Instructional that online instruction requires teachers to use a
designers use a variety of models that ensure a variety of tools and techniques which are new to
careful and systematic process is employed. Effec- them. One of the recognized keys to the success
tive processes begin with a needs assessment and of online courses is the facilitation of learning
continue on to examine content/learning require- by online teachers (Jaques & Salmon, 2006;
ments, learner needs, the learning environments, Salmon, 2000, 2002). This involves online com-
delivery systems, tools and resources available munication with students and the creation online
for development and delivery, as well as other learning environments that require or encourage
resources and constraints that will impact the communications between students.
project (e.g. financial resources, time available Stamper and Sales (2001) state that through fre-
for the project, talents and experiences of those quent, timely, and personal communications with
working on the project, social or political pres- online students, teachers create the perception that
sures). This information is then used to develop they are close at hand — a “close apparent” dis-
learning outcomes, select instructional strategies tance. They argue this communication-enhanced
and techniques, guide the selection of instructional relationship helps distance learners feel they are
resources, and development of course content. recognized, contributing members of the course.
When applied in distance education, or other Stamper and Sales go on to suggest that by cre-
forms of course development, instructional design ating a close, apparent distance, instructors can
results in carefully structured and thoroughly

13
 Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

increase learner satisfaction with online courses with management, record-keeping, and adminis-
and reduce drop-out rates. trative features.
Salmon (2000, 2002) has conducted action Some efforts to use a team approach have been
research and published on the facilitation of online undertaken in higher education (Wells, Warner &
courses. Her work illustrates to teachers what she Steele, 1999). Anne Arundel Community College,
believes are critical skills and techniques specific for example, created an Online Academy to help
to facilitating online courses. Through effective instructors develop skills needed to prepare and
use of the e-moderating and e-activities behaviors deliver online courses. Even in this effort, however,
she promotes, Salmon believes online learning online teachers are still expected to develop the
opportunities can be optimized. course “using software he or she is comfortable
Facilitation skills are essential competencies working with.”
to be included in online teacher development. Most institutions expect online teachers to
Training should include modeling of techniques acquire the skills needed to develop and maintain
that increase communications. Teachers should their courses. Arabasz and Baker (2003) report that
be encouraged to plan frequent communications across all levels of higher education institutions,
and to promptly address specific student needs. only 8% of institutional effort directed at online
learning is spent on creating e-learning course ele-
Development ments. Instead of investing in course development,
institutes are devoting resources to such areas as
Course development is the actual production of the Web-based development tools, online references
software version of a course for online delivery and resources, listservs, and help desks.
and the supporting instructional materials. Where Each professional development program
a learning content management system (LCMS) is for online teachers needs to determine its own
being used, online course development is likely to institutional competency requirements based
involve teachers in populating content presentation on the unique combination of delivery system
templates with text, graphics, photographs, and components and support options. At a minimum,
other instructional resources. Of course, working teachers need to have a thorough understanding of
with the template interface and different media development options and the vocabulary neces-
assets that need to be in the appropriate digital sary to communicate with other members of the
formats can be technically demanding. Since development team.
most teachers are not software geeks, this often
presents a challenge to be addressed through
support services or as part of the professional FUTURE TRENDS
development program.
In the commercial e-learning development Legal and Ethical Issues
world, course production is a team process
(Sales, 2002). Subject matter experts work with Numerous legal and ethical issues are associated
instructional designers, programmers and Web- with online distance education. Copyright law,
developers, graphic artists, animators, database which has special interpretation when it comes
specialists, and media production professionals. to online courses (Hoffman, 2000), is often seen
Through a collaborative and iterative process, as the only legal issue of concern. However, Ko
the instructional design is transformed into a and Rossen (2001) in their book on online teach-
functioning online course presentation, complete ing identify a range of issues including copyright,

14
Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

acceptable use, plagiarism, and ownership of the • Readiness for Change: Teacher readiness
newly created course materials. Mpofu (2002) for change can be determined by the types
provides a more comprehensive list by including of questions or concerns they express about
discussions of privacy and licensing/piracy. the change or innovation being considered.
Professional development for online teachers • Comfort with Online Technologies:
must examine all relevant legal and ethical issues. Teachers’ beliefs about their own ability to
Issues such as copyright and ownership need to use it easily, successfully, and with better
be considered from the perspective of how they results strongly influence their willingness
will influence design decisions. Acceptable use to consider adoption of that technology
and plagiarism should be covered as they relate • Design: Analysis, instructional design,
to informing students of institutional policies, creative design, and in some cases inter-
posting information online for others to access, face design. This domain encompasses the
and evaluating student work. Issues or software skills and processes necessary to take a
licensing and piracy may influence decisions re- course from the concept stage to the point
lated to development and delivery environments where it is ready for production.
as well as assignments given to students. Finally, • Development: Creation of the media as-
the legal and ethical issues associated with data sets that support the content (produced
privacy in terms of students’ records and personal during the design phase), production of the
safety should also be addressed. software product (through programming
or the use of a tool), and quality assurance
testing. The development domain begins
CONCLUSION with the design and ends with a fully func-
tional, error free, course.
Professional development to prepare teachers for • Facilitation: Instructor skills and behav-
online distance education must accommodate the iors, and strategies and techniques for
unique needs of each individual teacher. Teacher course delivery. Facilitation involves tak-
concerns, readiness to adopt new technologies, ing the completed course and creating a
and an institution’s specific policies, systems, dynamic learning experience for students.
and support services all contribute to the need This domain involves teachers in present-
for individualized or custom tailored training ing content, engaging students, providing
experiences. feedback, and otherwise creating a positive
Institutions and trainers must recognize that learning environment online in support of
development of online teachers requires an on- the “automated” portion of the course.
going process, not a single event. Professional • Legal and Ethical Issues: Laws, rules,
development programs need to offer a series of regulations, policies, procedures, and as-
graduated experiences that move teachers along sociated consequences. This domain, as
a continuum. Taking them from an entry point shown in the Competency Model, overlaps
based on each teacher’s unique needs to an exit the other three domains. Legal and ethical
point based on institutional competency standards. competencies influence teachers’ execu-
Professional development programs should tion of competencies in each of the other
engage teachers in activities that move them from domains.
their current level of understanding in each of the
follow domains.

15
 Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

REFERENCES Sales, G. C., & Emesiochl, M. (2004). Using

instructional technology as a bridge to the future:
Arabasz, P., & Baker, M. B. (2003). Evolving Palau’s Story. In L. Mahlck & D. W. Chapman
campus support models for e-learning courses. (Eds.), Adapting technology for school improve-
ECAR Respondent Summary. EDUCAUSE Center ment: A global perspective. Paris: International
for Applied Research. Institute for Educational Planning.
Hoffman, I. (2000). Fair use in online education Salmon, G. (2000). E-moderating: The key to
and Web based training. Retrieved June 12, 2007, teaching and learning online. London: Kogan
from http://ivanhoffman.com/onlinefair.html Press.
Jaques, D., & Salmon, G. (2006). Learning in Salmon, G. (2002). E-tivities: The key on active
groups, in on and offline environments. London: online learning. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.
Taylor and Francis.
Siragusa, L. (2000). Instructional design meets
Ko, S., & Rossen, S. (2001). Teaching online: online learning in higher education. WAEIR
A practical guide. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Forum. Proceedings Western Australian Institute
Company. for Educational Research Forum 2000. Retrieved
Loucks-Horsley, S. (1996). Professional devel- from: http://education.curtin.edu.au/waier/fo-
opment for science education: A critical and im- rums/2000/siragusa.html
mediate challenge. In R. Bybee (Ed.), National Smith, T. C. (2005). Fifty-one competencies for
standards & the science curriculum. Dubuque, online instruction. The Journal of Educators On-
Iowa: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company. line, 2(2). Retrieved April 12, 2007, from: http://
Mpofu, S. (2002, August). Legal and ethical www.thejeo.com/Ted%20Smith%20Final.pdf
issues in online teaching. Proceedings of the Spector, J. M., & de la Tega, I. (2001). Competen-
Pan-Commonwealth Forum on Open Learning, cies for online teaching. (EDO-IR-2001-09) ERIC
Durban, South Africa. Clearinghouse on Information & Technology at
Rogers, E. M. (1995). Diffusion of innovations Syracuse University. (ERIC Document Reproduc-
(4th Ed.). New York: Free Press. tion Service No. ED 456 841).

Sales, G. C. (2002). A quick guide to e-learning. Stamper, J., & Sales, G. C. (2001). K-12 distance
Andover, MN: Expert Publishing Inc. education: Today and tomorrow. Paper presented
at the Pacific Education Conference, Guam, Un-
Sales, G. C. (2005). Developing Online Faculty incorporated Territory of the United States.
Competencies. In P. L. Rogers (Ed.), Encyclo-
pedia of Distance Learning: Distance Learning The Higher Education Program and Policy Council
Technologies and Applications. Information Sci- of the American Federation of Teachers. (2000,
ence Publishing: Hershey, PA (an imprint of Idea May). Distance education: Guidelines for good
Group Inc.). practice. Washington, DC: Author.

Sales, G. C. (2007). Internet-based teacher train- The Institute for Higher Education Policy. (1999,
ing in Oman. Paper presented at the Comparative April). What’s the difference? A review of contem-
and International Education Society Conference, porary research on the effectiveness of distance
Baltimore, MD. learning in higher education. Washington, DC:
Author.

16
Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

The Institute for Higher Education Policy. (2000, Competency: A statement that defines the
April). Quality on the line: Benchmarks for success qualification required to perform an activity or to
in Internet-based distance education. Washington, complete a task. Faculty competencies for online
DC: Author. distance education identify the qualifications
needed to be successful in this job.
Twigg, C. A. (2003a). Improving learning and
Course Development: The actual production
reducing costs: New models for online learn-
of the software version of a course for online de-
ing. EDUCAUSE Review, (September/October):
livery and the supporting instructional materials.
28–38.
Faculty involved in the development of online
Twigg, C. A. (2003b). Improving learning and courses are often required to have technology
reducing costs: Lessons learned from Round 1 of specific knowledge and skills – digitizing, con-
the Pew Grant Program in course design. Troy, verting file formats, operation of specific software
New York: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, programs, and programming.
Center for Academic Transformation. Data Privacy: Current United States laws
provide protection to private data, including stu-
Wells, M., Warner, P., & Steele, S. (1999, Spring/
dents’ performance data. Online distance educa-
Summer). A team approach to developing online
tion environments need to address privacy issues
courses: Anne Arundel Community College’s
though design of courses and security features
online academy. PBS Adult Learning Service.
built into record keeping systems.
Retrieved from: http://www.pbs.org/als/agenda/
Fair Use: A term defined in the United States
articles/tapproach.html
copyright act. It states the exemption for schools
Wilson, B., Sherry, L., Dobrovolny, J., Batty, to some copyright regulations. (This exemption
M., & Ryder, M. (2001). Adoption of learning pre-dates many current educational applications
technologies in schools and universities. In H. of technology and may be not address some online
H. Adelsberger, B. Collis, & J. M. Pawlowski learning situations.)
(Eds.), Handbook on information technologies for Instructional Design: The process of planning
education & training. New York: Springer-Verlag. for the development and delivery of effective
education and training materials. Instructional
designers employ a systematic process that con-
siders learner needs, desired learning outcomes,
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
delivery requirements and constraints, motivation,
psychology, and related issues.
Apparent Distance: The perceived proximity
Online Teaching: Delivers instruction using
of faculty and students in a distance education
a computer network, usually the Internet, without
environment. Close apparent distance is the term
requiring face-to-face meetings of students and
used to describe a relationship that is perceived as
faculty. Courses may be synchronous, asynchro-
positive, supporting, in regular communication – a
nous, or a combination. (also commonly referred
relationship in which the student and faculty are
to as online distance education, distance education,
well known to each other and where communica-
online learning, and distributed learning)
tions flow easily.
Piracy: Refers to the illegal or unlicensed use
of software.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 1665-1672, copyright 2009
by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

17
18

Chapter 1.3
Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy
Leah Herner-Patnode
Ohio State University, Lima, USA

Hea-Jin Lee
Ohio State University, Lima, USA

Eun-ok Baek
California State University, San Bernadino, USA

ABSTRACT special education, and instructional technology)

in higher education.
The number of learning opportunities that are
technology mediated (e-learning) is increasing
as institutions of higher learning discover the INTRODUCTION
value of technology in reaching larger numbers
of students. The challenge for those instruc- Dewey (1933, p. 35) says: “While we cannot learn
tors who implement such technology in higher or be taught to think, we do have to learn how to
education is to correctly apply pedagogy that has think well, especially how to acquire the general
been successful in student learning to these new habit of reflecting.”
delivery methods. In some cases, new pedagogy Institutions of higher education are realizing the
is being created. For successful facilitation of value of the tech-mediated approach (E-learning)
knowledge to take place, instructors must make as a way to engage learners at a distance as well
students partners in the process, help them learn to as enhance courses that meet with the instructor
reflect about their activities, and focus on course in the traditional setting (Edwards, 2005). While
outcomes rather than the technology itself. We technology has made this a viable teaching alter-
will share key e-learning pedagogy from differ- native, the instructor has to make a concentrated
ent areas of specialty (mathematics education, effort not to let the technology overwhelm the
teaching objectives of the course.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch103

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

Instructors must engage the learners as collabo- ed (E-learning) course is one that may incorporate
rators in the process. New E-learning pedagogy a variety of technology-based educational strate-
includes discussions of what to do if technol- gies: synchronous and asynchronous collaborative
ogy fails and how to address students’ concerns communication, project/activity-based learning,
about isolation from other learners. This means and web-based interaction and feedback (Ed-
constructing a new way of thinking and reflecting wards, 2005). It may take place in a wholly online
on their own instruction, while maintaining the environment or in a combination of online and
traditional emphasis on course objectives. face-to-face interactions. Technology has made
When examining E-learning through the lens E-learning an attractive option, but technology
of constructivism it is important to understand the does not insure successful implementation of
motivation of those involved, both the instructor coursework (McVay, Snyder, & Graetz, 2005).
and the students (Vygotsky, 1987). When students According to Russell (1999), there are over 200
are asked to engage in problem solving that is rel- studies on technology for distance education that
evant to their culture, true learning is constructed report no significant difference in student learning
(Santmire, Giraud & Grosskopf, 1999). Students when technology, instead of traditional classroom
in teacher education programs must examine their approaches, are used to deliver course instruction.
own culture and learn to reflect on their knowl- This research shows that students achieve similar
edge, skills, and dispositions. The instructor may outcomes despite different uses of media. So the
use this reflection as a way to evaluate growth value of technology-mediated learning needs to
both in terms of the E-learning environment lie in convenience to the students, not in trying
and the course content. In this chapter, we will to boost their achievement over peers receiving
discuss 1) roles of the instructor and the student typical instruction.
in E-learning, 2) key pedagogical approaches to E-learning is essentially different from tra-
increasing students’ ownership in E-learning, and ditional education in that it requires changes in
3) reflection as a means of evaluating a student’s pedagogical approaches (Miller & King, 2003;
growth in E-learning. Moore & Kearsley, 1996). One of the most fre-
quently pointed out concerns about E-learning is
the sense of isolation and lack of human contact
BACKGROUND among its users (Baek & Barab, 2005; Baek&
Schwen, 2006; Hara & Kling, 2000). When
Learning from a distance is not new. For well students do not fully interact with the instructor
over 100 years, universities have offered alterna- and other classmates, they do not have ample op-
tives to visiting the main campus for classes. The portunity to learn content. Interaction among the
first of these, in the United States, were offered class community members is vital to the success
by Pennsylvania State University in the form of of E-learning (Moore & Kearsley, 1996, Palloff
correspondence by mail courses in 1892 (Shearer, & Pratt, 2001).
2004). There is always a demand for access to A great deal of research supports constructiv-
university classes close to home. Many institutions ist and student-centered pedagogical approaches
offer distance as well as face to face instruction. (Anderson, 2004; Baek & Barab, 2005; Baek&
In 2000–2001, 90 percent of public 2-year and Schwen, 2006; Bonk, Kim & Zeng, 2006;
89 percent of public 4-year institutions offered Carr-Chellman, Dyer, & Breman, 2000; Miller
distance education courses (National Center for & King, 2003) as ways of increasing students’
Education Statistics, 2003). A technology-mediat- ownership and responsibility, which contribute

19
 Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

to the improved quality of learning. One of the the instructor’s and students’ reflection about their
methods that has been successful in E-learning growth as professionals and in the classroom.
courses is a collaborative learning community
approach (Islas, 2004; Palloff & Pratt, 2001).
Specific pedagogical approaches to implement DIVISION OF ROLES IN E-LEARNING
the community approach include making students
partners in the learning process and helping them The techniques for working in an E-learning
to engage in collaborative inquiry and to learn environment are often different from traditional
to reflect about their activities (Baek & Barab, face-to-face course preparation. The focus for
2005; Baek& Schwen, 2006; Duffy & Kirkley, the instructor needs to be on the overall course
2004; Palloff & Pratt, 2001). outcomes and objectives rather than technology is-
If instructors are expected to provide students sues (Bannan & Milheim, 1997; Rieber, 1993; Su,
with a learning environment that engages students 2005). In a traditional format, the instructor assigns
in real world problem solving using their own ex- individual and group activities, welcomes some
periences and working with others, instructors also further communication during office hours and
need to experience a similar opportunity, in which receives the completed assignment in person on
they can actively search for meaning in content the assigned date. When the instructor introduces
and apply personal experiences (Knox, 1986). technology into the course and eliminates some
Having ownership of their learning, instructors or all of the face-to-face interaction, then numer-
will be more likely to reflect critically on their ous other opportunities for dialogue and feedback
own teaching practices and may then generate must be present (Su, 2005). This communication
new knowledge and attitudes toward teaching can take many forms and the knowledgeable
and learning. Teacher education programs and instructor evaluates and changes her methods of
practices are becoming focused on the need to communication depending on the type of course,
help teachers become more reflective about their the type of student, and the type of technology
teaching. Reflection helps us examine questions that works best for each class.
and explore our underlying assumptions, values
and beliefs while it moves us into more uncomfort-
able zones to inform our practice (Al-Mahmood & COMMUNICATING WITH
McLoughlin, 2004; Brookfield, 1995). Therefore, THE STUDENTS
reflection can not only help students understand
underlying principles of practice (Dewey, 1933), The instructor in the E-learning environment
but also assist instructors to measure students’ must be committed to engaging students in com-
growth. municating about the course content (Su, 2005).
Instructors must examine how their roles will These interactions can take a variety of forms. The
change in the E-learning environment. They can instructor may be seen by the students via video
do this by exploring new ways to approach course conference. Verbal communication can take place
instruction using technology, and by researching between students at multiple sites and the instruc-
the approaches that increase student learning tor. The instructor may also hold online office hours
within this environment. The final step in the in a chat room or require chat room participation at
process is to evaluate the effectiveness of the certain times during the week. The instructor may
course by looking at students’ growth. Traditional also verbally communicate via phone. All of these
methods of assessment can be supplemented by are examples of real time synchronous communi-

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Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

cation, requiring everyone involved to participate United States needed a course on working with
at the same time. Asynchronous communication is students with special needs. The administrators
more common in E-learning. The instructor will at both sites agreed that having the course at the
post assignments, questions and announcements. same time and conducted by one instructor would
Students will respond whenever they access the be efficient and cost effective. The study sought to
computer. The instructor does need to be aware that compare the distance learning experiences of two
the asynchronous nature of most online learning groups of undergraduate education students. The
can create anxiety among the students, because no data was collected at the end of the course using
instructor is present (Sherry, Cronje, Rauscher, & student evaluations. The first time this course was
Obermeyer, 2005). This anxiety can be mitigated taught, a facilitator was present at both campuses.
by a clear and organized syllabus. The instructor The instructor presented one week at one cam-
must also respond frequently to communications pus and the next week at the other campus. The
from students, and above all, the instructor must alternative campus received the course via video
model the type of information that is expected conference. Twice during the ten week quarter the
for satisfactory information exchange (Seaton, connection failed. The first time it was reconnected
Einon, Kear, & Williams, 2004). fairly quickly, but the second time the whole class
When implementing an E-learning course it time was lost. The instructor could communicate
is important to have a plan before the instructor with the class in front of her, but the facilitator
starts the course, as well as contingency plans in at the other campus did not know what to tell the
case technology fails. Videoconferencing allows other class. He was concerned with trying to fix
students at numerous locations to have access the connection, so he did not answer the phone
to the course in real time. It is helpful to have a when the instructor called with an alternative as-
facilitator present at each location that receives signment. The second time this course was held as
the broadcast. This person can help the instructor a distance learning course, everyone involved was
plan before the course starts. A facilitator can also more prepared. The facilitators agreed to answer
help the instructor design the room layout and the phone quickly when a connection failed and the
discuss the best utilization of the available equip- instructor agreed to have an agenda with alterna-
ment. The facilitator can also plan for breaks in tive assignments available for each class period.
the transmission and troubleshoot if connections The students were emailed the agenda prior to
fail. If no facilitator is present at the locations class each week. When the connection did briefly
receiving the broadcast, then students should fail, everyone was prepared and the students felt
have a detailed class summary to follow in the that the class time was not wasted. The fact that
event transmission is lost and they have to resort both sites had a facilitator that worked to fix the
to alternative activities with their time. technology problems immediately also created an
atmosphere of cooperation and the feeling that the
students’ time was valued.
ORGANIZATION AND The results of the student evaluations support
FACILITATOR ASSISTANCE having a facilitator who was available at both
sites and a more organized approach to foresee-
Research from a distance learning class illustrates ing and solving technology issues (see Table 1).
the need for constant communication between The student evaluations were not as concerned
participating sites. Two regional campuses that with technology and were not as negative for
are part of a large midwestern university in the the second class. The use of a knowledgeable

21
 Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

technology facilitator was an important factor like WebCT© or Desire2Learn©, the document
in the second course, which was perceived as will appear to upload, but if any extra characters
more successful by the participating students. If (*, ’, #) appear in the document name, it will not
the course is held online the instructor can still always successfully upload, which results in the
use the support of a technology facilitator. This instructor not being able to grade the document
form of technology support can be utilized for in a timely manner. The facilitator can help the
preplanning the course and deciding what as- instructor learn solutions for these common issues
pects of available online tools will best meet the and be available as tech support when students run
instructor’s objectives. The instructor may need into more complex problems. This results in the
extra training in the use of discussion boards or students feeling supported throughout the course
chat rooms. They will also need to understand and allows them to focus more on content than
the procedures students need to follow to upload the actual technology (Sherry, Cronje, Rauscher,
assignments. It is beneficial for the instructor to & Obermeyer, 2005).
have the ability to troubleshoot some common
technical issues. For example, when students
upload to a web-based course, created in a format

Table 1. Comments Related to Technology in the Distance Learning Course ©2007, Leah Herner-
Patnode. Used with permission

Quarter Theme Comments

Spring 2005 What aspects of the teaching or content of this course do What changes could be made to improve the teaching or
you feel were especially good? content to meet the objectives of this course?
Notes WebCT were great. (2) I really didn’t like the TV-web thing across campuses because
I felt like I was distracted more and struggled with understand-
ing the content when Dr. H was at Marion.
WebCT was great The technological issues were quite distracting. I think our
class was the right type for good distance learning.
Being able to reach you through email Have two separate courses instead of sharing the same class
time with another class through video conference.(2)
Having Midterm online We do not have the technology to facilitate class over a feed
like this.
Don’t do online course. It’s very distracting to the one that
doesn’t have the professor there.(2)
The distance learning is a huge pain. I also never really un-
derstood what all the assignments entailed. The field word
was a lot to be expected also.
Do not do it over the web. There were too many problems
trying to get connected to Marion. (4)
I didn’t really like the distance learning. (2)
No technology. It was horrible and distracting. (2)
Can’t think of anything but it was weird having a distance
learning class.
Spring 06 Course very organized. Outstanding encouragement of Format of class made it difficult to feel engaged or interested
student participation. (3) in material.
Liked open discussion forum and testing format. Pretty boring, going over on-line notes not necessary.

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Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

AWARENESS OF STUDENT NEEDS twenty-two referred to the technology aspect of

the course versus the course content. Compare
The instructor must be aware of the areas of need this with the Spring 06 comments when out forty
demonstrated by each group of students. It is ben- comments only six related to the technology, and
eficial to discuss the technology expectations along four of the six were positive. When the technology
with course objectives (Chickering & Erhmann, issues were addressed more effectively, both in
1996). One example of using web-based course terms of planning and student support, the final
tools would be to have the syllabus state that all course evaluations showed improvement in the
work is required to be posted in the web-based rating of the instructor. The course content did not
course dropbox using Microsoft Word. The upload change from Spring 2005 to Spring 2006, but the
is required by the start of class on the day the as- final evaluations were an average of 4.2 on a 5
signment is due, and students are responsible for point scale in all categories for Spring 2006 versus
checking to make sure their work is successfully a 3.7 for the previous course when the students felt
loaded. The syllabus also states that students more uneasy about technology. If the instructor,
are required to check for updates posted in the with the help of technical support, wants students
announcement section and access their student to focus on course content, then she has to create
email. By making these requirements a part of a comfort level with technology that helps them
the official syllabus, students will view them as see technology as a tool that enhances, rather than
a natural part of the course expectations. hinders the overall course presentation. Once
the instructor defines her role and the role of her
students it is important to increase the students’
TECHNICAL SUPPORT ownership of the course content.

The ability to access technical support is impor-

tant. Students who are new to technology may PEDAGOGICAL APPROACHES
have an increased need for extra instruction. This AND LEARNERS’ OWNERSHIP
can be accomplished by open hours in computer
labs operated by course facilitators, or general Increasing students’ ownership and responsibility
university tech support, by utilizing peers, or by will lead to quality work. A vital way in which to
making appointments for face-to-face assistance increase learners’ ownership and responsibility is
with the instructor. Once the student feel confident the collaborative learning community approach
with the technology, the student can focus on the (Baek & Barab, 2005; Baek& Schwen, 2006;
course content. When students are frustrated about Islas, 2004; Palloff & Pratt, 2001). Most salient
technology they tend to perseverate on that issue pedagogical approaches include making students
and it distracts them from the course objectives. partners in the learning process, helping them to
Some student evaluation comments from the engage in collaborative inquiry and to learn to
first time the distance learning class was taught reflect about their activities (Duffy & Kirkley,
illustrate this point. When students were asked to 2004; Palloff & Pratt, 2001). Let us discuss these
list changes that could be made to improve the approaches in detail, with examples.
teaching or content to meet the objectives of the
course, there were a number of students who could
only focus on the technology (see Table 1). Of the
forty-four comments from students for this quarter,

23
 Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

Students as Partners First, as a pedagogical term, it includes various

instructional models and approaches to facilitate
In the process of inviting students as partners, it higher-order thinking skills, using inquiry as a
is important to consider a new power relation- main conduit. Second, as a more generic term,
ship and dynamics between the instructor and it involves critical reflections on the learning
the students and to keep a balance between pre- processes on the part of learners themselves
planned teaching activities and emergent learning (Baek & Barab, 2005). Inquiry-based learning
activities. Even though macro-level activities can is established when learners take the lead in the
be designed by the instructor, their realization in learning process, thereby enhancing meaningful
reality is uncertain. The instructor needs to be flex- learning (Brown & Campione, 1994; Cognition &
ible enough to allow emergent learning agendas, Tech. Group at Vanderbilt 1997; Collins, Brown,
which give students opportunities to negotiate & Holum, 1991; Van Zee, Hammer, Bell, Roy, &
meaning anew. Learning can take forms quite Peter, 2005). Inquiry activities increase students’
contrary to what the instructor intended (Baek & engagement and understanding, and also teach the
Barab, 2005). This implies that planned procedures scientific process (Polacek 2005).
and structural elements should be intertwined Inquiry usually takes the form of processes.
with students’ emergent activities and needs in Dennen (2005) suggests that different stages of
the design. The main considerations are providing discussion - initiation, facilitation, conclusion,
minimal structures and allowing for opportunities feedback - can be utilized in the process of inquiry.
in which students can contribute in defining their Lim (2004, p. 633) introduces the elements of the
own learning activities. When the instructor works inquiry process (Figure 1) which are: Ask, Plan,
with adult learners such as teachers, the instructor Explore, Construct, and Reflect. These elements
needs to link class activities to students’ interests interact with Share activities via discussion and
by asking and capitalizing on learner-generated collaboration. The inquiry process can be imple-
issues (Duffy & Kirkley, 2004). The structure and mented by individual students or in a collabora-
activities need to be flexible enough to create a tive team and is more recursive and circular than
learning environment that involves facilitating linear as it evolves.
an intellectual curiosity utilizing students’ own
experiences. For example, main discussion topics • Ask: This element presents a real-world,
and venues can be planned in advance, but this authentic situation, scenario, or case in
should be kept minimal, so that the culture of the which students can relate their experiences
class community can be filled by the day-to-day to topics in instruction. Depending on the
professional experiences of the students. level of the students, the level of difficulty
and terminology in the scenario will be
Collaborative Inquiry- varied.
Based Learning • Plan: This element helps students to devel-
op investigation strategies to find informa-
Inquiry-based learning is an instructional approach tion in order to answer the generated ques-
that emphasizes students’ active quest for mean- tions. In a team project, the tasks and roles
ing. It is a way of exploring the world through need to be defined as a part of the Plan.
the process of asking questions, investigating, • Explore: The students engage in the pro-
and making decisions to solve problems. Inquiry- cess of investigating the problem by col-
based learning may take many different forms. lecting relevant information. The process

24
Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

Figure 1. Display of inquiry-based learning (©2007, Leah Herner-Patnode. Used with permission)

of exploration will include the use of vari- students maintain focus on the performance objec-
ous resources such as GIS, Probeware, fo- tives (Duffy & Kirkley, 2004).
rensic, and educational games. In order to facilitate collaborative team inquiry,
• Construct: The students analyze what they a number of team members will be evenly distrib-
have found, and synthesize and build their uted among the weeks. It is important to emphasize
own knowledge relative to the original that the main purpose of the collaborative inquiry
question, based on the information obtained is not to simply reduce the amount of work each
during the ‘Exploration’ Incorporating the individual needs to do, but to create synergy which
concept of learning-by-design, learners can be difficult to achieve when working alone.
will construct their knowledge via projects Each week, for example, one of the teams serves
using Podcast, Wiki and Blogs. as “hosts” of the online community; the team’s
• Reflect: The students have opportunities to responsibility is to foster communication in the
reflect on their conclusion as well as on the online community and to facilitate students’ learn-
entire inquiry learning process. Students’ ing. In order to foster online dialogues, the team
understanding on the topic/problem will be shares the roles of initiator, supporter, and wrapper.
assessed. During the collaborative inquiry process, the
instructor needs to scaffold the collaborative
The instructor needs to help students to create critical thinking to encourage challenging perspec-
their own meaning while engaging in the collabora- tives, and to provide a supporting environment
tive learning process. Students need to be actively (Duffy & Kirkley, 2004). In the inquiry process,
involved in social enterprise as members of the the instructor needs to encourage students’ indi-
learning community and to have opportunities vidual and collective reflection/feedback on their
to produce objects that show their understanding participation and learning. Specific instructions
from the collaborative inquiry (Wenger, 1998). and examples on good/active/responsible partici-
In order to successfully facilitate collaborative pation and non-examples are useful. Providing
inquiry, the instructor needs to provide a support- opportunities to reflect and evaluate their learning
ing structure that effectively supports the learning will help them increase ownership in their learning.
process, sustains student engagement, and helps It is useful to create rubrics for students to evalu-
ate their own participation and learning/outcomes

25
 Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

as well as other teams’ learning/outcomes. Later, Emphases in the Study of Reflection

students need to explain and defend the results
of their inquiry. If the instructor invites students’ Reflection as Process. “[Reflection] is what a
voices in the development of the rubrics, it will teacher does when he or she looks back at the
help students develop ownership in their learning. teaching and learning that has occurred, and re-
constructs, reenacts, and/or recaptures the events,
Student Participation in the the emotions, and the accomplishments. It is that
Course Improvement set of processes through which a professional
learns from experience” (Shulman, 1987, p. 19).
Along the same vein with the mentioned approach- This view focuses on reflection as a reactive
es, it is important to have students’ participation process, which is part of learning through teach-
in the course improvement. The instructor needs ing. Reflection as a process should be seen as
to structure frequent discussions about what is a spiral procedure (Hannary, 1994; Lee, 2000),
working with the course and what can be improved. which produces informative useful knowledge
A specific forum such as a name of a Café, our for our future decisions and action (Killion &
learning community, and our voice, can be dedi- Todnen, 1991).
cated to the discussion in which learners freely Reflection in Practice. When teaching, in-
post their experience about the course. When the structors frequently encounter an unexpected
majority of community members want to modify student reaction and attempt to adjust instruction
a direction of a certain activity to better support to take into account such a reaction. According
learning, it needs to be seriously considered and to Schön (1983, 1987), reflection can be seen in
possibly incorporated into the course design within two time frames: reflection-on-action, which can
the extent to which it does not cause confusion. occur before and after an action and reflection-
In the next section, we will discuss a way of as- in-action, which can occur during the action.
sessing students’ learning in E-learning. Both reflection-in and reflection-on-action help
reflective practitioners to develop and learn from
their experience. This view supports “integration
REFLECTION AS A of experience with reflection and of theory with
MEANS OF EVALUATING A practice” (Osterman, 1990, p. 135).
STUDENT’S GROWTH Reflection in Context. Schön’s (1983, 1987)
portrayal of reflection has been criticized, because
“Reflection leads to self knowledge and this is it does not explicitly include any social processes
fundamental to the development of our profes- within a learning community. The critics claim
sional practice”, says Kuit, Reay & Freeman (2001, that although reflection can be individualized,
p. 139). This chapter views reflection as a means it can also be enhanced by communication and
of learning and a tool for assessment. In order to dialogue with others. Therefore, instructors and
understand why and how reflection demonstrates a students should be encouraged to consider their
student’s learning, this section focuses on several own practice as well as the social conditions of
different emphases in the study of reflection and their practice. This idea of reflection has led to
ways of assessing reflection. work on the issue of social practice (Solomon,
1987), which includes consideration of ethical,
moral, and political principles (Colton & Sparks-

26
Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

Langer, 1993; Kemmis, 1987; LaBoskey, 1993; given situation using his/her own filter, there are
Valli, 1992; Zeichner & Liston, 1996). differences in the content of reflective thinking
Reflection in E-learning. When reflecting by individuals. Reviewing content of reflection
during the E-learning process, the focus will be provides the information about which issues
on teaching and learning practices in a clearly should be addressed and discussed in preservice
different way and under new environmental condi- teacher education and professional development
tions. The main difference between reflection in programs.
the E-learning environment and reflection in the Attitudes of the Reflector.Dewey (1933)
general education setting is the communication claims that the necessary attitudes for reflec-
mode. In the traditional setting, students reflect tion are open-mindedness, responsibility, and
verbally or in writing (Lee, 2000), whereas stu- wholeheartedness. An individual who is open-
dents in the E-learning setting reflect through the minded does not attempt to hold the banner for
written communication mode, when they are in one, and only one perspective, and does not look
discussion boards and chat rooms. It is clearly to other perspectives with argumentative delight
a new way of talking to each other. These new (LaBoskey, 1994; Van Manen, 1991). An attitude
forms of communication and new environments of responsibility involves careful consideration
for learning by using Internet technologies have of the consequences to which an action leads.
the potential of collaborative reflection (Bain, Responsible teachers ask themselves why they
2000; Churchill, 2005). are doing what they are doing and consider the
ways in which it is working, why it is working,
Reflection to Measure a and for whom it is working (LaBoskey, 1994).
Student’s Growth Wholehearted teachers regularly examine their
own assumptions and beliefs and the results of
Reflection is now seen as a general professional their actions and approach all situations with
skill. Teacher educators and curriculum develop- the attitude that they can learn something new.
ers have been endeavoring to develop systematic According to Goodman (1991), wholehearted-
criteria to assess one’s reflection, as do E-learning ness enables preservice teachers to work through
instructors. As mentioned earlier, E-learning their fears of making mistakes, being criticized,
requires changes in pedagogical approaches disrupting traditions, and making changes. Thus
(Miller & King, 2003; Moore & Kearsley, 1996) it provides a basis for action and growth.
and new methods to assess student learning and Depth of Reflective Thinking. Lee (2005)
performance. This section introduces reflection proposed three levels of reflective thinking, Re-
as an assessment tool to measure student beliefs, call (R1), Rationalization (R2), and Reflectivity
knowledge, and disposition. The following areas (R3). R1 and R2 are considered reactive and R3
are ways to measure a student’s growth by evalu- is regarded as proactive. At the R1 level, one
ating the reflection taking place in the E-learning describes what they experienced, interprets the
setting. situation based on recalling their experiences
Content of Reflection. Different issues are con- without looking for alternative explanations, and
sidered by different individuals while they have attempts to imitate ways that they have observed
experiences in the same context (Goodman, 1994; or were taught. At the R2 level, one is looking
Lee, 2005; Sparks-Langer et al., 1991; Taggart, for relationships between pieces of their experi-
1996; Van Manen, 1977; Valli, 1992; Zeichner ences, interpreting the situation with rationale,
& Liston, 1996). Since each individual screens a searching for “why it was,” and generalizing their

27
 Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

experiences or introducing guiding principles. At a capacity for warmth. They are also spontaneous,
the R3 level, one approaches his/her experiences curious, adaptable, and open to new events and
with the intention of changing/improving in the changes.
future, analyzes his/her experiences from various
perspectives, and is able to see the influence of
his/her experiences/actions in other situations. FUTURE TRENDS
Attributes of Reflective Practitioners. In E-
learning, students sometimes do not have opportu- E-learning is a rapidly growing instructional ap-
nities to demonstrate their growth in practice, due proach. Almost every institution offers some form
to the lack of interaction with the instructor and of E-learning opportunity to its students. This will
other classmates. However, it is still essential to continue to grow and evolve as a viable means of
discuss best practices, such as the characteristics instruction. To make sure E-learning is as effective
of an effective teacher and effective instructional as the best traditional courses, universities have to
approaches, through a discussion board or reflec- support instructors in learning about facilitating
tive statements. The differences between reflective an E-learning course and the unique pedagogy
teaching and teaching that is not reflective are involved. Continued research on best practices
discussed by many teacher educators (Gipe et should be disseminated to the higher education
al., 1991; Pollard & Tann, 1994; Taggart, 1996; community.
Zeichner & Liston, 1996). Table 2 compares the The learner-centered collaborative community
differences between technicians and reflective approach has been considered as a viable way to
practitioners in approaching a situation. Teachers increase students’ ownership in E-learning. It is
as technicians and teachers as reflective practi- congruent with the result of a higher-education
tioners approach a situation in different ways. survey (Bonk, Kim & Zeng 2006) about the fu-
This summary provides ideas for practice that ture prediction of pedagogical approaches for E-
teacher educators must encourage preservice and learning. It identified that group problem-solving
in-service teachers to carry out (See Table 2). and collaborative tasks, and authentic cases and
The reflective practitioners described by re- scenario learning will be the most widely used
searchers are people who make decisions; have instructional approaches in E-learning courses.
an understanding of people; are concerned with In order to facilitate the learner-centered environ-
the human, as opposed to the technical, aspects ment, the instructor needs to be a co-learner and
of problems; and have a need for affiliation and

Table 2. Differences between technicians and reflective practitioners ©2007, Leah Herner-Patnode.
Used with permission

Teacher as Technician Teacher as Reflective Practitioner

• Locates problems entirely in the students and their actions • Examines teacher’s own motivations and the context in which the
• Looks for a program or technique to fix the deviant behavior of problem occurs
students • Looks for distinct ways to pose the problem and attempts to get a
• Does not attempt to examine the context of the classroom different perspective on the students and the issues involved
• Does not seriously question the goals or values embedded in her/ • Questions teacher’s own beliefs and orientations
his chosen solution • Is responsive to the unique educational and emotional needs of
• Accepts the problems as given and tries to solve them individual students
• Questions personal aims and actions
• Constantly reviews instructional goals, methods, and materials

28
Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

partner in the practice of reflection about teaching important in the E-learning setting and can take
and learning. many forms. A good instructor gauges what works
In the coming years, the technologies that are best for content delivery and utilizes the most ef-
viable in E-learning will rapidly increase in num- fective form of communication with the students.
ber. Examples of such technologies will include An instructor who understands student needs and
wireless technologies, peer-to-peer collaboration accommodates those who need help will provide
tools, sharable learning/content objects, simula- a course that is organized and prepared for tech-
tions and games, virtual worlds, and intelligent nical difficulties, and whose students will gain a
agents. The instructors need to be proactive in good perception of the overall content. Research
learning relevant technologies and consider ap- supports constructivist and student-centered
propriate pedagogical approaches that capitalize pedagogical approaches (Anderson, 2004; Baek
on emerging technologies for E-learning. & Barab, 2005; Baek& Schwen, 2006; Bonk, Kim
As mentioned earlier, reflective thinking and & Zeng, 2006; Carr-Chellman, Dyer, & Breman,
reflective practice are now considered as general 2000; Miller & King, 2003) as a means to increase
professional skills. In the context of E-learning, students’ ownership and responsibility of the qual-
teacher educators should endeavor to find ways ity of their learning. If the instructor wishes to
of facilitating collaborative reflection, which will model the role of reflective practitioner, then the
strengthen a collaborative learning community and instructor needs to examine E-learning pedagogy
collaborative inquiry in an E-learning course. An- carefully while constructing a course that requires
other area to which greater attention must be paid critical thinking and reflection skills. It is in this
is in developing criteria to systematically assess way that we move towards using technology as
reflection skills. By doing so, teacher educators a tool that effectively meets course objectives.
can not only get evidence of students’ growth
but also collect insightful information that will
improve the quality of an E-learning course. REFERENCES

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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
tional Review, 57(1), 1–22.
Solomon, J. (1987). New thoughts on teacher Asynchronous Communication: Com-
education. Oxford Review of Education, 13(3), munication between two or more parties is not
267–274. doi:10.1080/0305498870130303 synchronized or happening in real time. The
person communicating can submit her questions

32
Reflective E-Learning Pedagogy

and statements at any time and other people in learners’ active search for meaning in content and
the class can see the communication when they application of personal experiences.
choose to read it. Learning Community: A curricular structure
Collaborative Inquiry: It is the active quest consists of a group of learners. It encourages
for meaning. It involves a process of asking ques- learners to actively participate and to contribute
tions, investigating, and making decisions to solve to the process of learning. The instructor typically
them as a way of exploring the world. This may serves as a co-learner and partners in reflective
take many different forms. As a pedagogical term, practice about teaching and learning.
it includes various instructional models and ap- Reflection: Dewey (1933, p.7) identified re-
proaches to facilitate higher-order thinking skills, flection as one of the modes of thought: “active,
using collaborative inquiry as a main conduit. As persistent, and careful consideration of any belief
a more generic term, it involves critical reflections or supposed form of knowledge in light of the
by learners themselves on their learning. grounds that support it and the future conclusions
Distance Learning: Coursework does not take to which it tends”
place in the traditional manner with the instructor Technology Mediated Course: A course
working face-to-face with the students. Students that may incorporate a variety of technology-
communicate with the instructor via technology. based educational strategies: synchronous and
Learner-Centered Approach: A pedagogical asynchronous collaborative communication,
approach that respects learners’ diverse needs and project/activity-based learning, and web-based
places learners’ voices in the center of the course interaction and feedback.
design. It emphasizes learners’ ownership through

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Digital Information Technologies: Innovations, Methods,and
Ethical Issues, edited by Thomas Hansson, pp. 233-248, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI
Global).

33
34

Chapter 1.4
Higher Education’s New
Frontier for the E-University
and Virtual Campus
Antonio Cartelli
University of Cassino, Italy

INTRODUCTION “… the theory and practice of design, develop-

ment, utilization, management, and evaluation of
Technologies entered in education since their first processes and resources for learning. ... We can
appearance and were used both for improving the think about it as a discipline devoted to techniques
efficacy and efficiency of traditional teaching and or ways to make learning more efficient based on
for creating new teaching-learning opportunities theory but theory in its broadest sense, not just
(Galliani et al., 1999). The definition “educational scientific theory”.
technologies” was coined in the 1950s to describe The Internet in the 1990s introduced further
the equipments to be used in teaching-learning elements of innovation in the use of technolo-
controlled environments. The introduction of the gies for education with an exponential growth of
computer in teaching led to the definition of “new instruments and resources leading to the transi-
educational technologies” to mark the overcom- tion from face to face (f2f) teaching to online
ing of traditional systems like audio-visual media teaching-learning experiences.
(i.e., cinema, radio and television) with the new The Internet more than other technological
digital medium. experiences entered in the educational systems all
In the 1970s the Association for Educational over the world and is today marking a revolution
Communications and Technology (AECT) formu- in continuous education and lifelong learning.
lated the definition of instructional technology as Universities, like many other institutions,
have been fully invested from the innovation in
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch104 teaching-learning processes and often participated

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus

in the transformation of distance education in on • The systematic analysis of e-learning experi-

line education. Among the best examples on this ences and their sharing could help in the
regard are the Open University and the Phoenix achievement of a progressive convergence
University online, where people can earn they of the university systems in the individual
degrees fully online. countries towards the establishment of a
After delay, Traditional universities are con- unique European model,
cerned today with the use of technologies for the • The collection and the dissemination of statistical
improvement of the efficiency of their courses, information on the state and role of e-learning
the monitoring of students’ careers and the access in the universities of the countries involved
to continuous education opportunities. in the project are the main information to
In what follows a survey of the Italian situa- be shared. The project also aimed at the
tion as an example of the more general European individuation of elements useful in identi-
context will be analyzed and the research funded fying, understanding and implementing an
from European Commission will be reported. observatory on e-learning evolution in the
universities.

ITALIAN UNIVERSITIES The results of the investigation were published

AND E-LEARNING in 2006 and are available online on the Website
of the CRUI (2006).
European universities have met the challenge of In what follows some data on the participation
modernisation by introducing e-learning activi- in the survey of the Italian universities is reported
ties in their organization. The governments also and the information considered relevant for what
encouraged the establishment of e-learning in follows is discussed.
higher education by supporting the digitization In Table 1 the percentage in the distribution of
of the infrastructures of their institutions. Italian universities in the survey is shown.
The ELUE project (E-Learning and University When limiting to the universities participating
Education) belongs to the initiatives approved in the survey (59 on 77) it emerged that only 64%
and funded from the European Commission for among them (i.e., 49% of total number of univer-
the promotion of e-learning and aims at the dif- sities) stated that they had an e-learning policy.
fusion of e-learning in the university in Finland, Figure 1 depicts the percentage of universities
France and Italy. The study reports the results of a reporting the presence of an e-learning policy.
joint survey carried out on the universities of the It has to be noted that assuming 51% of the
respective countries by the Conference of Italian universities without an e-learning policy is real-
University Rectors (CRUI), by the Conference des
Presidents d’Université Française (CPU) and by
the Finnish Virtual University (FVU). Table 1. Participation of the Italian university
The project belongs to the set of initiatives system in the survey
designed to foster the creation of an European
Area of Higher Education (as referred to from Universities %
the European Community action in the Bologna Universities which filled in the
59 76.6
questionnaire
Process) and its main ideas and aims can be sum-
Universities which didn’t fill in the
marized as follows: questionnaire
18 23.4

Total 77 100.0

35
 Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus

Figure 1. Percentage of the universities reporting Table 2. Distribution of e-learning centres in

the presence of an e-learning policy Italian universities

Absolute
Number of e-learning centers %
value
One 26 33.77
Two 14 18.18
More than three 19 24.68

it cannot be automatically deduced that universi-

ties which did not answer to the survey did not
have one or more e-learning centre (they could
have them in the faculties or in other structures).
At last when asked to indicate if research ac-
tivity was made on e-learning and ICT use in the
istic because the lack of an answer to the survey university only 49% among them declared they
is widely synonym of a lack of policy on e- had this activity in their agenda (i.e., 37,55% of
learning. the universities).
Furthermore the presence of ICT centres has Figure 3 reports how universities make or
been investigated and 84% of the universities plan to make research on e-learning and ICT
answering to the survey declared the existence use in education in the Italian universities which
of at least one structure of this kind (i.e. 64,37% answered to the survey.
of the Italian universities). In Figure 2 is reported It is clear from the data reported until now
the graphic of the distribution. This datum has how complex is the context of the e-learning
to be completed with the number of ICT centers presence in Italian traditional universities where
in the Italian universities as reported in Table 2. e-learning is present in single structures and is
The only remark on the data in Table 2 is the object of study and research but is not an integral
lack of completeness of the same data, because part of the university management strategies in
teaching.
Figure 2. Percentage of the universities reporting
the presence of an ICT center Figure 3. Percentage of the university research
on e-learning

36
Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus

It is beyond the scope of this chapter a detailed e-tutor presence/absence, which has not been
discussion of the results of the ELUE project but adequately solved.
to have a more complete panorama of Italian situ-
ation some further information is needed.
In Italy a special law, the so called Moratti- E-LEARNING IN EUROPEAN
Stanca Law (from the names of two Minister of UNIVERSITIES AND THE EUROPEAN
the former government who proposed it), recently COMMISSION INITIATIVES
introduced (2003) Telematics Universities and
stated: The previous paragraph shows how complex the
Italian situation is as regards e-learning and its use
a. The rules and duties those universities are in the universities. In other European countries
subjected to, the situation is similar to the Italian one also if
b. The creation of a Committee all Telematics the numbers are different from country to country.
Universities are submitted to for the approval To give impulse to the e-learning policies in the
and the accreditation, universities of the corresponding countries the
c. Whatever distance education strategy the European Commission promoted many workshops
University uses for its courses it has to and conferences and supported with grants many
guarantee and verify the presence of the e-learning projects. Actually the main aspects
students at the ending examinations (both the European Commission is working on are
in single courses and final theses). concerned with:

Until now eight Italian institutions have been • The cooperation among high education in-
accredited as telematics universities and the Na- stitutions on the planning of joined curricula
tional Council for University (CUN, 2005) recently involving different universities, including
published a document stating what follows: the agreements for evaluation, validation
and recognition of the acquired competences
• The Law suggests the introduction of e- (on a national basis),
learning strategies at different levels in tradi- • Large scale experiences on virtual mobility
tional universities together with the creation together with the physical mobility,
of new structures (telematics universities), • The development of innovative study cur-
but except a few requests only accreditation ricula based both on traditional learning
for new telematics universities have been methods and on line methods.
asked for,
• Telematics universities do not make research To the whole set of the above aspects in the
adequately neither in e-learning and distance context of the e-learning program the European
learning strategies and application nor in the Commission gave the name of European Virtual
scientific fields of the courses they propose, Campuses (notwithstanding the absence of a well
• There is great anxiety for the use of distance settled definition of virtual campus).
learning and e-learning in medical profes- In what follows the reports from the European
sions (both in initial and in-service training), Commission on virtual campuses will be analyzed
• The introduction of e-learning in traditional in a great detail due to the relevance they have on
courses is affected from the problem of the the e-learning development plan.

37
 Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus

Table 3. List of EACEA virtual campuses projects

In the consultation workshop held in Brussels
in 2004, 2005 and 2006
on 23rd November 2004 (EC, 2005a) three defini-
tions emphasising different aspects of a virtual 2004 virtual campuses projects
campus were proposed: REVE – Real Virtual Erasmus
eLene-TT e-Learning Network for Teacher Training
• Collaborative perspective, denoting ICT- ELLEU E-learning per le Lingue e le Letterature Europee
based collaboration of different partners
E.A.S.Y Agency for EaSY Access to Virtual Campus
supporting both learning and research in a
E-LERU Creation of LERU (League of European Research
distributed setting, Universities) virtual campus
• Enterprise (economic) perspective, denot- eTTCampus European Teachers and Trainers Campus
ing an ICT-based distributed learning and VICTOROIUS VIrtual Curricula ThrOugh Reliable InterOperat-
research enterprise. ing University Systems
• Networked organization perspective, denot- MASSIVE Modelling Advice and Support Services to Integrate
Virtual Component in Higher Education
ing an environment which augments and/
VIPA Virtual Campus for Virtual Space Design Provided for
or integrates learning and research services European Architects
offered by different partners.
Virtual COPERNICUS-CAMPUS

At the workshop held in Brussels on 11th

2005 virtual campuses projects
October 2005 (EC, 2005b) to explore the issues
eduGI Reuse and Sharing of e-Learning Courses in GI Science
associated with Virtual Campuses (VCs), one of Education
the four key themes of the EU’s eLearning Pro- eLene-EE Creating Models for Efficient Use of Learning – In-
gramme, the need for a critical review of existing troducing Economics of eLearning
projects in this area was identified. The workshop E-MOVE An Operational Conception of Virtual Mobility
identified a range of issues that affected the suc- E-Urbs European Master in Comparative Urban Studies
cessful implementation and deployment of VCs EVENE Erasmus Virtual Economics & Management Studies
and their long-term sustainability. Exchange

Among the conclusions of the European com- EVICAB European Virtual Campus for Biomedical Engineering

mission is that if e-learning and VC initiatives are PLATO ICT Platform for Online learning and Experiences Ac-
creditation in the Mobility Programme
to be sustainable within the EU, then it is vital
VENUS Virtual and E-Mobility for Networking Universities
that stakeholders understand how new models of in Society
teaching and learning transform the institution and
how they can be used to enhance the flexibility and 2006 virtual campuses projects
inclusiveness of the European education system. VCSE: Virtual Campus for a Sustainable Europe
The starting point for the revision work has eLene-TLC eLearning Network for the development of a Teaching
been the set of the projects funded from the Edu- and Learning Service Centre
cation, Audiovisual & Culture Executive Agency PBP-VC Promoting best practices in virtual campuses
(EACEA). The list of the projects as they were
approved and funded in three different years is
reported in Table 3. 1. Systematic critical review of existing virtual
It has to be noted that in the 2006 call for campus projects or experiences, including
proposals within the eLearning Programme, the their valorisation in terms of sharing and
EACEA stated that two priorities had been retained transfer of know-how, with an eye to sup-
for the call:

38
Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus

Figure 4. Synthesis of the different e-learning

porting deployment strategies at a European
experiences in today universities
level,
2. Support for the dissemination or replicable
solutions to help set up virtual campuses at
European level and to establish a community
of decision-makers.

The above list does not exhaust the e-learning

initiatives in Europe and, what’s more, do not
include the many e-learning experiences all over
the world. It is beyond the aims of this work the
detailed analysis of all the e-learning experiences
and of the great deal of virtual campuses projects,
but the following examples can help in better
understanding the e-learning impact on education:
• Times and spaces of high education are
rapidly changing,
• Virtual campuses involving universities in
• Deep organizational changes are needed
regions which had no or less contacts for a
to face the requirements for high quality
long time have been planned and carried out
continuous education,
(like the Baltic Sea Virtual Campus where
• Digital literacy is a need for actual and future
universities from Poland, Estonia, Latvia,
generations.
Russia, Finland, and so forth cooperate in
the development of master programs)
Until now it can only be deduced that a lot
• Virtual campuses based on the use of virtual
of experiences, involving at different levels e-
reality environments are available on the
learning instruments and strategies, are available
Net (the Nanyang University in Singapore
and they are well summarized in the image from
is one of the most interesting examples on
P.C. Rivoltella (2004) in figure 4.
this regard),
• International scientific institutions like ESA
(European Space Agency) and NASA (USA
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allegati/links/3143/E-LUE%202006%20ita.pdf
CONCLUSION AND
FUTURE TRENDS CUN. (2005). Document on telematics universities
approved on Oct 27, 2005. Retrieved March 17,
The experiences reported in the former paragraphs 2008, from http://www.med.unifi.it/SEGRETE-
give a snapshot of the changes induced from ICT RIA/notiziario/allegati/universita_telematiche.rtf
in High Education and confirm (whenever the need
for a demonstration was required) that:

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 Higher Education’s New Frontier for the E-University and Virtual Campus

European Commission - DGEC. (2005a). The Education Institutions so that: (a) curricula and
‘e’ for our universities – Virtual campus, or- degrees are transparent and readable, (b) students
ganisational changes and economic models. In can make their studies wherever they want in
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workshop held in Brussels on 23rd Nov 2004. extra-European students and (d) an high quality
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eu/education/archive/elearning/doc/workshops/ velopment of Europe is made available.
virtual%20campuses/report_en.pdf Brick and Click University: A definition
of university which is derived from a business
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model (bricks-and-clicks). In that model both
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offline (bricks) and online (clicks) activities and
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Instructional Technology: A growing field of
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virtual%20campuses/report_2005_en.pdf
solve educational challenges, both in the classroom
Galliani, L., Costa, R., Amplatz, C., & Varisco, and in distance learning environments. Resistance
B. M. (1999). Le tecnologie didattiche. Lecce: from faculty and administrators to this technology
Pensa Multimedia. is usually due to the fear in the reduction of human
presence in education it is hypothesized to induce.
Rivoltella, P. C. (2004). E-learning e didattica, tra
Lisbon Conference: Held in January 2000
tradizione e cambiamento. Unpublished presenta-
(in Lisbon) and underlined the aim of making
tion in the workshop Tecnologie dell’informazione
the European Union the most competitive and
e della comunicazione e nuovi orientamenti
dynamic society of the world, based on innova-
pedagogici, held in Cassino (Italy), Jan 13, 2004.
tion and knowledge.
Virtual Learning Environment (VLE): A
software system designed to help teachers in the
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS management of educational courses. The system
can often track and monitor the students’ opera-
Blended Learning: The combination of at least tions and progress. It is often used to supplement
two different approaches to learning. It can be ac- face-to-face classroom activities.
complished through the use of virtual and physical Virtual University: Sometimes called tele-
resources, i.e., a combination of technology-based matics university is an organization that provides
materials and face-to-face sessions used together higher education on the Internet. Among these
to deliver instruction. organizations there are truly “virtual” institu-
Bologna Process: European reform process tions, existing only as aggregations of universi-
aiming at the creation of an High Education Eu- ties, institutes or departments providing courses
ropean Space within 2010. Actually it includes 45 over the Internet and organizations with a legal
countries and many international organizations. framework, yet named virtual because they appear
It pursuit the organization of the national High only on the Internet.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Communication Technology, edited by Antonio Cartelli
and Marco Palma, pp. 350-356, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

40
 41

Chapter 1.5
Learning Activities Model
Richard Caladine
University of Wollongong, Australia

INTRODUCTION recognize that the events that make up instruction

may be partly internal when they constitute the
The design of learning is probably more accurately learner activity called self-instruction. (Gagné,
described as the design of learning activities as Briggs, & Wager, 1992, p. 3)
it is the activities that are designable compared
to learning which is the desired outcome of the Courses of study, subjects, or training programs
activities. While the term “instruction” may be are generally too large to be matched to a particular
out of favor with some commentators, as it im- technology or technological element of a learning
plies a teacher-directed approach, “instructional management system. Distance education courses
design” has been used for some years to describe are generally characterized by a “package” of sev-
the design of the things learners and teachers or eral technologies (Bates, 1995) or a “combination
trainers do to facilitate learning. of media” (Rowntree, 1994), indicating clearly
that more than one technology is generally used.
Instruction is a set of events that affect learners in In online learning or e-learning where a learning
such a way that learning is facilitated. Normally management system (LMS) is used for a course,
we think of events as external to the learner – subject, or program, the question remains of how
events embodied in the display of printed pages to undertake the matching of each technological
or the talk of a teacher. However, we also must element of the LMS to subsections of the course,
subject, or program.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch105

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Learning Activities Model

The learning activities model (LAM) is based that learning activities that utilize technologies in
on an investigation of approaches to the categori- these ways can be classified as:
zation and classification of learning activities and
reconceptualizes them in such a way as to facilitate • Interactions with the material using the
the matching of them to learning technologies. one-way technologies, and
With a small number of notable exceptions • Interactions between people using the two-
(Gagné et al., 1992; Laurillard, 2002) there is little way technologies.
reference in the literature to explicit methods of
classification and categorization of learning activi- Taylor (2001) provides corroboration of this
ties for the purpose of matching them to learning tacit conceptualization in the description of the
technologies. However, several commentators generations of distance education, where technolo-
provide tacit classification as a by-product of gies are categorized as providing “highly refined
discussions for other purposes. materials” and/or having “advanced interactive
delivery.” Further, Rowntree (1994) implies a
similar tacit categorization of learning activities
BACKGROUND by categorizing “media” as those for human in-
teraction and those for interaction with materials.
The approaches to the theorization of learning It is not surprising that learning activities can be
activities can be grouped into four categories: categorized as interactions with materials and
interactions between people as this is reflected
• Some commentators classify learning ac- in many learning experiences.
tivities for purposes other than the selec-
tion of learning technologies.
• Others do not overtly categorize or clas- THE LEARNING ACTIVITIES MODEL
sify, yet provide tacit conceptualizations
while achieving other ends. The learning activities model is a theoretical
• Yet others simply list methods or examples framework that can be used as an analytical tool
of learning activities in the absence of a and to assist designers of learning events. It is
more detailed conceptual framework. premised on the argument that categories of activi-
• A fourth approach is to provide categories ties that are subdivisions of the learning process
of learning activities that may ultimately can be matched to techniques, technologies, and
assist in the selection of learning technolo- methods as part of the design process.
gies in a way that is appropriate for the
learners, the material, the context, and the Provision of Material
budget.
Traditionally, the predominant approach to un-
By investigating other aspects of distance edu- dergraduate university teaching consisted of a
cation, Bates (1995), Taylor (2002), and Rowntree presentational style. Most lectures were primar-
(1994) imply a classification of learning activities. ily concerned with the provision of material, as
Bates’ descriptions of learning technologies as learning seemed to be equated with the acquisition
one-way or two-way implies that there are one- of knowledge as opposed to the development or
way and two-way learning activities and it follows construction of it by students. A similar approach
occurred in human resource development and

42
Learning Activities Model

many programs have been conducted in venues of interactions occur. These other interactions can
where a trainer presents material to a group of be identified through a brief analysis of the his-
trainees. The material was provided by the words tory of distance learning and flexible learning as
the professor or trainer spoke and the words writ- practiced in higher education and human resource
ten on the board, overhead projector, screen, or development.
handout. The material provided in traditional pre- Correspondence courses represent one of
sentations like this resulted in notes and memories the earliest forms of distance learning. In corre-
that learners took away from the training room spondence courses, learners interact with printed
or lecture theatre. materials that are sent to them through the mail.
The first category of the learning activities Sometimes there are opportunities for limited
model (LAM) consists of activities concerned interaction with the facilitator in the form of
with the provision of material and is referred comments and corrections on assignments and
to as “provision of materials.” Materials may assessments. Usually there are few, if any, op-
be provided in the classroom, training room, or portunities for interaction between learners. When
lecture theatre where they are part of the learn- technology was added to correspondence courses,
ing process. Alternatively, in distance education, and the term “distance learning” (or “distance
flexible learning, e-learning, or online learning education”) was applied to it, there was greater
materials may be provided away from designated opportunity for interaction between learners.
learning venues. Materials can be provided in a However, in many cases this was limited due to
number of ways, including: the high cost of conferencing technology or other
communication technology.
• The voice of the presenter or facilitator in Distance learning presents a clear comparison
a training program, lecture, tutorial, semi- to face-to-face learning where there usually are
nar, laboratory, study group, or residential many opportunities for learners to interact with
school facilitators and with other learners. Three discrete
• Visual aids to the above categories of interaction can be identified. They
• Printed materials, for example, prescribed are:
texts, references, and manuals
• Other printed materials such as train- • Interaction with materials,
ing notes study guides, lecture notes, and • Interaction with the facilitator, and
handouts • Interaction between learners.
• Other media, for example, radio and televi-
sion programs, audio and video, Internet re- The term “interaction” has been used in pref-
sources, Web pages, multimedia, streams, erence to “interactive” or interactivity. Apart
podcasts, and Web casts. from the grammatical constraints, this is done
to avoid confusion that can occur with the term
Interactions “interactive.” “Interaction” in several dictionaries
is defined as action on each party or reciprocal
The provision of material alone is generally action. There are usually two definitions of “in-
not considered sufficient to produce the desired teractive,” one that describes things that interact
outcomes of a learning event. For learning from and another that describes computers that react
materials to occur learners have to interact with it immediately to the input or commands of the
and, clearly, in many learning events other types operator. So that there is no confusion between

43
 Learning Activities Model

what is meant here by interactive and the computer • Pausing and replaying sections of a video
definition of interactive, the use of interaction is or audio recording,
retained, and defined as reciprocal action. This • Searching the Internet or World Wide Web,
is broader than, but includes, the interactivity of and
computer programs. For example, a conversation • Interacting with computer aided learning
in which each party tries to change the attitude packages (e.g. multimedia).
of the other can be described as and interaction.
Interaction is essentially a two-way process allow- In face-to-face learning, the boundary between
ing information to flow back and forth between the provision of material and interaction with it
learners, facilitators, and other people or things. can be difficult to distinguish. In a presentation,
For example, when a learner (or for that matter material is provided by the voice of the presenter
any viewer) watches a broadcast of a television and by any visual aids used. By definition interac-
program, material is provided to them. If they make tion with the material only happens when a learner
a video recording of the program and replay it, does something with it. In flexible learning, the
pause, rewind, and replay parts of it, the process boundary between provided material and interac-
gains an aspect of the two-way, and to a limited tion with it is usually clearer than in traditional
degree they interact with it. face-to-face learning. Often the material is re-
The three categories of interaction are clearly corded and provided by a technology and in such
identifiable in learning although not all categories cases the boundary is defined by the boundary of
are present in all learning events. The first category the technology.
of interaction, and the second category in the
learning activities model (LAM), is interaction Interaction with the Facilitator
with materials.
Interaction with the teacher or trainer plays an
Interaction with Materials important role in many learning events and for
simplicity’s sake this person is referred to as the
As well as the different categories of interaction “facilitator.” The role of the facilitator in traditional
that can be identified in learning events there are face-to-face learning will be different to their role
different levels of interaction that can be present in flexible learning. In flexible learning the role
within each category. Obviously there are many can include some or all of the following:
levels and styles of interaction and although the
interaction of the learner or viewer in the example • Design of materials,
of the videotape (above) is rather basic, it serves • Consultation with learners,
to help achieve the desired learning outcomes • Assessment of learners’ work,
through the removal of the ephemeral nature of • Answering learners’ questions, and
the broadcast once the program is encapsulated • Provision of materials.
in a video recording. “Interaction with materials”
is the second category in the learning activities In some contexts, for example, in-house train-
model (LAM) and some examples of activities in ing in a small company, these activities might be
this category include: undertaken by one person. In traditional face-to-
face learning at a university it could be a team
• Looking up a definition in a reference consisting of the presenter, a coordinator, and
book, one or more tutors. In flexible learning, learning

44
Learning Activities Model

events can be the result of single or team efforts. • Chance meeting and social events
The teams can consist of academics who provide (synchronous)
the content material, tutorial staff who answer
learners’ questions and assess their work, as well Generally, interaction is a valued quality of
as instructional designers, administration, and learning. The author was a member of the Educa-
other infrastructural staff. tion Committee of the National Tertiary Education
In a face-to-face learning environment, learners Union (NTEU), the peak academic industrial union
interact with facilitators by ways like interjecting in Australia, which developed a policy statement
in a presentation or asking questions during a that echoes this sentiment:
consultation with the facilitator in the facilitator’s
office or elsewhere. An example of interaction NTEU recognises the increase of flexible teaching
with the facilitator in higher education can be a and learning in tertiary education and while the
discussion taking place between a teacher and benefits of flexible teaching and learning are also
student in a tutorial or seminar. An example of recognised it must be remembered that education
interaction with the facilitator in training could is an interactive process, at the heart of which
be the discussion between a participant and the lies the relationship between student and teacher.
trainer in an in-service workshop. Tutorials, (National Tertiary Education Union, 1997, p. 12)
consultations, and workshops traditionally have
been face-to-face meetings; however, interaction In many Australian universities, it is part of
with the facilitator can happen in flexible learning teachers’ duty statements to be available for a
through the use of technologies like electronic number of hours per week for student consulta-
mail, audio conferencing, videoconferencing and tion. Also many teachers cultivate an attitude of
online discussion. While face-to-face interaction questioning in their students, hence engendering a
is obviously synchronous, the technologies used learning style that is highly interactive. In human
for interaction may be either synchronous or resource development interaction is also valued
asynchronous. Some examples of the techniques and considered vital to learning:
and technologies that can be used in interactions
with the facilitator are: All collaborative learning theory contends that
human interaction is a vital ingredient of human
• Questions and answers in lectures learning. (Kruse & Keil, 2000, p. 22)
(synchronous)
• Questions and answers in workshops Interacting with the teacher or trainer is the third
(synchronous) category of the learning activities model (LAM)
• Tutorial discussion (synchronous) and is referred to as “interaction with facilitator.”
• Phone calls (synchronous)
• E-mail (asynchronous) Interaction Between Learners
• Letters (asynchronous)
• Facilitator/learner consultation (face-to- Interaction between learners can be formal or
face) (synchronous) informal. The most formal would be in events
• Audio or videoconference discussions such as student presentations in tutorials or par-
(synchronous) ticipant interaction in workshops. Other examples
• Feedback on assessments (asynchronous) of formal interaction between learners occur
where they work as a group or team on a project

45
 Learning Activities Model

for assessment. Less formal interaction between • “The penny dropping” or sudden realiza-
learners can occur at any time or place where they tions that are apparently not stimulated.
talk about their learning.
The third type of interaction and the fourth As these activities are outside of the catego-
category of the learning activities model (LAM) ries mentioned so far, and so that the model can
is interaction between students, trainees, or par- represent all learning activities; a category for
ticipants and is referred to as “interaction between these activities is added to the learning activities
learners.” model. This is the fifth category and is referred
These last two categories (that is interac- to as “intra-action,” a term coined by the author
tion with the facilitator and interaction between to describe action within. The opportunities for
learners) are both dialogic. Dialog can have dif- intra-action can be maximized through thorough
ferent attributes depending on the technology it and appropriate design of the learning activities,
is mediated by. For example, e-mail is generally and environment. However, as learners bring their
limited to text while a videoconference can include own psychological baggage to their learning and
body language and vocal attributes. Dialog here as it is ultimately dependent on them, the activities
is defined as a conversation and is not limited to in the intra-action category cannot be prescribed
a duolog. or guaranteed.

The Fifth Category of The Learning Activities Model

Learning Activities
The five categories described are brought together
The first four categories of the learning activities to form the learning activities model (LAM). This
model describe the learning process as consisting model is a theoretical framework of learning ac-
of provided materials, interactions with materi- tivities has theoretical and practical applications
als, interactions with the facilitator, and interac- and is represented graphically in Figure 1.
tions between learners. This is not a complete In Figure 1 the space enclosed by the circle
description of all learning activities, rather it is a represents the total of all activities that happen
description of the activities that can be planned and during the process of learning and can be applied
undertaken in order to facilitate learning. There to complete programs of structured learning in a
are a number of things that learners do in order range of granularity. At a coarse granular level
to learn or as part of the learning process that the the model can be used to analyze and describe
designer of the learning event can facilitate but the approach taken to learning by an institution
generally cannot control. These activities do not or organization and the listing of activities for
fit into the first four categories of the learning each category of the model would reflect the ap-
activities model and include activities such as: proach. At a finer level of granularity the model
can be applied to courses or programs or to sub-
• Learners’ informal reflection on what they jects. At the finest level of granularity the model
have heard or read, can be applied to short discrete learning events
• Formal or structured reflective practice, such as using a set of instructions to perform a
• Critical thinking, task. The five categories of the model, provision
• Refining ideas, opinions, and attitudes, of materials, interaction with materials, interaction
• Comparing new to existing knowledge and with the facilitator, interaction between learners,
experiences, and

46
Learning Activities Model

Figure 1. The learning activities model

and intra-action are indicated by the segments or learning outcome can be easily, although subjec-
“piece of pie” shapes. tively, measured as the successful production of
It is not suggested that all categories of the the food. The first example is the simplest, con-
model need to be present for learning to occur or taining only two categories of learning activities.
that there is a relationship that always correlates In subsequent examples further categories of the
the presence of more elements with increases model are added expanding and developing the
in the effectiveness and efficiency of learning. activities of learning. In the simplest case of the
Some successful learning events may use all example, the learner is the person preparing the
five categories, and others may use only one or food and they interact with the learning materials.
two. There are many factors to be considered The learning materials are the recipe and other
in the design of the number of categories of the relevant information, for example, a conversion
model to include in learning events. For example, chart for weights and measures. We all know that
while interaction between learners is generally food can be prepared this way and that the results
considered desirable in learning events it may be can be anywhere in the spectrum of taste. So it
reduced or not occur where the number of learners would be reasonable to suggest that effective
is small; the duration of the learning event is short learning can happen this way.
and flexibility of time is desired. In such cases it
would be conceivable for no interaction between Example 1
learners to occur during the process of learning.
The model provides a framework within The materials are already on hand and not provided
which the activities of learning events can be as part of the learning event. The facilitator (as-
mapped and can be used as a tool for the design suming the facilitator is the person who prepared
of learning events. The following examples are the recipe and instructions) is not present and
provided to illustrate the model in general terms the learner works alone. The activities include
and to demonstrate the applicability of the model interaction with the materials (the materials being
to commonplace learning environments. the recipe book, not the ingredients) and an intra-
action (where the intra-action is the comparing
and critical evaluation of the process with recipes
THE MODEL EXEMPLIFIED prepared earlier and other experiences). This is
represented graphically in Figure 2.
This group of examples concerns a simple, ev-
eryday learning event: preparing and cooking
food from a recipe for the first time. The desired

47
 Learning Activities Model

Figure 2. Example (1) Interaction with materials and intra-action

Example 2 Example 3

In the second example the learner prepares the food In the third example the learner prepares the food in
in much the same way but this time the materials much the same way interacting with the materials
include a videotape of a television program, and including the television program. However, the
through the recorded program activities in the learner is not alone. The leaner works and interacts
category of provision of material are introduced. with another learner, discussing aspects of the food
As well as interacting with the recipe some limited preparation, sharing information, experiences,
interaction with the videotape (i.e., replaying, knowledge, and reactions. Hence the category
pausing, etc.) is possible as well. The graphical of onteraction between learners is added and the
representation (Figure 3) is the same as in the graphical representation is presented in Figure 4.
earlier example with the addition of the provision
of material category. Example 4

In the fourth example, the learner is a member

of a face-to-face cooking class. The learner still

Figure 3. Example (2) Provision of materials, interaction with materials and intra-action

Figure 4. Example (3) Provision of material, interaction with material, interaction between learners
and intra-action

48
Learning Activities Model

Figure 5. Example (4) All categories

interacts with the materials and the other learners, There are some things that the learning ac-
and material is provided by the words spoken by tivities model (LAM) cannot, and is not intended
the facilitator. The category of interaction with to, do. It will not prescribe the best mixture of
the facilitator is introduced as opportunities ex- activities to use for a particular learning event or
ist for learners to question and interact with the content area. It is not sensitive to the cultural and
facilitator. In this example, all five categories of demographic make-up of learners. The facilitator is
learning activities are present. usually the expert on the content and the facilitator
The examples of the cooking class show how or designer should have created a profile of the
the model can be used to analyze existing learning learners and hence they are best placed to match
events in a general everyday learning environment. the activities of the model with the content and
The category intra-action has been included in each the learners.
example and as mentioned earlier this category
is one that the learner controls rather than the
facilitator or designer and is included here as an REFERENCES
indication that it is possible for activities in this
category to take place in these examples. Bates, A. W. (1995). Technology, open learning
and distance education. New York: Routledge.
Gagné, R., Briggs, L., & Wager, W. (1992). Prin-
CONCLUSION ciples of instructional design. Fort Worth, TX:
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College.
The learning activities model (LAM) has been
developed for two purposes. First, it provides a Kruse, K., & Keil, J. (2000). Technology-based
theoretical framework for analysis of learning training: The art and science of design, develop-
activities, and second, it assists facilitators and ment and delivery. San Francisco: Jossey Bass
designers of learning events in the design process Pfeiffer
by subdividing learning events or programs into
Laurillard, D. (2002). Rethinking university teach-
categories of activities. It can be used in a forma-
ing: A conversational framework for the effective
tive way to analyze a proposed learning event or
use of learning technologies (2nd ed.). London:
program or in a summative way to assist in the
Routledge.
revision of an existing learning event or program.
The learning activities model (LAM) can also be National Tertiary Education Union. (1997). Policy
used to compare different methods and modes of manual 1997-1998. Melbourne, Australia: Na-
achieving learning goals. tional Tertiary Education Union.

49
 Learning Activities Model

Rowntree, D. (1994). Preparing materials for Interaction: Reciprocal between humans

open, distance, and flexible learning. London: and between a human and an object including a
Kogan Page. computer or other electronic device that allows
a two-way flow of information between it and a
Taylor, J. (2001). Fifth generation distance edu-
user responding immediately to the latter’s input.
cation (Report No. 40). Higher education series
Learner: A generic term to describe the person
(Report No. 40) Canberra, Australia: Department
learning, rather than terms such as “trainee” and
of Education, Training and Youth Affairs.
“student.”
Learning: An umbrella term to include train-
ing, development, and education, where training
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS is learning that pertains to the job, development
is learning for the growth of the individual that
Categorization: Grouping according to ac- is not related to a specific job, and education is
cording to the role played. learning to prepare the individual but not related
Classification: Grouping according to similar to a specific job.
or like characteristics. Learning Activities: The things learners
Distance Learning (aka Distance Educa- and facilitators do, within learning events, that
tion): Education in which learners are separated are intended to bring about the desired learning
from facilitators. outcomes.
Education: A structured program of inten- Learning Event: A session of structured
tional learning from an institution. learning such as classes, subjects, courses, and
Facilitator (aka Facilitator of Learning): training programs.
The person who has prime responsibility for the Learning Management System (aka Virtual
facilitation of the learning; rather than terms such Learning Environment, Course Management
as “teacher,” “trainer,” or “developer.” System and Managed Learning Environment):
Flexible Learning: An approach to learning A Web-based system for the implementation,
in which the time, place, and pace of learning assessment, and tracking of learners through
may be determined by learners. In this chapter learning events.
this term is used to include the approaches taken Learning Technologies: Technologies that are
by distance learning and open learning. used in the process of learning to provide mate-
Higher Education: Intentional learning in rial to learners, to allow learners to interact with
universities and colleges. it, and/or to host collaborations between learners
Human Resource Development: Intentional and between learners and facilitators.
learning in organizations. Can include training Online Learning: Flexible or distance learn-
and development. ing containing a component that is accessed via
Instructional Design: The process of is con- the World Wide Web.
cerned with the planning, design, development, Representational Technology: A one-way
implementation, and evaluation of instructional technology that supports interaction with the
activities or events and the purpose of the disci- material.
pline is to build knowledge about the steps for
the development of instruction.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Technology Curriculum Integration, edited by Lawrence
A. Tomei, pp. 503-510, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

50
 51

Chapter 1.6
What Factors Make a
Multimedia Learning
Environment Engaging:
A Case Study

Min Liu
University of Texas at Austin, USA

Paul Toprac
Southern Methodist University, USA

Timothy T. Yuen
University of Texas at Austin, USA

ABSTRACT 11 key elements of the PBL environment that

helped evoke students’ motivation: authenticity,
The purpose of this study is to investigate stu- challenge, cognitive engagement, competence,
dents’ engagement with a multimedia enhanced choice, fantasy, identity, interactivity, novelty,
problem-based learning (PBL) environment, Alien sensory engagement, and social relations. These
Rescue, and to find out in what ways students elements can be grouped into 5 perspectives of
consider Alien Rescue motivating. Alien Res- the sources of intrinsic motivation for students
cue is a PBL environment for students to learn using Alien Rescue: problem solving, playing,
science. Fifty-seven sixth-grade students were socializing, information processing, and voluntary
interviewed. Analysis of the interviews using the acting, with problem solving and playing contrib-
constant comparative method showed that students uting the highest level of intrinsic motivation. The
were intrinsically motivated and that there were findings are discussed with respect to designing
multimedia learning environments.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch10+

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

INTRODUCTION previous research examining the impact of this

multimedia PBL environment has primarily fo-
In order for technology to positively impact cused on its cognitive effects such as its use on
classroom learning, students must be motivated acquiring science knowledge and problem-solving
to use the technology in addition to learning the skills (Liu, 2004; Liu & Bera, 2005; Li & Liu,
content presented with that technology. Literature 2008), cognitive tools and cognitive processes
on motivation and classroom learning has shown (Liu, Bera, Corliss, Svinicki, & Beth, 2004), and
that motivation plays an important role in influ- its effect on reducing cognitive load (Li & Liu,
encing learning and achievement (Ames, 1990). If 2007). Studies on Alien Rescue have shown it to
motivated, students tend to approach challenging be an effective learning environment for science
tasks more eagerly, persist in difficult situations, knowledge and problem-solving (Liu, 2004, 2005;
and take pleasure in their achievement (Stipek, Liu & Bera, 2005).
1993). Studies have indicated strong positive As we continued to work with students and
correlations between intrinsic motivation and teachers in different classrooms, it became appar-
academic achievement (Cordova & Lepper, 1996; ent that students often considered their experience
Gottfried, 1985; Hidi & Harackiewicz, 2000; Lep- with Alien Rescue “fun” and enjoyed using it.
per, Iyengar, & Corpus, 2005). This suggests that The following quote from a teacher captured the
motivational problems or lack of effort is often a essence of this observation:
primary explanation for unsatisfactory academic Kids are talking about science outside of
performance (Hidi & Harackiewicz, 2000). the classroom. They talk about Alien Rescue in
Students’ lack of interest in mathematics and the halls and they talk about Alien Rescue after
science has been cited as one of the primary school. All of the sixth graders are doing this, and
reasons contributing to U.S. students lagging far so some of them have friends in different class
behind other high-performing countries in math periods that are working with Alien Rescue. They
and science, especially at the middle-school level will say, “what did you find out today or have you
(National Science Board, 1999). According to found where this alien can go?” I think that the
Osborne, Simon, and Collins (2003), research most exciting thing is that they are talking science
has indicated a decline in attitudes toward sci- outside of the classroom; I think that is the most
ence from age 11 onward. Other researchers have impressive thing.
also found that as children become older, their This sentiment led us to ask questions regarding
intrinsic motivation to learn science tends to de- the affective effects of Alien Rescue. Why did stu-
cline (Eccles & Wigfield, 2002; Gottfried, 1985; dents like using Alien Rescue? What did they find
Lepper, Iyengar, & Corpus, 2005). Therefore, in interesting? How did it compare to other school
order to help students succeed in learning math activities they usually do in the classroom? The
and science, instructional technologists must cre- purpose of this study is to investigate sixth-graders’
ate technology enhanced learning environments affective experiences, specifically motivation, as
that can motivate students and facilitate learning. they were using Alien Rescue and to find out in
In an effort to meet this goal, we have designed what ways Alien Rescue was motivating to these
and developed a multimedia enhanced problem- students. Our guiding research question was:
based learning (PBL) environment for six-grade
science, Alien Rescue (Liu, Williams, & Pedersen, How does a multimedia enhanced problem-based
2002). This program has been used by thousands learning (PBL) environment, Alien Rescue, mo-
of middle school students in multiple states. Our tivate students to learn science?

52
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

BACKGROUND to allow students to access information according

to their own learning needs and present multiple
Using Multimedia to Enhance the related problems in one cohesive environment
Delivery of Problem-Based Learning (Hoffman & Richie, 1997).

Problem-based learning emphasizes solving Motivation as an Important

complex problems in rich contexts and aims at Factor for Learning
developing higher order thinking skills (Savery
& Duffy, 1995). According to Savery and Duffy, For preschool children, learning is fun. There are
PBL environments have three primary underly- no motivational problems for learning in these
ing constructivist propositions: (1) understanding years (Cordova & Lepper, 1996). Their motivation
is in our interactions with the environment, (2) is manifested by their choice of behavior, latency
cognitive conflict is the stimulus for learning and of behavior, intensity of behavior, and persistence
determines the organization and nature of what of behavior, and is accompanied with cogni-
is learned, and (3) knowledge evolves through tive (e.g. goal setting) and emotional reactions
social negotiation and by the evaluation of the (Graham & Weiner, 1996). Motivation is often
viability of one’s understanding (Savery & Duffy, considered to be a necessary antecedent for learn-
1995). In PBL environments, the focus of learning ing (Gottfried, 1985; Lepper, Iyengar, & Corpus,
is not only the knowledge outcome, but also the 2005) and is a function of expectancy of attaining
process by which students become self-reliant a goal that is valued (Klinger, 1977; Pintrich &
and independent. Schunk, 2002; Weiner, 1991). When students are
The benefits of PBL, such as the activation of intrinsically motivated to learn something, they
prior learning, self-directed learning, and motiva- may spend more time and effort learning, feel
tion, have been documented in medical education better about what they learn, and use it more in
and with college and gifted students (Albanese, the future (Malone, 1981; Okan, 2003). An activ-
& Mitchell, 1993; Gallagher, Stepien, & Rosen- ity is said to be intrinsically motivating if people
thal, 1992; Hmelo & Ferrari, 1997; Norman & engage in it ‘for its own sake’ and if they do not
Schmidt, 1992; Stepien, Gallagher, & Workman, engage in it for extrinsic reasons or motivators
1993). However, literature has also indicated that (Malone, 1981). Extrinsic motivators, such as
implementing complex and ill-structured learning external rewards and punishments, can destroy the
environments such as PBL in K-12 classrooms continuing motivation of students to learn more
has been challenging (Airasian & Walsh, 1997). about subjects outside of class (Greeno, Collins,
Multimedia-enhanced PBL environments & Resnick, 1996; Maehr, 1976).
provide a new and different means that can assist Unfortunately, in later years, instruction in
students to develop problem-solving skills, to re- school, rather than being fun, is often boring
flect on their own learning, and to develop a deep and dull to students, and students’ motivational
understanding of the content domain (Cognition problems to learn quickly appear: “In a variety of
and Technology Group at Vanderbilt, 1997), and settings and using a variety of measures, inves-
if designed well, can also be more motivating to tigators have found children’s reported intrinsic
students than text-based delivery methods. Mul- motivation in school to decrease steadily from at
timedia technology can enhance the PBL delivery least third grade through high school” (Cordova &
through its video, audio, graphics, and animation Lepper, 1996, p. 715). The problem of motivating
capabilities as well as its interactive affordances students is particularly acute when the subject mat-

53
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

ter is science (Tuan, Chin, & Shieh, 2005), from can be motivated by a learning environment and
the point of entry to secondary school (Osborne its implementation in the classroom, which may
at al., 2003) — when their intrinsic motivation reduce the need for the teacher as the source of
to learn science, interest in science, and attitudes motivation.
toward science decline (Eccles & Wigfield, 2002;
Gottfried, 1985; Lepper, Iyengar, & Corpus, 2005; Purpose of the Study
Stake & Mares, 2001). Thus, promoting intrinsic and Methodology
motivation is critical to help students learn science.
To address our research question, we used inter-
Sources of Intrinsic Motivation views as our primary data source and the constant
for Learning Environments comparative method as our analysis technique.
We also include descriptive statistics to illustrate
There are many different perspectives of the specific aspects of the multimedia PBL environ-
sources of intrinsic motivation since it may vary ment that affect motivation and learning.
over time, circumstances, and how people view
what they are doing (Pintrich & Schunk, 2002). A Multimedia PBL Environment:
Lepper and Malone (1987) summarized past views Alien Rescue
of the sources of intrinsic motivation and their
characteristics (p. 258): Alien Rescue is a multimedia enhanced PBL en-
vironment for 6th grade science and is designed in
• Humans as problem solvers: challenge, accordance with the National Science Education
competence, efficacy or mastery Standards and the Texas Essential Knowledge
• Humans as information processors: curios- and Skills (TEKS) guidelines (Liu, Williams, &
ity, incongruity, or discrepancy Pedersen, 2002). The learning objectives include
• Humans as players: fantasy involvement increasing knowledge of our solar system and im-
using graphics, story, and sound proving problem-solving skills. It typically takes
• Humans as voluntary actors: control and fifteen 45-minute class periods to complete. Alien
self-determination Rescue presents a complex problem for scientific
investigation and decision-making by students.
These four perspectives on the sources of The story of Alien Rescue has a science fiction
intrinsic motivation are commonly expressed as premise that allows students to take on the role
challenge, curiosity, fantasy, and control, respect- of a scientist in charge of finding habitats (e.g.,
fully (Pintrich & Schunk, 2002). Though listed the planets and moons) in our solar system for six
as separate categories, these perspectives overlap endangered aliens by using a rich set of technology
each other. For example, people become curious enriched cognitive tools. Alien Rescue’s cognitive
(i.e. humans as information processors) because tools include information databases with various
of an incongruity in information. This often leads media, simulation tools, expert modeling, and
people to want to solve the problem or challenge charts and a notebook tool.
(i.e. humans as problem solvers) presented by the
discrepancy. Each perspective separately cannot Participants and Research Setting
sufficiently explain the phenomenon of intrinsic
motivation. However, in total, they provide a One hundred and ten sixth graders from a middle
comprehensive understanding of how learners school in a mid-sized southwestern city used Alien

54
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

Rescue as part of their science curriculum for three Interviews after the completion of the program
weeks. The demographics of these sixth graders were also semi-structured and conversational,
were approximately 71% White, 15% Hispanic, focusing on students’ overall experience and
10% Asian/Pacific Islander, and 4% African impression of the program. The following were
American. About 50.8% were female students eight core questions used as the interview guides:
and 49.2% were male students.
We observed students’ interaction with Alien • What did you think of Alien Rescue (AR)?
Rescue for the entire duration, and interviewed On a scale of 1 to 5 (highest number mean-
roughly 50% of the students (n=57). Both indi- ing the best), how do you like AR?
vidual and focus group interviews were conducted • Which part did you like the most/least
during and after using the program. Focus groups about Alien Rescue? Why?
of two to five students were randomly formed as • Did you find the problem challenging? Did
time and seating arrangement permitted. We made you like to solve it? Why?
an effort to talk to as many students as the time • What have you learned? Did you think that
and situation allowed. Altogether, sixty interviews you learned any science content by using
occurred, including ones performed during and Alien Rescue? What scientific topics, con-
after the completion of the program. The time cepts, or skills have you learned by using
for each interview ranged from 5 to 20 minutes. Alien Rescue? How did you learn?
• How different is working with Alien
Interviews and Analysis Rescue from working on other school ac-
tivities? Did you like researching and how
All interviews were audiotaped and transcribed. was it different from researching in other
The interview questions sought to capture students’ classes or subjects?
cognitive and affective experiences during and • Did you choose your own team member?
after using Alien Rescue. As recommended by How did you work together?
Suchman (1990), these semi-structured interviews • Did you talk with your peers about Alien
occurred as informal conversations that were open- Rescue outside of class? If so, what did you
ended but guided by students’ activities. Sample talk about?
interview questions included the following: • Would you want to work on programs like
Alien Rescue in the future? Why?
• What are you working on now?
• Have you found a planet for the alien spe- Transcribed interviews were analyzed using the
cies? Which one? Why do you think it is constant comparative method (Lincoln & Guba,
a good home for species X? How did you 1985). Relevant information from the students’
reach that conclusion? utterances or incidents was extracted through a
• Why did you need to launch probes? What systematic set of methodological procedures that
did you find out? Do you understand the inductively generated and connected raw data
data? If you find something you do not to codes, codes to categories, and categories to
know, what do you do? themes (Creswell, 2005). First, the data was exam-
• Which parts did you like or dislike most ined for evidence or indicators of motivation and/or
about Alien Rescue? Why? affect, since these two psychological concepts are
considered to be highly linked (Eccles & Wigfield,
2002). The relevant incidents in the transcripts

55
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

were coded to describe what the students said affect, such as “I liked researching on the aliens
about motivation and emotion, a process referred and stuff like finding stuff out.”
to as “focused coding” (Charmaz, 2006, p. 57). After analyzing 288 incidents of students’
At the next level, the codes were compared with motivational drives, eleven themes emerged that
each other and categories emerged at a higher influenced the students’ positive motivation and
level of abstraction that subsumed these codes. affect while using Alien Rescue. The themes for
The analyses continued until an “emergence of motivation and affect were: authenticity, chal-
regularities” (Lincoln & Guba, 1985, p. 350) was lenge, cognitive engagement, competence, choice,
reached. The emerged themes were compared with fantasy, identity, interactivity, novelty, sensory
and against conventional intrinsic motivational engagement, and social relations. These themes
theory perspectives with the purpose of fram- and categories are shown in Table 1, along with
ing our categories as well as informing existing the number of incidents and percentages.
knowledge.
Authenticity

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Students found situated authentic learning to be

motivating and valuable. There were three sub-
Findings categories for authenticity: authentic activity, sci-
entific practices, and scientific roles. When asked
Of the approximately 500 paragraphs of text how different was working with Alien Rescue from
recording the students’ spoken words in the tran- other school activities, some students responded
script, there were 145 incidents where students that the activity was different because it was au-
spoke of their motivation and affect. A paragraph thentic in nature: “It [Alien Rescue] was just like
consisted of as little as one word to as much as doing something that a real scientist would do.”
several sentences. Some paragraphs contained In addition, students were motivated by taking
more than one incident. Of the 145 incidents, 142 on the role of a scientist and performing what they
incidents expressed positive motivation and af- described as scientific practices. Students were
fect. Figure 1 summarized students’ expression of able to role-play as a scientist and work within
motivation and affect. Beyond these 145 incidents a space station while using the tools afforded by
of motivation and affect, there were 288 incidents the environment. When asked questions on what
describing the reasons driving their motivation and they liked about Alien Rescue, students’ answers

Figure 1. Students’ expressions of motivation and affect

56
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

Table 1. Students’ sources of motivation while using Alien Rescue

Themes Categories No. of Incidents

Authentic Activity 5
Authenticity
Scientific Practices 8
(19 incidents, 7% of total)
Scientific Roles 6
Challenge
— 28
(28 incidents, 10% of total)
Confiscation 12
Choice
Control 7
(34 incidents, 12% of total)
Freedom 15
Learning 18

Cognitive Engagement Problem solving 10

(54 incidents, 18% of total) Researching 21
Thinking 5
Competence/Confidence
— 12
(12 incidents, 4% of total)

Fantasy Empathy 10
(39 incidents, 14% of total) Fiction 29
Identity
(11 incidents, 4% of total) Attainment Value 11
Activeness 4
Computer-based 7
Interactivity
Feedback 4
(25 incidents, 9% of total)
Playing 2
Miscellaneous 8

Novelty Novelty 13
(15 incidents, 5% of total) Variety 2

Sensory Engagement Multimedia 8

(21 incidents, 7% of total) Probes 13
Debate 6
Social Relations
Group Work 10
(30 incidents, 10% of total)
Peer Interaction 14

included statements such as: “I liked Alien Rescue Challenge

because how else were you going to learn if you
want to be a real scientist because it has a lot of In general, students liked the challenge of using
the things you have to do and have to learn how Alien Rescue and found it motivating: “I thought it
to do” and “I like the program it was neat and… I was hard, but it was fun at the same time because it
think it was a good experience if you were going was a challenge and I personally like challenges.”
to be scientist some day—it just made you ready For some students, Alien Rescue was “more of
for that stuff.” challenge, so you can’t give up,” which shows a
desire to attempt solving the problem. Other re-

57
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

sponses to whether Alien Rescue was challenging this was the most mentioned reason why they
or difficult included “I think it’s fun and it’s kind thought Alien Rescue was fun. The four main
of hard” and “Alien Rescue gave me a good chal- sub-categories expressed by students were learn-
lenge because it made me exercise my brain more ing, problem solving, researching, and thinking.
than I would normally if it was an easier game.” For instance, a student articulated, “…I like the
However, there were a few instances of students program. It was neat and I learned a lot of terms, a
expressing frustration that Alien Rescue was too lot of scientific names that I didn’t know before…”
challenging or that there was not enough time to When asked why they liked researching on Alien
complete it. A student said, “I just think that the Rescue, one student summed it up by saying, “I
reason that it [Alien Rescue] could probably be think that it was fun, doing the research on the
better is because it could have been easier.” planets because you got to figure out different
things about the planets and you get to send probes
Choice and get information that you don’t know and then
you have to research all the aliens and figure out
Students’ feeling of control and choice were im- what they need and then try to match them up.”
portant with both positive and negative affective A student appreciated that Alien Rescue is “like
valences. When asked what was liked about Alien a puzzle that’s kind of hard to solve but kind of
Rescue, a student replied, “They [probes] were fun easy at the same time, not easy I should say but
because you got to create them and tell them what difficult. Yeah, and it’s fun and good.” Another
to do.” Students thought it was fun to explore the student said, “It was neat converting things from
program, choose what to do, create probes, and Kelvin to Celsius and how you could like figure
launch them to targeted planets and moons. On out their temperatures and stuff.”
the flip side, students did not like losing control,
such as when using the expert tool for guidance. Competence/Confidence/
The expert tool is a set of video clips in which an Self-Efficacy
expert explains how they would address aspects
of the problem and share their problem-solving Some students felt competent or confident of his
strategies. Students did not like this and were able or her knowledge of Alien Rescue and his or her
to explain exactly why: recommendations of habitats for the aliens. This
may also be considered self-efficacy, which ac-
Student: well the thing I hate about it [Alien cording to Eccles and Wigfield (2002), is a person’s
Rescue] is the expert. self-evaluation of his or her ability and beliefs
Group: OH! [agreement from the group] about the probability of success in tasks. During
Student (cont.): He would immediately take engagement with Alien Rescue, students attained
control of everything. You can’t get rid of the feeling of competence and self-efficacy. After
him, he would just stand there and start completing Alien Rescue, this feeling manifested
talking and he would just take control for itself as confidence regarding the selection of
some reason… habitats for the aliens. One student expressed his
or her confidence as, “I’m very confident because I
Cognitive Engagement really researched, I’m pretty sure that it was right.”
Another student said, “I’m pretty confident, well,
The students interviewed liked the cognitive we are because we think that we researched it a
engagement that Alien Rescue afforded. In fact, lot and we think that we got it right.”

58
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

However, not all the students felt confident For some of the students, Alien Rescue affirmed
about their recommendations. For example, their identity. These students were motivated to
a student who was not expressing confidence learn science in order to fulfill their desire to be-
because of computer problems said “I was sort come a scientist or space explorer, or both. Alien
of confident on some because the computers we Rescue’s science fiction narrative brought special
had kept messing up and it erased my notes but personal meanings to the activities for some stu-
we did the best we could and I think that’s all dents. For instance, a student said, “I want to one
that matters.” day go out of space and find a new planet plus
the ones already discovered and study asteroids
Fantasy and comets because I really like space ‘cause its
very interesting”. Another student stated, “And
Fantasy was the second major reason, after cog- considering the fact that I have been wanting
nitive engagement, for why students liked and to be an astronaut since I was like three or four
were motivated to use Alien Rescue. Fantasy was years old, this was just like the best program for
expressed in terms of empathy for the aliens and me…” Another student wanted to “know what it
space exploration. With regards to aliens, students would be like standing on the moon or going to
were motivated by the fictional narrative of saving other places” and wanted to eventually “go out of
the aliens’ lives and as students said, “you’ve got space and find a new planet plus the ones already
to do it to help save the aliens” and “if you miss discovered and study asteroids and comets” be-
something the alien will die for that” and “[I like cause of an individual interest in space.
Alien Rescue] because [of the] aliens, ‘cause it’s
also fun to imagine having them and being friends Interactivity
with them.” Others expressed positive affect for
Alien Rescue because it was fictional, such as “I Students were highly engaged with Alien Res-
thought Alien Rescue was pretty cool because cue because of its interactive features. Students’
you got to actually have some fiction fun in it.” comments on interactivity can be broken down
The science fiction aspect of Alien Rescue to activeness, computer-based, feedback, play-
made one student remark, that in “most other ex- ing, and miscellaneous. Of these, activeness and
periments, you don’t have this much fun because being computer-based were the most important
you have to do it in real life, this is like science for these students. When asked, “How different
fiction or something.” is working with Alien Rescue from working on
other school activities?,” a student summed up
Identity/Attainment Value his peers’ comments by saying, “It [Alien Rescue]
was better because instead of being stuck on the
According to Eccles and Wigfield (2002), the at- desk, you got to play around with the computer
tainment value is the individual’s determination and kind of do whatever you wanted.” Another
about whether the task confirms or disconfirms student who liked “hands-on projects a lot more
the core aspects of the person’s beliefs and self- than reading out of a book” reiterated this point.
concepts about his or her self. That is, the task One student summed up how interactivity evoked
confirms or disconfirms an individual’s self- positive affect and motivation, saying”…it’s
identity, which is informed by the communities funner because you are not just looking through
that the student wishes to participate in, whether textbooks you get to actually play around and it’s
in school or beyond. funner than just sitting there in class.”

59
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

However, a few students did not think there Social Relations

was adequate feedback from the program. One
student commented on the lack of feedback, “… I Interaction with fellow classmates and peers was
think it should tell you if you got it right and show an important feature of Alien Rescue. These inter-
how if they like where they live.” In other words, actions took the form of debating within groups
Alien Rescue did not present the outcomes of the on where an alien should go, “one of the things
students’ recommendations for the habitats of the that I liked about the research was working in a
aliens, and some students desired this feedback. group because I think it would have been a lot
less fun working by ourselves because I think its
Novelty fun to talk and, it’s actually fun to argue because
you are actually getting all that information out
Students liked to have new and different experi- and its fun all around.”
ences. This was reflected by their preference for Not only did the debate occur within groups
the novelty of Alien Rescue, especially since it is but also between friends from other groups and
computer based, and how it varied from regular peers outside of class:
classroom instruction. For instance, when asked
“On a scale of one to five, one being not very “Well, I talked about it with my friends, because
much and five being very much, how much do one of my friends was, ‘Oh my gosh I’m totally
you like Alien Rescue?,” a student replied, “I clueless about this one alien. Do you know where
would give it a five because I like doing things they go?’ And I said, ‘Well I think they go over
that are irregular.” there’ and she said, ‘No, that’s wrong they need
to go here.’ And we would have messed up if it
Sensory Engagement weren’t for my friends, because my friend stopped
me in the hall and she said, ‘guess what we finished
Not only did students find cognitive engagement Alien Rescue today’ and I said, ‘That’s [habitat]
motivating, but also the engagement of their what I chose and she said, ‘No, it isn’t [right].
visual and audio senses. Students enjoyed the Then, I figured it out and so my friend ended up
multimedia presentation in general (e.g. video being a little bit wrong and then I had to call
scenario of the problem at the beginning of the Lynn. And then they had a big argument with me
program, graphics), but the aliens (including 3D because they thought I was wrong and my friends
alien videos) and probe simulations, in particular. were wrong. I said, ‘No I’m right’ and then I had
For instance, when students were asked, “Did you to do more research.”
like researching and how was it different from
researching in other classes or subjects?” one Students also found that group interaction
student answered, “[I like Alien Rescue] because afforded them the teamwork needed to solve the
you have fun and you get to look at the aliens, problem. As a student pointed out, “when you work
you get to look at the graphs, you get to look at in groups, you don’t have to do all the research”
the pictures and then just kind of go from there” and the different tasks can be distributed to the
and another student answered, “I like this one part appropriate people. As an example, the same
about watching probes.” student cited the conversion of Celsius to Kelvin
problem as being a topic one student may know,
but another student may not know. The sense of
camaraderie is enhanced by the fact that students

60
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

within the same group can help each other since challenges that are too difficult evoke feelings of
“your partner tells you information that you don’t frustration or helplessness.
know.” Unfortunately, not all the members of The results showed that Alien Rescue was
groups were helpful, as a student stated, “I sort able to evoke the humans-as-problem-solvers
of did work by myself because my partner never motivation within students. This was the single
helped me.” largest source of intrinsic motivation. This is not
surprising since problem-based learning environ-
ments often have been found to be intrinsically
GENERAL DISCUSSION motivating (Gallagher, Stepien, & Rosenthal,
1992; Hmelo & Ferrari, 1997; Savery & Duffy,
The purpose of this study was to explore the 1995), and the core task of a PBL environment
characteristics of a multimedia enhanced problem- is problem solving.
based learning environment that intends to provide The sources of motivation in Alien Rescue that
a rich context for learning science and afford comprised this perspective were: authenticity,
students a motivating experience. The coding challenge, cognitive engagement, and compe-
and categorizing procedures found eleven key tence. As has been found by other researchers,
elements that middle-school students considered challenge was a key source of motivation among
motivating and/or evoked affect: authenticity, students (Lepper & Malone, 1987; Malone &
challenge, cognitive engagement, competence, Lepper, 1987; Ryan & Deci, 2000). Cognitive
choice, fantasy, identity, interactivity, novelty, engagement was the single most discussed theme
sensory engagement, and social relations. by the students in this study. The students were
These elements were in congruence with the intrinsically motivated in using Alien Rescue
four sources of intrinsic motivation as discussed because it cognitively engaged them to research
in the literature. A new source of intrinsic motiva- and learn new concepts and facts, and to think and
tion was revealed through the analysis: humans as solve the complex problem presented. Thus, Alien
socializers - interpersonal relationships, identity, Rescue does not only present a challenge but pro-
and group membership. Thus, our study was able vides an environment in which students valued the
to expand upon the existing theory on sources of learning and thinking processes required to meet
intrinsic motivation with the addition of “humans the challenge. The rich set of technology-based
as socializers” as a fifth source. tools within Alien Rescue (Liu & Bera, 2005)
supported the learning and thinking processes as
Humans as Problem Solvers well as encouraged interactivity.
In addition, many students knew that they were
Activities are intrinsically motivating when the engaged in authentic activities and understood
problems or challenges are personally meaningful. that solving the problem in Alien Rescue required
To best promote this motivation, the task should be skills that were authentic to the practices and roles
optimally challenging (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990), of being a scientist. Results suggested that this
and if possible, adaptable to the learner’s ability. authenticity was a source of intrinsic motivation,
As the individual masters challenges in an activity, perhaps because it brought more meaning to the
s/he also attains a feeling of competence, mastery, problem-solving exercise. Some students found
and self-efficacy for accomplishing that activity. personal meaning because they valued space
Challenges that are too easy bring on boredom and exploration and science (i.e. identity/attainment
value). However, a learning environment cannot

61
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

accommodate for all the different, sometimes that the activeness (see Vinter & Perruchet,
idiosyncratic, attainment values of students. In- 2000) and feedback that Alien Rescue afforded
stead, the best way to accomplish the inclusion via computer-based activities evoked positive
of meaningful activities is to present them in a affect for students. Finally, an indication that the
way that convinces students that the processes students were experiencing play was that many
employed are authentic in nature. of them called Alien Rescue a computer game and
Finally, some students believed that they found compared it to other games they played.
the correct habitats for the endangered species
and were confident about their decision. This Humans as Information Processors
perceived competence may be viewed as a source
of intrinsic motivation and/or the result of intrinsic We take pleasure in resolving the mystery or
motivation. Alien Rescue scaffolds and recipro- disequilibrium and prefer activities that are nei-
cally builds a student’s perceived competence as ther very familiar nor very different (Pintrich &
the students proceed to complete the program. Schunk, 2002). Like challenges, to best promote
This is an important design consideration: students this motivation is to provide optimal, intermediate
should develop the feeling of self-efficacy as they levels of surprise and incongruence. Interestingly,
progress through the learning environment in order curiosity was not explicitly mentioned by students
to promote intrinsic motivation. using Alien Rescue. Instead, students described
being motivated by novelty. That is, they were
Humans as Players attracted to novel and different experiences as
presented by Alien Rescue.
People play because it is fun. Fantasy involvement Piaget (1977) theorized that organisms (hu-
using graphics, characters, story, and sound can mans) not only desire experiences that are close
promote the feeling of play. Fantasy, heightened to their existing schema, but also radically new
by using sophisticated multimedia techniques, experiences that require new cognitive structures
removes students from everyday (non-play) life, or schemata to be accommodated. “Piaget explains
which in turn promotes the feeling that the activ- how, at times, this process results in a ‘reach be-
ity at hand is playing. A playful activity affords yond the grasp’ in the search for new knowledge”
the learner to focus on the activity, which drives (Fosnot, 1996, p. 13). Here, it seems that there is
engagement (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). However, some overlap of the metaphor of humans as prob-
if the activity is too playful, then the learner may lem solvers and humans as information processors.
focus on the playing aspects and less on the learn- Students were not only interested in meaningful
ing objectives. challenges but their interest was piqued if the
Fantasy and interactivity combined, i.e. human experience was novel to them. This novelty was
as a player, were strong sources of intrinsic moti- especially enhanced by the multimedia delivery
vation for students to use Alien Rescue. Fantasy of Alien Rescue. Such use of multimedia effects
was the second biggest contributor to intrinsic promotes sensory curiosity (Malone & Lepper,
motivation for the students. Fantasy involvement 1987).
was promoted by using a science fiction narra- Yet, it is interesting that “human as information
tive that was expressed through multimedia and processors” was not as strong as a source of in-
interactivity. Interactivity is closely aligned with trinsic motivation for students using Alien Rescue
the concept of playing, and in particular, students as expected. This could have been because the in-
liked playing on the computer. Results suggested terpretation and categorization by the researchers

62
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

may have unintentionally marginalized this source. logistics of performing group assessment in K-12
For instance, perhaps when students expressed classrooms often discourages curricula incorporat-
their fondness for designing and using probes to ing group work. The results of this study pointed
find information about specific planetoids, this was to the need to consider peer collaboration as part
an indication of their need to resolve their curios- of the implementation of learning environments.
ity instead of preference for fantasy involvement Developing and maintaining social relations
using graphics. Or maybe it was both. or socializing is not explicitly stated as a source
of motivation in most classical descriptions of
Humans as Voluntary Actors intrinsic motivation because it appears to be ex-
trinsic in nature. However, Lepper and Malone
The sources of intrinsic motivation from the implicitly incorporated socializing by including
perspective of ‘humans as voluntary actors’, as self-determination (Deci and Ryan 1992; Ryan &
stated by Malone and Lepper (1987), are: control Deci, 2000) as part of the humans as voluntary
and self-determination. People are fond of the actors perspective. Self-determination theory of
feeling that they are in control of their environ- intrinsic motivation posits that people are in-
ment. Environments that provide choices and self- nately motivated to seek out optimal stimulation
direction support the feeling of autonomy, which and challenges that meet the needs of autonomy,
enhances intrinsic motivation. This motivation is competence, and relatedness. In self-determination
best promoted when the activity provides “a sense theory, the competence need is the desire to feel
of personal control over meaningful outcomes” capable of acting appropriately in an environ-
(Lepper & Malone, 1987, p. 258). Yet, too much ment, which overlaps directly with the concept
control over the outcomes can reduce the mean- of humans as problem solvers. The autonomy
ingfulness of the activity. need is the need of humans to feel that they are in
The open-ended nature of Alien Rescue affords control of their environment, as discussed in the
a significant amount of choices. Therefore, it was metaphor of humans as voluntary actors. Thus, a
expected that students would have mentioned more accurate portrayal of humans as voluntary
choices and control more often than was found. actors is that it is about control and autonomy,
Yet, as an indication of their desire for control, rather than self-determination.
students had a strong negative reaction to the However, self-determination theory also in-
expert-modeling tool, which they felt had con- cludes relatedness as a source of intrinsic motiva-
fiscated their control. tion. Relatedness is the need to feel secure and
connected to others in the learning environment.
Humans as Socializers The need for security and connectedness is closely
aligned with Maslow’s (1955) theory of hierarchy
The theme of social relations was an essential of human needs of safety and belongingness. In
motivating factor of Alien Rescue users. Most Maslow’s theory, safety needs can be seen in
students found the socializing aspect of working individual’s preference for familiar (e.g. social)
with their peers motivating. Debating and arguing surroundings, and belongingness needs involve the
their perspectives about the problem and possible need for affectionate relationships and the feeling
solutions were engaging and fun. Such lively of being part of a group (Petri, 1981).
discourse occurred both inside and outside the In support of the existence of the need to be
classroom. Collaboration is an important aspect of connected to others and interpersonal relations
PBL environments. Unfortunately, the difficulty in as a motivator, there have been numerous studies

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 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

demonstrating that cooperative learning and group enhanced with the assistance of technology. Situ-
activities, such as those provided in problem-based ating the central problem within a science fiction
learning environments, have a positive effect premise, using video newscasts to announce the
on students’ interest, engagement, and motiva- arrival of the aliens, placing students in the role of
tion (Shernoff, Csikszentmihalyi, Schneider, & a scientist, providing a space station environment
Shernoff, 2003). And although not mentioned in for the student to explore, and providing numerous
the above intrinsic motivation metaphors, Lepper databases of rich information make the learning
and Malone’s (1987, p. 248) taxonomy of intrinsic environment more compelling and engaging for
motivations includes interpersonal motivations, these sixth-graders.
which are promoted by organizing activities with Students’research and problem solving in Alien
cooperation, competition, and recognition. A fun- Rescue are assisted with the set of cognitive tools,
damental design element of PBL environments is each with a specific function. These cognitive
organizing the activity so that learners cooperate tools are an important part of enhancing intrinsic
to solve a problem, which affords the opportunity motivation. This includes providing tools that stu-
to enhance interpersonal relations and motivation. dents consider are authentic and used in the “adult
The innate desire of individuals to establish, world” such as the notebook, probe designing, and
strengthen, and maintain interpersonal relations— informational databases about NASA missions,
the sense of belonging to and participating in a and our solar system. These tools are interactive,
social group or community—is aligned with the supporting fantasy and sensory engagement. They
social constructivist view of motivation (Greeno, provide necessary cognitive scaffolding during
Collins, & Resnick, 1996; Wentzel, 1999), which is students’ problem solving. As students develop
an underlying theory behind problem-based learn- more expertise during the process, they feel more
ing environments. In the classroom, this social confident with their work, which ultimately leads
group comprises of friends and classmates. The to enhancing students’ self-efficacy. The cognitive
super-motive is the reciprocal process of valuing tools provide students both cognitive scaffolding
the social group and the development of one’s in assisting them to solve a complex problem,
identity within that social group. Individuals have and also motivational scaffolding in making them
the innate need to belong to a social group or com- feel less overwhelmed or helpless. Together with
munity where they can develop their self-esteem the incorporation of teamwork, students are in
and attain esteem (via social recognition) from control of their own learning, relying less on the
others through participation in that social group teachers, and are encouraged to be self-reliant
or community (Bandura, 1986; Hickey, 2003; and independent. The cognitive tools, however,
Maslow, 1955; Ryan & Deci, 2000). Motivation should not be considered to have a one-to-one
is the process of negotiation of one’s identity and correspondence to the sources of motivation.
participation in a community in order to attain Instead, the relationship between the tools and
esteem (Lave & Wenger, 1991). sources of motivations are one-to-many. That is,
every tool can afford different sources of intrinsic
The Significance of Using motivation. For instance, the probe-designing tool
Technology in PBL Delivery supports the fantasy narrative, provides control
for the students to test hypotheses and multimedia
Within the context of PBL, the eleven elements sensory curiosity while affording the students to
that the students found to be motivating about continue the process of problem solving. When
Alien Rescue were, to a large extent, delivered and designing cognitive tools within a learning envi-

64
What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

ronment, designers should consider how tools, their participation in problem solving and play-
individually and collectively, support the sources ing. The students expressed pleasure in engaging
of intrinsic motivation (See Figure 2). cognitive challenges while problem solving and
the environment afforded these middle school
students the feeling of playing while problem
CONCLUSION solving. Thus, removing them from everyday
life and immersing them in a fantasy appeared
Intrinsic motivation is shown to be highly cor- to motivate the students to engage in solving a
related with the academic success of students, difficult task. The importance of incorporating
and is thought to be the antecedent to learning. these sources of intrinsic motivation into design-
Thus, it would behoove designers of multimedia ing multimedia learning environments for this age
learning environments to consider incorporating group is obvious.
elements that promote the five sources of intrinsic Other sources of intrinsic motivation such as
motivation: problem solving, playing, information social relations, curiosity, and choice—though less
processing, voluntary acting, and socializing. mentioned in comparison, also merit attention in
The findings of this study showed that students designing multimedia learning environments. A
using Alien Rescue repeatedly described their learning environment that promotes social rela-
experience as fun, interesting, and enjoyable, tions is important because it is not only a source
which are the characteristics of being intrinsically of intrinsic motivation, but peer collaboration is
motivated. The two strongest sources of intrinsic also a way to scaffold student learning through
motivation for students using Alien Rescue are the zone of proximal development (Vygotsky,

Figure 2. Summarizes the motivating characteristics as exhibited in Alien Rescue with their correspond-
ing theoretical motivational perspectives

65
 What Factors Make a Multimedia Learning Environment Engaging

2006). In addition, students are motivated by Also, will all the sources of intrinsic motivation
the novelty of the computer program, as well as be enhanced when focusing on improving one or
with the sensory curiosity afforded by the rich more of the sources’ efficacy?
multimedia design. Finally, choice is an essential Finally, it is possible to use the five sources
source of intrinsic motivation and becomes salient of intrinsic motivation as a rubric for evaluating
to the students who, as shown in this study, had future research on motivational characteristics of
strong negative reactions when it was insufficient multimedia learning environments. Quantitative
or taken away. instruments can be developed to evaluate a wide
Taken together, the eleven elements (authentic- range of multimedia learning environments to de-
ity, challenge, cognitive engagement, competence, termine which sources were the major contributors
choice, fantasy, identity, interactivity, novelty, for each genre. For instance, how do the results of
sensory engagement, and social relations) as ex- this study compare to other multimedia enhanced
hibited in Alien Rescue have shown what makes problem-based learning environments? The
a learning environment engaging to the sixth- results from studying each genre of multimedia
graders, and reflect the five sources of intrinsic learning environments can also be compared and
motivation. Thus, these motivational factors are contrasted to gain greater understanding of how to
important for designers to consider in designing motivate students. From this research, we would
learning environments. not only understand how to enhance motivation
through multimedia, but we could also be able to
add new insights and dimensions to motivational
FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS theories as well.

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This work was previously published in Cognitive Effects of Multimedia Learning, edited by Robert Zheng, pp. 173-192, copy-
right 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 71

Chapter 1.7
Quality Learning Objective
in Instructional Design
Erla M. Morales
University of Salamanca, Spain

Francisco J. García
University of Salamanca, Spain

Ángela Barrón
University of Salamanca, Spain

INTRODUCTION to syntax. In this way, the machines can make

complex tasks to deliver users the information
Due to continuous technological advancements, to meet their needs.
the Web offers diverse applications for e-learning. The challenge of defining the type of informa-
However, in practice, many times technological tion to manage for e-learning is a topic that has
development is considered synonymous with im- led to the emergence of new concepts for resource
proved education. It is very important to take into development. One of these concepts is the learning
account the appropriate use of Web development object, which considers resources as independent
in order to promote knowledge acquisition with units that can be re-used for other contexts and
a proper selection, delivery and construction of educational situations.
information. However, there are a lot of LOs definitions; the
In order to support knowledge management in most widespread one is from IEEE LOM (2002)
e-learning, it is critical to take into account the that states the “digital or non-digital entity that may
type of information in development. The evolu- be used, reused or referenced while the learning
tion of the Web towards semantics supports the receives technical support.” However, this concept
idea of giving more significance to contents than is too broad to guarantee an efficient resources
management. We believe LOs should represent
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch107

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

at least a single instructional objective and all of work offers recommendations for quality criteria
the related materials required to support that goal. of resources to consider in composing quality di-
In order to manage LOs without interoperabil- dactic units from LOs. Finally, the fourth section
ity problems, specifications and standards are in points out our conclusions
development. However, the ability to interchange
learning objects is not synonymous of a good qual-
ity result. Research about quality LOs is a topic LOS AND QUALITY CONCEPT
that has had limited focus and there are only a few
published works dealing with their quality design. There are new organization models, which need
In today’s world, reusable LOs concepts and to be encouraged (Cunha et al., 2006). One of the
standards for their treatment represent an ad- most important is the virtual organization model
vantage for knowledge management systems to (Putnik et al., 2006). As a product of Web develop-
whatever kind of business that supports an online ment, the LOs concept exists (Moreno & Bailly
system. Users are able to manage and reuse content Baillière, 2002; IEEE LOM, 2002; Polsani, 2003;
according to their needs without interoperability Wiley, 2000). LOs have characteristics of being
problems. The possibility of importing LOs for independent units, which are able to be reused in
e-learning aims to increase their information other educational situations.
repository, but the learning object quality is not In agreement with this there are new ways for
guaranteed. working and organizational dimensions (Cortés et
As stated before, the purpose of this article al., 2006). Knowledge management for e-learning
is to provide an awareness of the elements that based on reusable LOs means the possibility of
should be considered in quality learning objects’ accessing specific content according to the learn-
instructional design for e-learning systems. ers’ needs. To avoid interoperability problems,
According to this, in the second section we there are some organizations that are working to
propose our own LOs definition considering develop standards and specifications to manage
different kind of aggregation levels; in this way resources for e-learning systems.
it is possible to make clear what we understand To manage LOs, it is important to respond
for LOs and what kind of LOs we are managing. with what we understand for LOs. We define a
Another important issue is to make clear what LO as a “unit with a learning objective, together
is the meaning of quality; for this reason in this with digital and independent capabilities, acces-
section we present our own definition about it. sible through metadata to be reused in different
In order to achieve quality LOs design it is contexts and platforms” (Morales et al., 2006).
important to take into account their characteristics. LOs must have a learning objective because it
The third section defines LOs’ characteristics in enables it to direct the contents and material relat-
order to promote quality LOs instructional design. ing to them. Ideally a LO must contain different
To achieve this we analyze cognitive theories to types of elements, which help to clarify the main
promote learning as well as explain issues relating idea. In this way learning could be reinforced.
to the LOs characteristics that help to improve their For reusing LOs in many educational levels
quality for a suitable management. It is because and contexts, it must include a principal or a few
LOs need to be enabled with other ones to build related ideas; in this way teachers are free to decide
the largest units (didactic units, courses, etc.) in which learning context they must be used. It is
possible to deliver selected LOs for students; it possible because LOs are not necessarily related
means they are part of the whole. In addition, this to any time, methodology or instructional design.

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Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

Independent LOs characterized by one or few ity Los.” According to the RAE (2006) definition,
related ideas means the possibility to teach some quality is a property or group of properties inherent
topic by itself, avoiding reusability problems. in a thing, which aims to judge their value. Taking
Accessible through metadata capabilities deliver into account this definition and LOs character-
the LOs characteristics providing different kinds istics, we define quality learning objects design
of information about them. as a property or group of properties inherent in
Our proposal is based on IMS specifications, a learning objects, which aim to value them as
for this reason we refer to metadata considering equal, better or worse than other ones.
IMS LOM (Learning Object Metadata) (IMS Quality is a concept that involves other issues
LOM, 2003), which is a derivation of IEEE LOM for their evaluation, for example, quality criteria,
(IEEE LOM, 2002). Finally, LOs reusability metrics, instruments, and so forth. To achieve a
means the possibility that a LO could be reused whole quality LOs design, in the next section we
many times independent of software and platforms are going to mention LOs characteristics that aim
changes. This issue reflects their interoperability to define quality criteria to evaluate their quality
and durability characteristics. for an instructional design process.
IEEE LOM (2002) defines different kinds of
aggregation or granularity levels for Los; this LOs INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN
means different type of LOs to manage accord-
ing to their size. However, we think IEEE LOM Different kinds of learning theories exist to explain
(2002) definitions are too wide and do not consider how learning occurs. However, to apply some de-
educational sense. According to this we suggest sign for contents it is necessary to consider some
the following definitions: methods depending on learning situations, it is
possible through instructional design. Reigeluth
• Level 1: The smallest level of aggregation, and Moore (1999) explain that instructional design
for example, a picture, an image, a text, is a theory that offers an explicit guide about how
and so forth (IEEE LOM, 2002) to teach to learn.
• Level 2: A lesson with a specific learning Instructional design theories are related with
objective and a kind of content, practice the kind of information to try. About LOs some
and evaluation activities instructional design theories exist. Merrill (1999)
• Level 3: A learning module composed by proposes the instructional transaction theory
a group of lessons (LOs Level 2), practice directed to mechanized process “is an attempt to
and evaluation activities extend the conditions of learning and component
• Level 4: One or more courses composed display theory so that the rules are sufficiently
by a group of modules (LOs Level 3) with well specified to be able to drive automated in-
different kinds of contents, practice and structional design and development.”
evaluation activities This theory describes knowledge in terms of
three types of knowledge objects: entities, activi-
The levels mentioned suggest pedagogical ties, and processes. Also it identifies a lot of issues
components in order to help students to achieve like interrelationships among knowledge objects
their learning objectives. However this issue is including: components, properties abstractions,
not enough to ensure quality Los. and associations between entities, activities, and
In order to propose quality LOs design it is processes.
important to define what is the meaning of “qual-

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 Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

Merrill’s theory has been criticized about its that must be considered to ensure a quality LOs
excess structure because it doesn’t facilitate the instructional design. According to this in order to
content developers’ work and to put it into practice. provide an awareness of the elements that should
Based on Merrill’s theory (1999), Cisco Sys- be considered in the quality learning objects
tems (2004) suggests a guide for reusable learning instructional design for e-learning systems we
objects creation. This guide proposes specific suggest some quality criteria into the following
structures for any kind of specific learning ob- LOs components.
ject. It also provides a help guide and examples
for their classification. To ensure solid structures • Overview: According to Cisco Systems
for multi-courses, Cisco Systems provides five (2004) and Moreno and Bailly-Baillière
levels of hierarchy: course, module, lesson, topic, (2002), a didactic unit needs a general vi-
sub-topic. Each one of these levels has specific sion in which may be explained general
elements to structure them. objectives and introduction about the LOs
Cisco System LOs structure is shared by content. Introduction is an important ele-
Moreno and Bailly-Baillière (2003), however they ment for any kind of content because, as
suggest taking into account three kind of contents: well as their informative function about the
data and concept, procedure and process and fi- contents, they establish the purpose of the
nally reflection and attitude. According to them, topics and orient learners to what they are
the three kinds of contents involve the other ones expected to learn. On the other side, it is
(Moreno & Bailly-Baillière, 2003). In this way a motivation element that aims to engage
it is possible to simplify the content developers the students, letting them know why it is
work covering other related types of contents. We important for them.
think defining three kinds of contents involving
another ones is a good idea because each kind An overview must show the LOs objective too.
of them defines what learners are able to do, As we explain in the LOs definition, according to
because each one of them represents a specific LOs reusability characteristics ideally an objective
unit of learning together with a specific difficulty must be simple with one or few related ideas. We
level. For example, data and concept refer to basic suggest that an objective must be directed to learn
information about any subject, so they need to be one kind of content because in this way all the
considered at the beginning of a lesson; process instructional design would be targeted to achieve
and procedure implies a high level of difficulty this specific objective.
because it refers to some sequenced steps, which Other important issues that must be included
needs to consider previous to basic information in a LOs overview are its own title and the title
(data and concept). of the unit of learning; in this way students can
Finally, we would like to suggest “principles” know what part of a whole they are trying; the list
kind of content instead of “reflection and attitude;” of topics that aim to relate the topics; the number
this is because principles learning is related with of hours to be available to achieve the objective
high cognitive levels as induction, deduction, and that aim to organize the learning; and, finally,
so forth. Then, this kind of content needs to be keywords that aim to know what related areas
considered at the end of a lesson. are involved with the LOs content.
Nowadays, LOs instructional design is a topic
that is highly discussed. However, according to • Contents: One of the most important issues
those mentioned above there are some issues for instructional design is to define what

74
Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

kind of content we are trying. According are used to verify if the objectives were
to this some instructional design proposals achieved or not.
exist (Merrill, 1999; Clark, 1999; Moreno
& Bailly-Baillière, 1999; and so forth) in Activities may be included into any kind of
order to define a suitable information or content during all teaching and learning processes.
type of knowledge (facts, procedure, pro- They help users to know if they must to take the
cess, concept, principle, etc.) The type of next lesson or a content feedback.
content or unit of learning is very impor- Activities are recommended for any kind of
tant because it responds the answer about instructional design, however for LOs there are
what to teach according to a specific cogni- several issue to take into account that are not usu-
tive domain. ally discussed. In general activities are too related
with a context. Activities are recommended to
In general any kind of content must have some acquire new knowledge according to the students’
quality characteristics taking into account dif- context (culture, interests, etc.).
ferent issues. From a pedagogical point of view, However activities related with a specific
contents must be in line with logic and psycho- context can causes problems to reuse LOs for
logical meaningful: that is to mean, on one side another context. To promote LOs reusability
discipline logic (content sequence, methodology, we suggest proposing into instructional design
kind of activities, etc.), and on the other side users some LOs activities that aim to learn the contents
suitability (level of difficulty, user interests, etc.). independent of the context. For example, some
Other issues related with any kind of content are self-assessment activities can help students to
the information veracity, data entirely correct, remember and, relating concepts between them,
good redaction and orthography, and so forth. some questions about content reflection can help
However, taking into account the LOs charac- to learn specific contents, and so forth.
teristics it is important that contents do not mention In order to avoid contents reusability prob-
something about the time, for example, this week lems we suggest making some context activities
or this semester… because it could delay its reus- independent of the LOs structure, in this way the
ability for other educational situations. The same LO would have more probabilities to be reused
thing must be taking into account for the audience, in another context.
so phrases related to the kind of users like “dear Some authors (Zapata, 2005; Del Moral &
engineering students…” must be avoided. Cernea, 2006) promote constructivist learning
environments for learning objects. They empha-
• Practice activities: Activities may be di- size that activities must be as diverse as possible
rected to promote new knowledge acqui- to attend to different kind of users: case studies,
sition and prepare users for a final assess- to resolve problems, collaborator work, reflect
ment. Clark (2002) promotes practice and about situations, and so forth. However, we think
assessment activities. The first one has to a deep reflection about them is necessary before
support students to acquire new knowl- their application to LOs.
edge providing feedback, pointing out the Activities are closely related with the kind of
most important information, and to prepare contents; if LOs contents are just talking about a
them for a final evaluation. The second one basic concept, fact or data, the kind of activities
must be a final experience together with may be directed to reinforce them, for example, re-
an approbation or reproval degree. They lating basic concepts with true or false options, and

75
 Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

so forth. Probably another activity like case study be done, for example, by diagrams, sche-
doesn’t need this level of complexity. According mas, conceptual maps, and so forth.
to this, in order to respond different complexity • Evaluation activities: As we mentioned
levels, contents, and cognitive domains, we sug- above, assessment is a kind of activity that
gest taking into account three kinds of activities: must be a final experience together with
initiation, restructuring and application. an approbation or reproval degree. Their
function is to verify if the objectives were
• Initiation activities classification may be achieved or not. An evaluation must take
for all LOs, which are designed to teach into account each one of the learning ob-
basic content for a specific subject. An ex- jectives and must be directed to any kind of
ample of this is a quiz. content and their level of difficulty.
• Restructuring activities classification may
be directed to promote new knowledge ac- As we said before, LOs need to be enabled with
quisition, such as activities that promote other ones to build the largest units (didactic units,
questions, investigation, and so forth. courses, etc.) possible to deliver selected LOs for
• Application activities may be directed to students (Cisco System, 2004; Moreno & Bailly-
promote students’ experiences in order to Baillière, 2002). According to the LOs components
achieve their new concepts acquisition. An mentioned above, Figure 1 shows the relation be-
example of this activity is a case study. tween LOs instructional design components trough
an ontological model proposing some classification
Due to LOs reusability characteristic some that could be considered for an application profile
authors like Cisco System (2004) and Bailly- Bail- in order to improve LOs management.
lière (2002) recommend making some sequential LOs classification suggested above is a way to
activities at the end of a lesson. This is to avoid facilitate LOs management according to instruc-
consistency problems with new LOs adaptation. tional design characteristics. Cognitive level aims
In this way it is possible to attend the whole of to define what student skills to develop and what
each one of individual LO content. they are able to do. This information is important
Web development is directed to the social web, from a pedagogical point of view to determine their
which promotes collaborative tasks that need to reusability in another educational context.
be considered for learning. According to this. On the other side, contents classification aims
García-Peñalvo et al. (2007) suggest relating Web to decide if they are suitable for other educational
tools with different kind of e-activities in order to objectives and aims to determine the contents
promote collaborative work. sequence, because any kind of content defines the
specific type of content that LOs contain. This is-
• Summary or conclusions: For whatever sue is useful to give students specific LOs content
kind of teaching and learning process, it is they need.
advisable a summary after contents review. According to the knowledge model proposed,
For a suitable summary it is advisable to activities are classified by practice and evaluation,
point out the principal ideas and relation as we explained in the first section. Both have the
between them, in this way it is possible to same classification and strategy, however the last
reinforce the contents and learner progress. one must be evaluated to promote students to
Also it is important to relate the contents another learning stage.
with another knowledge areas. This may

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Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

Figure 1. An ontological model for LOs instructional design

LOs normalization is a way to prepare LOs for CONCLUSION

their management and evaluation, because in this
way it is possible to uniform their characteristics Nowadays LOs are a subject that is highly dis-
promoting their quality criteria. This issue aims to cussed, but there is not a consensus about their
respond to an important question for knowledge instructional design. This is due to several things,
management: what to manage? one of which is a big breach between pedagogi-

77
 Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

cal and computer science areas. On one side, Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R. E. (2002). E-learning
from the computer science area there is a high and the science of instruction: Proven guidelines
concern about promoting LO characteristics for for consumers and designers of multimedia learn-
automated process: reusability, accessibility and ing. San Francisco: Josey Bass/Pfeiffer.
interoperability.
Cortes, B. C., Cunha, M. M., & Putnik, G. D. (Eds.).
Nowadays some specifications and standards
(2006). Adaptive technologies and business inte-
are in development as an attempt to solve these
gration: social, managerial and organizational
problems. As well some researches are focused
dimensions. Hershey, PA: Idea Group Reference.
in development repositories to attend to any kind
of LOs aggregation level. Cunha, M. M., & Putnik, G. D. (2006). Agile vir-
From a pedagogical point of view, researchers tual enterprises: Implementation and management
complain of a lack of instructional design plan, support. Hershey, PA: Idea Group Publishing.
which aims to direct the LOs content to achieve
Del Moral, M. E., & Cernea, D. A. (2006). Wikis,
a learning objective. However, there are some
Folksonomías y Webquest: Trabajo colaborativo
pedagogical issues that are difficult to achieve
a través de Objetos de Aprendizaje. En III Simpo-
for automated process.
sio Pluridisciplinar sobre Objetos y Diseños de
Nowadays technical and pedagogical issues for
Aprendizaje Apoyados en la Tecnología, Oviedo,
quality learning objects design are not easy to solve
España. Retrieved from http://www.spi.uniovi.es/
because it depends of an agreement between them.
od@06/inicio.htm
In a way to help to give a solution we suggested
some issues to take into account from instructional García-Peñalvo, F. J., Morales, E., & Barrón,
design view. We think it is very important to apply A. (2007). Learning objects for e-activities in
some instructional design, because it aims to give social web. WSEAS Transactions on Systems,
LOs educational sense. 6(3), 507–513.
The LOs definition we are proposing aims to
IEEE LOM. (2002). Standard for learning object
define some instructional design components, and
metadata. ANSI/IEEE. Retrieved from http://ltsc.
quality criteria provided aim to create a valid and
ieee.org/wg12/
quality unit of learning. On this basis, it is easier
to apply quality criteria for LOs because they have IMS LOM. (2003). Learning resource metadata
a uniform structure. specification. Retrieved from http://www.ims-
This work does not pretend to solve the LOs global.org/metadata/mdinfov1p1.html
quality problem, but proposes some ideas to
Merrill, D. (1999). Instructional transaction theory
improve their quality into a pedagogical point of
(ITT): Instructional design based on knowledge
view that must be applied both to instructional
objects. In C. Reigeluth (Ed.), Instructional design
design and metadata information.
theories and models: A new paradigm of instruc-
tional theory (Vol. II, pp. 397-424). Mahwah, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc.
REFERENCES

Cisco Systems. (2004). Reusable learning object

authored guidelines: How to build modules, les-
sons and topics (White paper). Retrieved from
www.cisco.com

78
Quality Learning Objective in Instructional Design

Morales, E. M., García, F. J., & Barrón, Á. (2006). KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
LOs instructional design based on an ontologi-
cal model to improve their quality. In L. Panizo E-Learning: The use of Internet technolo-
Alonso, L. Sánchez González, B. Fernández gies for learning activities to promote a wide
Majón, & M. Llamas Nistal (Eds.), Proceedings display of solutions for improving knowledge
of the 8th International Symposium on Comput- and performance.
ers in Education, SIIE‘06 (Vol. 1, pp. 441-448). Instructional Design: Instructional design
León, Spain. is the systematic development of instructional
specifications using learning and instructional
Moreno, F., & Bailly-Baillière, M. (2002). Diseño theory to ensure the quality of instruction. It is the
instructivo de la formación online. Aproximación entire process of analysis of learning needs and
metodológica a la elaboración de contenidos. goals and the development of a delivery system
Editorial Ariel Educación. to meet those needs. It includes development of
Polsani, P. (2003). Use and abuse of reusable learn- instructional materials and activities, and tryout
ing objects. Journal of Digital Information, 3(4). and evaluation of all instruction and learner activi-
ties (http://www.umich.edu).
Putnik, G. D., & Cunha, M. M. (Eds.). (2006). Learning Object: A unit with a learning
Knowledge and technology management in virtual objective, together with digital and independent
organizations: Issues, trends, opportunities and capabilities, accessible through metadata to be
solutions. Hershey, PA: Idea Group Publishing. reused in different contexts and platforms.
Real Academia Española (RAE). (2006). Re- Learning Objects Repository (LOR): Col-
trieved from www.rae.es lections of learning objects that are accessible
via Internet. They function like portals with a
Reigeluth, C. M., & Moore, J. (1999). Cogni- Web-based user interface, a search service and a
tive education and the cognitive domain. In C. catalogue for the resources contained.
Reigeluth (Ed.), Intructional-design theories and Level of Granularity: How much or how little
models: A new paradigm of instructional theory information is included in a learning object. It is
(pp. 51-68). Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc. related with the LOs size.
Wiley, D. A. (2000). Learning object design and Metadata: Coded information about a learning
sequencing theory. Unpublished Doctoral Dis- object that aims to describe and manage them in
sertation, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT. the learning object repository.
Quality Learning Objects: A property or
Zapata, R. M. (2006). Calidad en entornos virtuales group of properties inherent in a learning objects,
de aprendizaje y secuenciación de learning objects which aim to value them as equal, better or worse
(LO). [Encuentro d Universidades & eLearning.]. than other ones.
Actas del Virtual Campus, 2006, V. Reusability: A property of learning objects,
which promotes the reuse of them for other educa-
tional situations and contexts. It depends on both
metadata information and instructional design.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Networked and Virtual Organizations, edited by Goran D. Putnik and
Maria Manuela Cruz-Cunha, pp. 1325-1332, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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80

Chapter 1.8
Instructional Design
Methodologies
Irene Chen
University of Houston – Downtown, USA

ABSTRACT the ASSURE model. These models share three

major components: analysis, strategy develop-
Instructional design (ID) is the systematic process ment, and evaluation. This chapter identifies the
of planning events to facilitate learning. The ID different roles and responsibilities involved when
process encompasses a set of interdependent developing a typical title and outlines the main
phases including analysis of learners, contexts and steps in the development.
goals, design of objectives, strategies and assess-
ment tools, production of instructional materials,
and evaluation of learner performance and overall INTRODUCTION
instructional design effort. The system approach,
developed in the 1950s and 1960s, is rooted in the Instructional design (ID) is the systematic process
military and business world and has dominated of planning events to facilitate learning. The ID
educational technology and educational develop- process encompasses a set of interdependent
ment since the 1970s. Currently, there are more phases including analysis of learners, contexts and
than 100 different ISD models, with almost all goals, design of objectives, selection of strategies
based on the generic ADDIE model. Other com- and assessment tools, production of instructional
monly known models include the Dick and Carey materials, and evaluation of learner performance
model, the R2D2 model, the ICARE model, and and overall instructional design effort (Gagne,
Briggs, & Wager, 1992). 
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch108

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Instructional Design Methodologies

Instructional design models may be defined as learning. Instructional design is the sys-
the visualized representations of an instructional tematic process of developing instructional
design process, showing the main elements or systems and instructional development is
phases of the process and their relationships. the process of implementing the system or
The systems approach involves setting goals and plan.
objectives, analyzing resources, devising a plan of • Instructional technology is the systematic
action, and continuous evaluation and modifica- application of theory and other organized
tion of the program (Saettler, 1990). The system knowledge to the task of instructional de-
approach, developed in the 1950s and 1960s and sign and development.
rooted in the military and business world, has
dominated educational technology and educa- The growth of instructional design is relatively
tional development since the 1970s. brief when compared with more mature design
Currently, there are more than 100 ISD models, fields such as architecture. Only during the last
but almost all are based on the generic ADDIE century have scholars conducted in-depth research
model. The more commonly known models are into learning theories, instructional theories, and
the Dick and Carey model, the ICARE model, systematic approaches to instruction. Many re-
and the ASSURE model. These models all share searchers analyze how human learning is relevant
three major common characteristics: analysis, for the design of educational material (Gros, Elen,
strategy development, and evaluation. This chapter Kerres, Merrienböer, & Spector, 1997; Reigeluth,
identifies the different roles and responsibilities 1999; Schneider, n.d.; Winn, 1997). ID theory pro-
involved in developing a typical title and outlines vides guidance on the task of designing learning
the main steps in the development. This chapter experiences. It also provides a bridge to learning
also explores ID in terms of definitions, models, theories and instructional theories. According
and usage. to Reigeluth, “Instructional theory describes a
variety of methods of instruction (different ways
of facilitating human learning and development)
INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN, and when to use—and not use—each of those
TECHNOLOGY, AND methods” (Squire & Reigeluth, 2000).
THEORY BACKGROUND Most researchers agree that instructional
materials are concerned with electronic learn-
The following key ID terminologies (1996) are ing environments. Such an environment is a
explained in “Definitions of Instructional Design”: combined system involving tasks, stakeholders,
courseware, etc., which is aimed at supporting
• The discipline of instructional design is a learning processes. Learning takes place mostly in
branch of knowledge concerned with re- interaction between learners, courseware products,
search and theory about instructional strat- other tools, and to a lesser degree tutors (human
egies and the process for developing and or artificial) (Schneider, n.d.).
implementing those strategies. The discipline of instructional design concerns
• Instructional development is the process of research and theory about instructional strategies.
implementing the design plans. Theory background for teaching and learning are
• An instructional system is an arrangement presented in the following section.
of resources and procedures to promote

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 Instructional Design Methodologies

INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN Producers also need to focus on the identified

PROJECT MANAGEMENT audience and objectives and suggest technology
options. The instructional design steps save time
Developing an instructional project involves by focusing the team and serve as the foundation
skill sets ranging from project management and for project development and a roadmap through
interface design to sound preparation and program- the process.
ming. Sometimes, budgets and schedules require
multimedia developers to juggle more than one
role. Design teams represent various fields of INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN
expertise (producers, instructors, editors, etc.). AND TECHNOLOGY PROJECT
Although multimedia tools make it possible for MANAGEMENT LIFE CYCLE
one person to perform every task, few people
have the combination of technical, artistic, and Every instructional design project is different, but
management skills necessary to fill every role almost all follow these typical project planning,
well. As a rule, teams with a range of expertise development, and implementation steps:
best develop instructional design projects. The
more a person understands each team crew’s role 1. Determine project scope
and responsibilities, the better they will perform 2. Letter of understanding
in these roles. 3. Contractual agreement
4. Storyboard
• Project manager 5. Prototype
• Instructional designers 6. Script development
• Content experts/writers/script writer/ 7. Media development
writer/editor 8. Authoring
• Developers/program authors/lead 9. Alpha testing
programmer 10. Beta testing
• Video specialists/camera operator 11. Project delivery
• Audio/video specialists/sound engineer/
audio technician Several of the previously mentioned steps can
• Graphic artists/art director overlap each other. Most projects involve several
• Testers cycles of media development, authoring, review,
and revision. In fact, your project is likely to
The entire instructional design team together evolve as your resources change. For example, the
has to establish a consistent design for the title by content has to be ready before the developers can
specifying what the navigation system looks like, integrate it into the final project. But writers need
where information and media appear on screen, to integrate the content and review it on screen in
and what fonts, colors, and graphical design ele- order to edit the content well.
ments to use.
Time is critical, especially with a team of
more than three members working on the same THE APPLICATIONS OF
instructional project. Team members need to share INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN MODELS
expertise, intent, calendars, and internal standards.
Designers need to clarify their goals, objectives, In addition to its concerns with research and theory
content, and evaluation plans to the producers. about learning and instructional strategies, the

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Instructional Design Methodologies

discipline of instructional design is also concerned and support each other. This also ensures that the
with the process for developing and implementing design is complete and packaged to be transmitted
those strategies. The learning and instruction theo- to the clientele prior to instruction. In this way,
ries discussed above forms the basic foundation no phase of instructional design will be forgot-
of most of the work that instructional designers ten or shortchanged. Instructional design models
do, much as a basic understanding of engineering can help both individuals and design teams work
undergirds the work of architects (Schneider, n.d.). through the process of planning and developing
Instructional design theory is also what designers instruction. Consciously working back and forth
draw on when they need guidance to overcome through the steps of an ID model will add speed
problems in the design process. and clarity and insure that key instructional prin-
Models help learners to visualize the problem, ciples are addressed. Instructional design models
and then break it down into discrete, manageable can also be used to assess existing educational
units (Ryder, 2006). In instructional design, models material and help in everyday planning.
can be defined as the visualized representations A variety of models for instructional system
of an instructional design process, displaying the design proliferated the late 1970s and early 80s:
main phases and their relationships. Each phase Gagné and Briggs, and Dick and Carey, to name
has an outcome that feeds the subsequent phase. a few. One possible reason for this phenomenon
ID models are visualized representations of an involves the establishment of formal education
instructional design process, showing the main and training departments within both public and
elements or phases and their relationships. The private organizations. Faced with the computer-
instructional design models are the instructional ized technologies of the times, these organizations
designer’s primary “tool,” which functions as a require a means to quickly develop appropriate
guide allowing the designer to produce effective, methods by which to educate employees in the
efficient, and consistent instruction (Hinton, n.d.). new business practices ushered into existence by
Instructional design models can be used in the information age. Another explanation is that
many settings and to varying degrees. Individual businesses, especially consulting organizations,
instructors creating their own traditional classroom are becoming increasingly required to demonstrate
material can benefit from consciously using an value-added not only to their organization, but to
instructional design model. Instructional design the clients they serve. The evaluation and continu-
projects present the same kind of management ous improvement components of contemporary
issues that other types of projects face. Design- instructional design models of make far strides
ers need to consider variables that range from from the early develop-and-implement models of
how the project should look onscreen to what the middle of the century in this aspect.
the personnel, equipment, budget, schedule, and
resources allow the project to accomplish. Good
project development depends on having a clear SYSTEMS APPROACH
picture of the steps involved in the process. In- TO INSTRUCTIONAL
structional design teams use instructional design SYSTEMS DESIGN (ISD)
models to speed up the process, assist in internal
and external communication, and cover all phases The system approach, rooted in the military and
of instructional design. business world, was developed in the 1950s and
Close alignment of instructional design steps 1960s, and has dominated educational technology
insure that the elements of instruction are all and educational development since the 1970s.
consciously addressed and all the pieces relate to

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 Instructional Design Methodologies

Instructional design has successfully estab- components of the system interact to achieve
lished a fairly broad knowledge base, with founda- learning. The focus is on what the learner will be
tions in psychology and other professional prac- able to know when the instruction is concluded.
tices. The systems approach to instructional design
was often accredited to James Finn. Seels (1989)
described Finn as the father of the instructional THE ADDIE MODEL
design movement because he linked the theory
of systems design to educational technology and The ADDIE model has been in use for training
thus encouraged the integrated growth of these development for several decades. Almost all ISD
related fields of study. Finn also made educational models currently in use are based on the generic
technologists aware that technology was as much ADDIE. The systems approach does not prescribe
a process as a piece of hardware (Seels, 1989). or promote any particular teaching methodology.
The onset of World War II introduced the huge No one method will be appropriate for all objec-
problem of training thousands of military person- tives or for all students. Rather, it is a vehicle that
nel quickly and effectively. The answer at the time helps teachers to think more systematically and
was an enormous influx of mediated learning logically about the objectives relevant to their
material: films, slides, photographs, audiotapes, students, and the means of achieving and assess-
and print materials. In the 1960s, the military was ing these (Chen, 2005). These early efforts of ISD
rapidly infusing instructional systems develop- in education led to several ISD models that were
ment into their standard training procedures. This developed in the late 1960s.
period was distinguished by the articulation of The current version of the systems approach
components of instructional systems. is a process comprised of a series of phases.
The systems approach views a system as a Sometimes referred to as the ADDIE model, the
set of interrelated parts, all working toward a systems approach of instructional design contains
defined goal. Examples of systems include the the following major phases: analysis, design,
human body and a community. Parts of a system development, implementation, and evaluation.
will depend on other parts for input and output.
The entire system uses feedback from stakehold- • Analysis
ers to determine if the goal is achieved. In 1962, • Determine the instructional goal
Robert Glaser employed the term instructional • Analyze the instructional goal
system and named, elaborated, and diagramed • Analyze the learners and context of
its components. He also synthesized the work of learning
previous researchers and introduced the concept • Design
of “instructional design,” submitting a model, • Write performance objectives
which links learner analysis to the design and • Development
development of instruction. • Develop instructional strategies
In the field of education, the systems-approach • Develop and select instruction
model first focused on language laboratories. The • Develop assessment instruments
instruction can be viewed as a systematic process • Implementation
in which every component is crucial to achieve • Implement the system
the goal of successful learning. These components • Revise the instruction if necessary
include the learner, instructor, instructional ma- • Evaluation
terials, and the learning environment. The many

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Instructional Design Methodologies

• Design and conduct the formative evalua- 4. Write performance objectives

tion of instruction 5. Develop assessment instruments
• Conduct summative evaluation 6. Develop instructional strategy
7. Develop and select instruction
Each step receives input from the previous 8. Design and conduct formative evaluation
step and provides output for the next step. A sys- 9. Revise instruction
tem is modified if the goal is not achieved. Each 10. Use summative evaluation
component is carefully linked. The ADDIE model
is possibly the best known design model, and is Establishing an instructional goal or goals is
frequently used in academic circles. typically preceded by a needs assessment. The
needs assessment is a formal process of identify-
ing discrepancies between current outcomes and
THE DICK AND CAREY MODEL desired outcomes for an organization. Dick et al.
described the performance objectives as a state-
Today, Walter Dick and Lou Carey are widely ment of what the learners would be expected to
viewed as the torchbearers of the approach with do when they have completed a specified course
their authoritative book “The Systematic Design of instruction, stated in terms of observable per-
of Instruction” (1978). While a number of ver- formances.
sions of the ISD model exist, the Dick and Carey The technique of hierarchical analysis is ap-
model is very popular in current instructional plied for goals in the intellectual skills domain
design programs. to identify the critical subordinate skills needed
Dick and Carey’s model, a systems-approach to achieve the goal and their interrelationships.
model for designing instruction, is based on the Formative evaluation is used to collect data and
assumption that there is a predictable link between information that is used to improve a program,
a stimulus and the response that is produced in conducted while the program is still being de-
a learner. It describes the phases of an iterative veloped. And finally, summative evaluation is
process that starts by identifying instructional conducted after an instructional program has been
goals and ends with evaluation. This model in- implemented and formative evaluation completed
cludes analysis, design, development, formative to present conclusions. The Dick and Carey model
evaluation, plus needs assessment in a nonlinear describes all the phases of an iterative process
relationship (Dick & Carey, 1978). The designer that starts by identifying instructional goals and
needs to identify the sub-skills the student must ends with summative evaluation. This model is
master that, in aggregate, permit the intended be- applicable across a range of context areas (e.g.,
havior to be learned, and then select the stimulus K-12 schools to business to government) and users
and strategy for its presentation that builds each (novice to expert).
sub-skill.
The following is a list of the elements of Dick
et al.’s model explained in “The Systematic Design THE RAPID PROTOTYPING MODEL
of Instruction.”
Some researchers feel that conventional ISD mod-
1. Determine the instructional goal els place too much emphasis on procedures and
2. Analyze the instructional goal not on principles. They argue that conventional
3. Analyze the learners and contexts ISD models prescribe global tasks such as prepare

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the draft version of your instructional material team. The approach stresses the importance of
and fail to provide guidance in the selection of thinking about and revising ideas, plans, con-
appropriate instructional strategies and tactics. cepts, and procedures based on observation and
As a result, the rapid prototyping methodology analysis of what is happening in the context of
has been used in software engineering. Generally, practice (Chen, 1998). The recursive nature of
rapid prototyping models involve learners and the process involves making the same decisions
subject matter experts (SMEs) interacting with several, even many, times throughout the design
instructional designers in a continuous review and development process so that initial decisions
and revision cycle. or designs are not necessarily the “final” ones.
A typical rapid prototyping model uses tem- Non-linearity refers to the lack of a prescribed
plates for various types of task for the sake of ef- sequence of steps in the R2D2 design process. A
ficiency. Much time and other resources are saved designer using the R2D2 model can commence
by focusing on critical content and key steps and the design process with a vague plan and gradu-
producing a lean instructional package. Improve- ally develop, refine, and revise the plan through
ments to this core package are added gradually group interaction. The designer can elect to begin
after it is implemented. with any number of tasks through task analysis;
Tripp and Bichelmeyer’s rapid prototyping there is no required “beginning point.” The
model is a four level process that 
is intended to fourth principle, participatory design, refers to
create instruction for individual lessons as opposed the involvement of a design team, which usually
to entire curricula. The 
process stages include: includes instructional designers, experts on the
subject matter as well as aspects of the instructional
• Perform a needs analysis process, specialists in graphic design and other
• Construct a prototype supporting fields, and end-users (Chen, 1998).
• Utilize the prototype to perform research Participatory design means representatives of each
• Install the final system type of stakeholder are involved in all aspects of
the design and development process. The partici-
This model relies on expert instructional de- patory design approach stresses the need for the
signers to utilize heuristics as well as their 
past team to develop approaches and solutions based
experience and intuition to guide the design on input and feedback from the team.
(Hoffman & Margerum-Leys, n.d.) With R2D2, the ID team is expected to actively
reflect on and analyze work to date and regularly
revise and rework both the material being devel-
R2D2 oped and the models that underlie its development
(see Figure 1).
Willis (1995) proposed the recursive, reflective,
design, and development model (R2D2). This
iterative model is based on constructivist theory THE ICARE MODEL
and has four general guiding principles that ap-
ply to the entire ID process: reflection, recursion, According to its main proponents, Hoffman and
non-linearity, and participatory design. Ritchie (1998), the ICARE model is distilled
Reflection involves critically considering work from basic instructional design practice, adapting
to date and making changes based on personal various systems or “steps of instruction” to what
analysis as well as feedback from a collaborative seemed to be particularly useful components for an

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Instructional Design Methodologies

Figure 1. A graphical representation of the R2D2

THE ASSURE MODEL
instructional design (ID) model. The model has
three focal points (define, design and develop, and
This ASSURE model developed by Heinich, Mo-
disseminate). The nature of this graphic, which has
lenda, Russell, and Smaldino provides an acronym
no obvious beginning or ending and constructs
to help practitioners remember the steps they must
an “impossible world” perspective, represents
work through (Heinich et al., 2001). It incorporates
the two Rs of the R2D2 ID model: recursion and
Gagne’s events of instruction to assure effective
reflection (Willis, 1995).
use of media in instruction. The ASSURE model
was modified to be used by teachers in the regular
classroom The ASSURE model applies these six
processes that teachers and trainers can use to
design and develop the learning environment for
their students. 

• Analyze learners
• State objectives
• Select instructional methods, media, and
materials
• Utilize media and materials
• Require learner participation
online course. For instance, in converting a course • Evaluate and revise
to distant learning units, a conventional 20-credit
module is broken down to 20 units worth 9 hours
of study each. The model has the following five FUTURE TRENDS
distinctive but interrelated components that are ap-
plied to individual lesson/lecture known as a unit: Every ID model has some attributes not uni-
versally seen in all the others, such as inclusion
1. Introduction of context analysis as a function of the design
2. Content process, sequencing of test development, and
3. Apply the formative evaluation. Because of the limita-
4. Reflect tions of two-dimensional graphic representations
5. Extend and to simplify a discussion of the activities of
instructional design, instructional design models
Introduction involves reflection and determina- have an unintended, yet starkly apparent attribute
tion as to how the model fits into the context of the of being sequential. Designers from every experi-
learners’classroom. The next step is connecting the ence level may sometimes follow this sequence;
educational material with the learner’s real-world however, more commonly circumstances may
environment, and presenting the new material cause the designer to modify the sequence of
initially with ample explanations for appropriate design activities. Many times the steps within a
conceptual scaffolding. Then designers have to certain phase may occur concurrently.
apply the material during simulation and provid- The growth of instructional design is relatively
ing feedback on the learner’s progress, including brief. Only during the last century have scholars
performance assessment. After these three steps, done in-depth studies into learning theory and
reflections and extension follow. systematic approaches to instruction. Until re-

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cently, technologies have limited the number and ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI)
diversity of learners an instructor could address
and involve. New breakthroughs in hardware Artificial intelligence involves the computer
and software technologies open the doors to new working to supply responses to student input
possibilities. Jacobs and Dempsey (2002) present from the computer’s database. The development
three emerging influences that will impact the of artificial intelligence will permit control over
future of instructional design: object-oriented instructional environments and activities. This is
distributed learning environments, artificial intel- especially apparent in the improvement of course
ligence (AI), and the fields of cognitive science management, which is a key aspect of instructional
and neuroscience. design. Computers are particularly good at keeping
track of information and providing guidance in
solving problems. Therefore, learning manage-
OBJECT-ORIENTED DISTRIBUTED ment systems (LMS) are likely to become more
LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS routinely available to learners, instructors, and
managers in the future and intelligent tutorials
Objects permit the reuse of code and materials, will most likely become common place.
saving time and resources needed by program- Researchers including Muraida, Spector, and
mers, and expanding compatibility of applica- Gros discussed the use of automated instructional
tions. While most electronic learning content is design (AID) tools in military courseware develop-
currently developed for a specific purpose such ment. According to them, AID tools are especially
as a course or a situational performance interven- useful in situations where instructional design
tion, the reusable learning object (RLO) content expertise is lacking and subject-matter experts
is modular, freestanding, able to satisfy a single and others are responsible for developing instruc-
learning objective, and transportable among ap- tion. AID tools may eliminate some traditional ID
plications and environments. As organizations tasks such as storyboarding and test generation
make significant investments in digital learning (Kasowitz, 1998). There are four types of tools
content, they seek greater assurances of portabil- that guide users through the ID process: expert
ity, platform independence, and longevity, and systems, advisory systems, information manage-
reusability of digital content (Resnick, 2002). The ment systems, and electronic performance support
development and acceptance of “open standards” systems. Authoring tools are also mentioned as
helps safeguard investments in content develop- popular mechanisms for supporting the produc-
ment because they enable integration with other tion of computer-based instruction. The strength
campus systems and facilitate content sharing. of AID tools lies in their ability to guide novices
Object-oriented distributed learning environ- and non-ID professionals through the process of
ments present several new challenges to ID mod- creating effective instruction.
els. There is a growing body of literature relates
to game design and larger issues surrounding new
media theory. Some of this work has already been COGNITIVE SCIENCE AND
applied to education (Aldrich, 2004), but much NEUROSCIENCE
more could be done to apply gaming and principles
of virtual world to instructional design. As discussed in previous sections, historically,
instructional design grew out of educational psy-
chology and became integrated with instructional

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Instructional Design Methodologies

technology (Dick, 1987; Merrill & Wilson, 2005; the moral and value layers of meaning, human-
Reiser, 2001). Advances in the areas of cognitive computer interface, and the aesthetic side of our
science and neuroscience will encourage more work. The foundations or pillars of practice need
accurate monitoring of human learning based to go beyond learning theory, and beyond the vari-
on individual activity. A recent special issue of ous ID models depicting the life cycle of design.
Educational Technology (May-June 2004) began a Many ID professionals also propose that
dialogue between researchers associated with two while most of the current discussions focus on
fields: instructional design and learning sciences traditional ID models, there is a growing concern
(Wilson, 2005). The learning sciences (LS) field both within and without the field about the efficacy
enjoys higher academic status due to its closer of instructional design and its contribution to the
ties to psychology and cognitive science, which learning community. Recent attacks on ISD have
are seen as more basic and rigorous disciplines devalued it as being archaic, inflexible, and inef-
within the academy. On the other hand, ID holds fective (Hadley, 2004). While instructional design
the practitioner advantage. This is a powerful models are helpful in mapping the intricacies of
advantage in that ID trains professionals for both a design problem, they are sequenced of design
academic and non-academic jobs. Instructional decisions without the knowledge required to make
designers are seen as having more relevance to them. As a result, models consistently fall short
everyday concerns of practice, training, education, of real-world training problems.
and commerce (Wilson, 2005).
Within the field of instructional design, re-
searchers and practitioners have observed two CONCLUSION
constant refrains:
As presented, instructional design is a field that
• On the one hand, it is said that ID practi- affiliates with a number of disciplines including
tioners rarely work according to theories. educational psychology, information studies, and
They merely work intuitively (Gros et al., instructional technology. It is a discipline that
1997). applies theory to practice—learning theory to
• On the other hand, it is maintained that instructional design practice. Gagné himself said
much of ID theory is no longer applicable that, “In seeking a way of dealing with multiple
in the current context of rapid change, objectives other that serially, we perceive a need
global communication, and high technol- for treating human performance at a somewhat
ogy (English & Reigeluth, 1996). higher level of abstraction than is usual in most
instructional design models.” (1990). There is
These two prevalent views seem to suggest simply no right way to plan an educational project.
that there is a tension between theory and prac- However, ID practitioners can borrow the plan-
tice. According to modern instructional theorist, ning techniques and analytical tools, which can
there has been call for instructional design to shift be from established models and applied to inform
process driven analysis to learner driven analysis. and improve the finished product. This should
Reigeluth (2004) spoke of the “balanced be part of the toolkit of any competent designer
diet” provided by ID’s broad concern for design, (Hunter, n.d.).
development, implementation, management, and The generic ADDIE process has been the
evaluation. Wilson (2005) also calls for a more mainstay for many instructional designers over
balanced approach by increasing servings of the past two decades. Other than that, instructional
often-neglected aspects of design, particularly design is so eclectic that many researchers in the

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field have raged debates for years over basic defi- Chen, I. (1998). Design and development of a
nition, terminology, and procedures. Some claim prototype electronic textbook for technology and
that the systems thinking that formed the core of teacher education. Unpublished doctoral disserta-
ISD is outdated and inappropriate for instructional tion, University of Houston.
design and development; what is needed is more
Chen, I. (2005). Behaviorist theorists. In C. How-
rapid prototyping and user-centered design and
ard & G. Berg (Eds.), The encyclopedia of distance
development (Spector, 2004). This led many ID
learning. Hershey, PA: Idea Group Publishing.
researchers and practitioners to consider where we
have been and wonder how they have survived. Collins, A., Brown, J. S., & Holum, A. (1991).
Key to this merger between learning theories, Cognitive apprenticeship: Making thinking vis-
instructional theories, designers, and technologists ible. American Educator, 6-11, 38-46.
is a broad view of technology that included process
Definitions of Instructional Design. (1996). Re-
technologies such as procedures, models, and
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tion of learning principles to bring their work curriculum development process. Educational
into line with instructional technology, and use Leadership, 44(4), 54–56.
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the 21st century, ID must look to more mature English, R. E., & Reigeluth, C. M. (1996). For-
design fields for direction. Design disciplines mative research on sequencing instruction with
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automobile design are not characterized by the ogy Research and Development, 44(1), 23–42.
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signer and the craftsmanship of the product. Many
Gagné, R., Briggs, L., & Wager, W. (1992). Prin-
researchers argue that the value of instructional
ciples of instructional design (4th ed.). Fort Worth,
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TX: HBJ College Publishers.
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
constructivism, and hypertext: Random access
instruction for advanced knowledge acquisition Instructional Design: Instructional design,
in ill-structured domains. In T. Duffy & D. Jonas- also known as instructional systems design, is
sen (Eds.), Constructivism and the technology of the analysis of learning needs and systematic de-
instruction. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. velopment of instruction. Instructional designers
Spiro, R. J., & Jehng, J. (1990). Cognitive flex- often use Instructional technology as a method
ibility and hypertext: Theory and technology for for developing instruction. Instructional design
the non-linear and multidimensional traversal of models typically specify a method, that if fol-
complex subject matter. In D. Nix & R. Spiro lowed will facilitate the transfer of knowledge,
(Eds.), Cognition, education, and multimedia (pp. skills, and attitude to the recipient or acquirer of
163-205). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. the instruction.
Instructional Technology: The use of technol-
Squire, K. D., & Reigeluth, C. M. (2000). The ogy (computers, compact disc, interactive media,
many faces of systemic change. Educational software, hardware, video, audio, peripherals,
Horizons, (Spring): 143–152. teleconferencing, etc.) to support learning.
White, A. (2001). Component display theory. Needs Assessment: Used to determine if an
Retrieved January 9, 2006, from http://coe.sdsu. instructional need exists by conducting a needs
edu/eet/Articles/cdt/start.htm assessment using some combination of the fol-
lowing methods and techniques.
Performance/Learner Analysis: Used to
identify learner/trainee/employee characteristics

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Instructional Design Methodologies

and individual differences that may impact on revisions later on, and by completing design tasks
learning/performance such as prior knowledge, concurrently, rather than sequentially throughout
personality variables, aptitude variables, and the project. The steps are crunched together to
cognitive styles. reduce the amount of time needed to develop
Project Management: Project management training or a product. The design and development
is the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and phases are done simultaneously and the formative
techniques to a broad range of activities in order evaluation is done throughout the process.
to meet the requirements of the particular project. Storyboard: (see figure in Appendix) The
A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to process of sketching the content on planning
achieve a particular aim. Project management worksheets or with development software. As
knowledge and practices are best described in was true of the flowchart for computer program-
terms of their component processes. These pro- mers, the storyboard does not have to be a work
cesses can be placed into five process groups: of art. Graphics can be hand drawn. The idea
initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and of storyboarding is to give the production team
closing—and nine knowledge areas—project enough information so each member can take the
integration management, project scope manage- storyboards and begin to develop his/her portion
ment, project time management, project cost of the final product. The client and/or the subject
management, project quality management, project matter expert will work closely with the develop-
human resource management, project communica- ment staff in creating the storyboard.
tions management, project risk management, and Task Analysis: Used to determine if it is a
project procurement management. training/incentive/organizational problem. That
Rapid Prototyping: The use of rapid prototyp- is, identify who has the performance problem
ing methodologies is to reduce the production time (management/workers, faculty/learners), the cause
by using working models of the final product early of the problem, and appropriate solutions.
in a project tends to eliminate time-consuming

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APPENDIX

Figure 2. A storyboard template

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 1-14, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 95

Chapter 1.9
Contemporary
Instructional Design
Robert S. Owen
Texas A&M University-Texarkana, USA

Bosede Aworuwa
Texas A&M University-Texarkana, USA

INTRODUCTION Jordan, 1991; Kritch & Bostow, 1998; McDonald,

Yanchar, & Osguthorpe, 2005).
This article discusses the principles of two
qualitatively different and somewhat competing
instructional designs from the 1950s and 1960s, BACKGROUND
linear programmed instruction and programmed
branching. Our hope is that an understanding of An important difference between these instruc-
these ideas could have a positive influence on tional designs is associated with the use of feed-
current and future instructional designers who back to the learner. Although we could provide
might adapt these techniques to new technolo- a student with a score after completing an online
gies and want to use these techniques effectively. multiple-choice quiz, applications that provide
Although these older ideas do still see occasional more immediate feedback about correctness upon
mention and study (e.g., Brosvic, Epstein, Cook, completion of each individual question might
& Dihoff, 2005; Dihoff, Brosvic, & Epstein, & be better. Alternatively, we could provide adap-
Cook, 2004), many contemporary instructional tive feedback in which the application provides
designers are probably unaware of the learning elaboration based upon qualities of a particular
principles associated with these (cf., Fernald & answer choice.
Following is a discussion of two qualitatively
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch109 different instructional designs, one providing im-

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Contemporary Instructional Design

mediate feedback regarding the correctness of a frame. A frame is completed when the student
student’s answer, the other providing adaptive provides a response to a stimulus and receives
feedback based on the qualities of the student’s feedback. Skinner contended that this method
answer. Suitability of one design or the other is a caused learning through operant conditioning,
function of the type of learner and of the learning provided through positive reinforcement for
outcomes that are desired. stimuli that are designed to elicit a correct answer
(c.f., Cook, 1961; Skinner, 1954, 1958).
Skinner (and others who use his methods)
SOME CLASSIC CONCEPTS referred to his method as programmed instruc-
OF INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN tion, which incorporates at least the following
AND OUTCOMES principles (cf., Fernald & Jordan, 1991; Hedlund,
1967; Holland & Skinner, 1961; Skinner, 1958;
Although the idea of non-human feedback would Whitlock, 1967):
seem to imply a mechanical or electronic device,
other methods could be used. Epstein and his col- • Clear learning objectives.
leagues, for example, have used a multiple-choice • Small steps; frames of information repeat the
form with an opaque, waxy coating that covers the cycle of stimulus-response-reinforcement.
answer spaces in a series of studies (e.g., Epstein, • Logical ordered sequence of frames.
Brosvic, Costner, Dihoff, & Lazarus, 2003); when • Active responding by a student who works
the learner scratches the opaque coating to select at his/her own pace.
an answer choice, the presence of a star (or not) • Immediate feedback to the response in
immediately reveals the correctness of an answer. each frame with positive reinforcement for
Examples of the designs discussed next are based correct answers.
on paper books, but they are easily adaptable
to technologies that use hyperlinks, drop-down A technique in programmed instruction is to
menus, form buttons, and such. help the student a great deal at first, and then gradu-
ally reduce the cues in latter frames; this is called
Linear Programmed Instruction fading (Fernald & Jordan, 1991; Reiff, 1980).
If correct responding suggests that a student is
The programmed psychology textbook of Holland learning at a quick rate, gating can be used to skip
and Skinner (1961) asked the student a question over frames that repeat prior information (Vargus
on one page (the following quote starts on page & Vargus, 1991). The programmer is expected
2) and then asked the student to turn the page to to use information about student performance to
find the answer and a new question: make revisions; if the student is not succeeding,
then it is due to a fault of the program, not to an
A doctor taps your knee (patellar tendon) with a inability of the student (Holland & Skinner, 1961;
rubber hammer to test your __________. Vargus & Vargus, 1991).

The student thinks (or writes) the answer Programmed Branching

and turns the page to find the correct answer
(“reflexes”) and is then asked another question. Crowder (e.g., 1959, 1963) and others (e.g.,
Questions or statements are arranged in sequen- Pressey, 1963) were critical of Skinner’s approach,
tially ordered frames such as the previous single arguing that students not only learn from know-

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Contemporary Instructional Design

ing a correct answer, but also learn by making • It does not take into consideration the se-
mistakes. Crowder distinguished between his quence of development and readiness to
automatic tutoring device and the Skinner-type learn (e.g., children of different ages or
teaching machine, proposing that the automatic children vs. adults).
tutoring device is more flexible in allowing the • It develops rote learning skills rather than
student to receive an explanation when an error critical thinking skills.
is made. Crowder (1959, pp. 110-111) provides • Students can in some implementations
an example of how this approach could be used cheat.
in a programmed textbook: • The encouragement to respond quickly
could develop bad reading habits.
In the multiplication of 3×4 = 12, the number
12 is called the product and the numbers 3 and Crowder’s programmed branching design,
4 are called the which has received far less attention and study
Page 15 quotients. than Skinner’s ideas, would seem to answer at least
Page 29 factors. some of these criticisms. Crowder’s design pro-
Page 43 powers. vides an explanation to both correct and incorrect
answers, so the learner is not rewarded for cheating
In this programmed branching method of or working too quickly. Since the explanation is
Crowder, the student is taken to one of several tied to the learner’s thinking at the time a choice
possible discussions depending on the qualities was made, Crowder’s design would appear to be
of the answer. better to develop critical thinking skills, but might
While Skinner’s design would be expected to not be so good at developing rote learning skills.
work only when stimuli elicit correct answers, Crowder’s design would appear to be better suited
Crowder’s design allows for mistakes and must to students who have a greater readiness to learn,
be designed to anticipate particular mistakes. while perhaps not so well suited to a student who
Crowder believed that this method caused learning is at an earlier stage of learning a subject.
through cognitive reasoning. Whatever answer is The previous discussion suggests that each of
chosen by the student, the programmed textbook these designs is useful, but that each is useful in
(or machine) makes a branch to a discussion as- different kinds of situations and that the learning
sociated with issues relevant to the answer that outcomes of each approach might be different.
was chosen. This is followed by a return to the Skinner’s teaching machine, for example, might
same question if the student had made an incorrect be more useful in situations where students are
choice, or a jump to new a frame containing the learning lists and definitions. The automatic tu-
next question if the student had made a correct toring device, on the other hand, might be more
choice. useful when the student is already at a higher level
of understanding whereby s/he can now use rea-
Learning Outcomes soning to derive an answer, or in situations where
the student understands that there are degrees of
Many issues have been raised over the years about right and wrong without concrete answers. The
programmed instruction methods. Reiff (1980) Skinner-type teaching machine might be better
discussed several criticisms: suited to “lower-order” levels of learning, while the
Crowder-type automatic tutoring device might be
better suited to “higher-order” levels of learning.

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Although many ideas have been proposed with first two arguments would seem to become more
regard to a hierarchical perspective on “lower” and diminished in the future.
“higher” levels of learning, the most well-known, It is hoped that this article assists in diminishing
“Bloom’s Taxonomy” (A Committee of College the latter two arguments by introducing instruc-
and University Examiners, 1956), originated in tional designers to the principles discussed in this
about the same timeframe as the ideas of Skinner article and by encouraging instructional designers
and Crowder. “Bloom’s Taxonomy” proposes to create more effective designs with regard to
that the objectives of learning lie on a hierarchi- appropriateness for a particular student audience
cal continuum: (1) knowledge of terminology and with regard to the type and level of learning
and facts, (2) comprehension of translation and outcomes that are desired. By better understanding
paraphrasing, (3) application, (4) analysis, (5) the past, we can better affect the future.
synthesis, and (6) evaluation. Curiously, there has been less attention de-
“Bloom’s Taxonomy” is actually only Part I voted to Crowder’s ideas of adaptive feedback
of a two-part work. The previously mentioned than to Skinner’s ideas of immediate feedback
first part is known as the cognitive domain. Part and reinforcement. We continue see occasional
II (Krathwohl, Bloom, & Masia, 1964) focuses research devoted to related issues, such as issues
on the affective domain: (1) willingness to receive of immediate vs. delayed feedback (e.g., Brosvic
ideas, (2) commitment to a subject or idea, (3) et al., 2005; Dihoff et al., 2004; Kelly & Crosbie,
feeling that an idea has worth, (4) seeing inter- 1997) or of allowing students to keep selecting
relationships among multiple ideas, and (5) the answers from a multiple-choice set until the cor-
integration of ideas as one’s own. rect answer is finally discovered (Epstein et al.,
2003). However, we still can only speculate with
regard to conditions under which a Skinner-style
FUTURE TRENDS of instructional design would be better and when
a Crowder-style of design would be better. It is
Fernald and Jordan (1991) discussed several hoped that this article generates greater awareness
reasons as to why programmed instruction might of and use of these designs in new technologies,
have fallen out of use since the decades of the but also that greater interest in these ideas will
1950s and 1960s: stimulate more research into the learning mecha-
nisms associated with them.
• It was seen to dehumanize the teaching
process.
• Educators feared that it might be too effec- CONCLUSION
tive and threaten their jobs.
• The importance of the learning principles New technologies such as Web browsers now
was not understood. make it relatively easy for educators with the most
• Applications were often not effectively modest of skills to present instructional frames in
designed. a linear sequential ordering or as branches that are
dependent on the student’s selection of answers
Technology, economics, and attitudes have from a list. In adapting some of these older ideas
since changed. As economics and student demand to newer technologies, we hope that instructional
push us to use distance education methods, the designers will be better equipped to select appro-
priate methods by considering:

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Contemporary Instructional Design

• the student’s level of readiness for learning Epstein, M. L., Brosvic, G. M., Costner, K.
• the basis for learning when different in- L., Dihoff, R. E., & Lazarus, A. D. (2003). Ef-
structional designs are used fectiveness of feedback during the testing of
• the qualitatively different kinds of learning preschool children, elementary school children,
outcomes that are possible with different and adolescents with developmental delays. The
instructional designs Psychological Record, 53(2), 177–195.
Fernald, P. S., & Jordan, E. A. (1991). Programmed
instruction versus standard text in introduc-
tory psychology. Teaching of Psychology, 18(4),
REFERENCES
205–211. doi:10.1207/s15328023top1804_1
A Committee of College and University Examin- Hedlund, D. E. (1967). Programmed instruction:
ers. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives— Guidelines for evaluation of published materials.
The classification of educational goals, Handbook Training and Development Journal, 21(2), 9–14.
I: Cognitive domain. New York: David McKay
Company, Inc. Holland, J. G., & Skinner, B. F. (1961). The
analysis of behavior. New York: McGraw-Hill
Brosvic, G. M., Epstein, M. L., Cook, M. J., & Book Company, Inc.
Dihoff, R. E. (2005). Efficacy of error for the
correction of initially incorrect assumptions and Kelly, G., & Crosbie, J. (1997). Immediate and
of feedback for the affirmation of correct respond- delayed effects of imposed feedback delays in
ing: Learning in the classroom. The Psychological computerized programmed instruction. The Psy-
Record, 55(3), 401–418. chological Record, 47(4), 687–698.

Cook, D. L. (1961). Teaching machine terms: A Krathwohl, D. R., Bloom, B. S., & Masia, B.
glossary. Audiovisual Instruction, 6, 152–153. (1964). Taxonomy of educational objectives—The
classification of educational goals, Handbook II:
Crowder, N. A. (1959). Automatic tutoring by The affective domain. New York: David McKay
means of intrinsic programming. In E. Glanter Company, Inc.
(Ed.), Automatic teaching, the state of the art (pp.
109-116). New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc. Kritch, K. M., & Bostow, D. E. (1998). Degree
of constructed-response interaction in computer-
Crowder, N. A. (1963). On the differences be- based programmed instruction. Journal of Applied
tween linear and intrinsic programming. In J. P. Behavior Analysis, 31(3), 387–398. doi:10.1901/
DeCecco (Ed.), Educational technology: Readings jaba.1998.31-387
in programmed instruction (pp. 142-152). New
York: Holt, Rinehart, and Wilson. McDonald, J. K., Yanchar, S. C., & Osguthorpe, R.
T. (2005). Learning from programmed instruction:
Dihoff, R. E., Brosvic, G. M., Epstein, M. L., & Examining implications for modern instructional
Cook, M. J. (2004). Provision of feedback dur- technology. Educational Technology Research
ing preparation for academic testing: Learning is and Development, 53(2), 84–98. doi:10.1007/
enhanced by immediate but not delayed feedback. BF02504867
The Psychological Record, 54(2), 207–231.
Pressey, S. L. (1963). Teaching machine (and
learning theory) crisis. The Journal of Applied
Psychology, 47(1), 1–6. doi:10.1037/h0047740

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 Contemporary Instructional Design

Reiff, J. C. (1980). Individualized learning through page with a single question. In linear programmed
programmed materials. Education, 100(3), instruction, a frame includes a stimulus, a response,
269–271. and reinforcement (positive feedback).
Hierarchy of Learning: The concept that
Skinner, B. F. (1954). The science of learning and
learning can be sequentially ordered along a
the art of teaching. Harvard Educational Review,
continuum from lower-order to higher-order.
24(2), 86–97.
“Bloom’s Taxonomy” is one of many that have
Skinner, B. F. (1958). Teaching machines. Sci- been proposed.
ence, 128(3330), 969–977. doi:10.1126/sci- Linear Programmed Instruction: A design
ence.128.3330.969 whereby a series of frames are presented to the
student in a specific sequential order. The student
Vargus, E. A., & Vargus, J. S. (1991). Programmed
actively responds to stimuli in each frame and
instruction: What it is and how to do it. Jour-
receives immediate feedback to that response.
nal of Behavioral Education, 1(2), 235–251.
Learning results through operant conditioning.
doi:10.1007/BF00957006
Operant Conditioning: Learning through
Whitlock, G. H. (1967). Programmed learning: immediate positive feedback (reinforcement) re-
Some non-confirming results. Training and De- garding the correctness of an answer; the student
velopment Journal, 21(6), 11–13. learns to respond in a particular way to a particular
question or issue (stimulus). Fading can be used
by gradually reducing stimulus cues in subsequent
frames when material is repeated.
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Programmed Branching: A method whereby
the student is taken to one of several possible
Adaptive Feedback: Immediate feedback in
explanations or discussions depending on the
the form of an explanation or discussion that is
qualities of an answer that is given to a question.
tailored to the qualities of the student’s answer.
Gating is a simple skip of frames that repeat prior
Automatic Tutoring Device: A device that
information when a student’s answers suggest that
uses programmed branching and adaptive feed-
the material has been adequately learned.
back. Learning results from cognitive reasoning.
Teaching Machine: A device that uses linear
Cognitive Reasoning: Learning through the
programmed instruction whereby frames present
process of thinking about an issue; the student
a question followed by feedback of the correct
learns new ideas and relationships by relating an
answer. Learning results from reinforcement of
issue to previously learned material.
the student’s correct answer.
Frame: A small piece of information or a state-
ment to which the student is exposed, such as a

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology, Second Edition, edited by Mehdi
Khosrow-Pour, pp. 728-731, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 101

Chapter 1.10
Instructional Design
Methods Integrating
Instructional Technology
Paula Jones
Eastern Kentucky University, USA

Rita Davis
Eastern Kentucky University, USA

ABSTRACT based on learner needs and content requirements.

With the instructional design process, educators
Effective teaching begins with effective planning evaluate student needs, plan the lesson objectives,
of instruction. Planned instruction with technology design the instructional content, and create as-
integrated appeals to students and accommodates sessments. Evaluation and revision of each of the
students’ needs. Students expect technology to be instructional components is continually modified
utilized to support the learning process because of to meet the changing needs of the learners and the
their acquaintance with a variety of technologies advancement of technology.
at a very early age. Educators must be aware of
the needs and expectations of students and then
design courses that integrate technology based on INTRODUCTION
these identified needs and expectations. A critical
element required to integrate technology into the Educators today integrate technology into the
learning environment successfully is the instruc- classroom to create various instructional op-
tional design process. The instructional design portunities for students. There are four primary
process provides a framework for systematically reasons why educators should integrate technol-
planning, developing, and adapting instruction ogy into the instructional process to create new
and varied instructional opportunities to support
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch110 student learning. First, educators need to develop

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

and design instruction that will build student to successfully utilize the technology is also
understanding. The term “understanding” is best important to the learning process. According to
defined through the following three principles: Clark and Sugrue, if students view instructional
technology to be within a moderate range of
1. Understanding is a function of learning facts difficulty to use, then they will invest time and
and core principles of a topic effort to learn from this instructional medium. If
2. Understanding is the product of actively re- the students find the instructional medium is too
lating new knowledge with prior knowledge challenging, their motivation to participate and
and experiences learn is reduced (p. 359).
3. Understanding is a consequence of using Third, students expect the use of technology
and managing intellectual abilities well. to be a part of the learning process. Students are
(Sherman & Kurshan, 2005) using technology very early in their lives for
non-academic activity; therefore, they are more
Developing and supporting student under- likely to use technology in all aspects of their lives
standing includes keeping the student actively especially in their educational careers. “Students
engaged in the instruction while at the same time believe computers are helpful and they will use
appealing to students’ various learning styles. them more in the workplace,” (Dooling, 2002, p.
A second reason for educators to integrate 22). In addition, Ellis reports that students have
technology into the instructional process is be- very high expectations of technology-supported
cause there is a need to plan instruction that will learning (2004). Educators aware of these expecta-
motivate students to learn. According to Sherman tions will focus on course designs that integrate
et al. (2005), “the lack of interest is generally technology. Therefore, planning instruction with
the number one reason that students give for not the student’s expectations and needs in mind will
learning to mastery level” (p. 11). Technology- help the student to be successful in achieving the
based instruction can stimulate students’ interests instructional objectives.
to explore, discuss, and compare their knowledge The fourth reason for integrating instructional
with others. technology into the classroom is because educa-
It is important to note that instructional tech- tors are searching for new and more effective
nology, in and of itself, will not directly improve ways of communicating with students. Students
student understanding. In fact, a primary reason should be provided opportunities to communicate
that instructors use technology in their instruction with instructor, with peers and with the content.
is to increase motivation to learn. Motivation Understanding of new concepts in the course
is indeed one of the necessary components of content is developed through various types of
learning. According to the self-efficacy theory interactions and media.
of motivation (Bandura, 1978; Salomon, 1981), It is also important to note that integrating
a direct relationship exists between instructional technology into instruction is not a “quick fix”
technology (how and when it is used in the teach- that will automatically improve student learning.
ing process) and student learning because of the In fact, the integration of technology into a poorly
motivation factor. Researchers believe a student’s planned lesson will not transform the instruction
attitudes, beliefs, and values influence their into a well-designed or effective instructional
motivation to gain understanding of a topic or opportunity for students. In fact, when technol-
discipline (Clark & Sugrue, p. 350). At the same ogy is integrated into a poorly designed lesson,
time, the level of knowledge or skills needed the learner will many times feel frustrated and

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Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

confused. Without the proper support mechanisms process. Instructional design is the process and
in place in schools such as aligned curriculum, the framework for systematically planning, de-
appropriate assessment techniques, and ongo- veloping, and adapting instruction based on iden-
ing professional development opportunities for tifiable learner needs and content requirements
teachers, technology integration by itself will not (University of Idaho, 2004). “The most widely
change the fact that students may not achieve the used methodology for developing new training
academic goals for the course. programs is called instructional systems design”
Therefore, the educator’s challenge is to plan (Kruse, 2004). With this process, educators will
instruction that integrates technology and ensures carefully evaluate the students’ needs, plan the
that it is an integral and manageable component lesson goals, design the instructional content, and
of instruction. The instructional goal will guide create assessments with students’ expectations
the technology that is used. When technology is in mind. Therefore, the methods of instructional
combined with a well-planned curriculum that systems design play a key role in planning effec-
includes appropriate instructional strategies to tive instruction. The ISD methods should be used
integrate technology, then student learning (un- to identify the instructional technologies that are
derstanding) can be enhanced. needed to help the learners to achieve the goals
Instructional technology is an integral part of and objectives of the instruction.
teaching and learning in today’s classroom. This Instructional systems design (ISD) methods are
chapter will identify and explain some of the a step-by-step process to help educators evaluate
key terms related to instructional technology and the needs of the students, identify what is to be
instructional design. In addition, information will learned, specify the process through which the
be provided on student expectations for instruction lessons will be learned, plan the actual design,
and implications for educators. The purpose of develop instructional materials, and evaluate the
this chapter is to address the following questions: effectiveness of the instructional components
(Hains, 2000). The ISD approach considers
• What is instructional technology? instruction from the perspective of the learner
• What is instructional design? rather than from the perspective of the content,
• What are the benefits of using instructional (Morrison, Ross, & Kemp, 2001). Morrison et al.
design methods? (2001) state that through the instructional design
• Why is the ADDIE model recommended model, the following questions are addressed:
as a beginning methodology for instruc-
tional design? • What level of readiness do individual stu-
• What are students’ expectations of dents need for accomplishing the instruc-
instruction? tional objectives?
• What are the implications in planning in- • What instructional strategies are most ap-
struction that integrates technology? propriate in terms of objectives and learner
characteristics?
• What media or other resources are most
BACKGROUND suitable to help the student to learn the
objectives?
Educators who plan to integrate instructional tech- • What support is needed for successful
nology successfully into the learning environment learning?
need to be familiar with the instructional design

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• What revisions are necessary throughout it” (Gentry, 1995). Therefore, instructors/instruc-
the instructional process? (p. 4) tional designers should first identify what it is
that the students should learn and then decide
The ISD process is based on a set of compo- if and when it would be appropriate to integrate
nents working together to achieve a goal with technology into the learning process.
learners’ needs in mind. The steps usually involve
the following four phases: design, development, Instructional Technology Defined
evaluation, and revision.
According to the University of Idaho, the “Instructional technology is defined as the theory
design phase includes determining the need and practice of the design, development, utiliza-
for instruction, analyzing the learners’ needs, tion, management, and evaluation of processes
and establishing goals for the instruction. The and resources for learning” (Seels & Richy, 1994,
development phase includes reviewing current p. 1). To better understand this definition, Hains
content, creating new content, organizing content, (2000) describes each of the four components used
and selecting delivery methods. In the evaluation to define instructional technology as:
phase, the designer reviews the goals and objec-
tives of the instruction and develops an evaluation 1. Instructional design and development:
strategy. During this phase, students’ feedback The process of specifying conditions for
is collected and analyzed. In the final phase of learning and developing the products that
revision, information from the evaluation phase focuses on these conditions. This component
is implemented to improve the quality of the would include instructional systems design,
instructional experience. message design, instructional strategies
The ISD steps are continually evolving based design, and learner characteristics analysis.
on the needs, success, and feedback received from 2. Media utilization: Includes the selection of
students and instructors. As noted earlier, there the communication medium and the delivery
are several sequential steps to be implemented by system. Examples of this component would
the instructor in order to move students through include the use of a course management sys-
levels of understanding and application. There tem like Blackboard™, Angel™, or the use
are criticisms that the ISD models are too linear of instructional video and audio components,
and too inflexible (Kruse, 2004). However, when or even a course Web site with use of e-mail
all of the ISD phases are used interchangeably, and blogs.
the ISD process can prove to be very productive 3. Management: This component of the term
in helping students to achieve the instructional relates to all of the responsibilities associated
goals. The ISD process should be flexible, al- with the management of the technologies
lowing the instructor to move freely among the including acquisition, maintenance, delivery
various phases of the design, as dictated by the of services and management of information.
needs of the learners. 4. Evaluation: Includes using evaluation
In addition, technology has a very important methods that will provide timely and ac-
role in the instructional process. “Technology curate information to those involved in an
should be the servant and not the master of in- education technology design effort.
struction. It should not be adopted merely because
it exists, or because an institution or faculty fear “The purpose of instructional technology is to
being left behind the parade of progress without affect and effect learning” (Seels et al., 1994, p.

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Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

12). It is critical to understand that the main goal when it comes to the creation of technology-based
of providing instruction is “learning.” The means instruction. Some of the advantages noted are: (1)
to understanding and learning is the instruction ability to create engaging metaphors or themes,
that is planned. Therefore, the instructor and the (2) designing learning activities that are effective
instructional designer plans and utilizes instruc- in meeting the students’ expectations and needs,
tional technology to help students build upon prior and (3) the opportunity to engage and possibly
attainted knowledge, skills and attitudes, and use motivate learners by the use of technology (Kruse,
technology as a tool to enhance learning. 2004). Roblyer (2000) adds that instruction can be
designed to integrate technology in ways to help
Instructional Design Defined the student to remedy identified weaknesses. Once
more, the early phases of the ISD process would
Instructional design (also known as instructional allow the instructor to become aware of the stu-
systems design) is defined as the analysis of dents’ weaknesses and be able to offer instructional
learning needs, identifying instructional goals opportunities to address these individual needs.
and objectives, and the systematic development In addition, designing instruction that provides
of instruction. Instructional designers will use students the opportunity to build their skills and
instructional technology as a method for devel- conduct self-evaluations through the use of tech-
oping instruction when appropriate to meet the nology can be very beneficial. Instruction can
goals of the instruction and to meet the needs of also be designed to develop technological and
the learners. Instructional design models typically visual literacy (Roblyer, 2000). These skills will
specify a method that if followed will facilitate the better prepare students for high demand jobs in
transfer of knowledge, develop skills and adapt the business world.
or encourage attitudes of the learner Thomas Friedman, in The World is Flat, iden-
In summary, instructional design is the sys- tifies the United States as a global, information-
tematic planning of instruction. Instructional based economy with an increasingly diverse
design is the process of specifying conditions for workforce. Therefore, there is a great need for a
learning (Hains, 2000). Instructional design is the better-trained workforce who is capable of using
step-by-step process used for identifying students’ technology to improve services, increase quality
needs, the design and development of instructional and raise production. As a result, instruction should
materials, and the evaluation of the effectiveness focus on using technologies that will prepare
of the instructional intervention (Kruse, 2004). students for the workforce.
Planning for instruction is an organized process Embry (2005) reported in one study published
where instructional materials are thoughtfully cre- in October 2005 by the National School Boards
ated and are planned to deliver instruction that is Association (NSBA), 90% of the respondents
most effective for the student. The goal is for each reported that the use of technology in the class-
student to learn in an environment that provides room has increased educational opportunities for
opportunities for full potential of the student. students. This was evidenced by students being
more engaged in learning, having a stronger ability
Benefits of Instructional to communicate and possessing increased critical
Design Methods thinking skills. Technology is indeed valuable to
learners and utilizing appropriate instructional
According to Kruse, the systemic approach to design methods will help to develop a better,
instructional development has many advantages well-designed opportunity for learning.

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The ADDIE Model instructional goal of the lesson? What are the
delivery options? What instructional tech-
Many instructional design models are based on nology, if any, would enhance student learn-
the ADDIE model. The ADDIE model represents ing? What will the students do to determine
the following components: analysis, design, competency? What is the timeline? What are
development, implementation, and evaluation the online pedagogical considerations?
(Kruse, 2004). In Figure 1, the flow of information 2. Design phase: The systematic method of
within the phases is illustrated with the larger ar- research, planning, developing, evaluating,
rows. The smaller arrows illustrated how the flow and managing an instructional process.
of information can be reversed to the previous 3. Development phase: Addresses the tools
phase at any point in the sequence as identified and processes used to create instructional
in the instructional analysis conducted in each material. This stage includes story boards,
phase. The ADDIE model of instructional design coding, graphic user interface, and creating
is recommended as a beginning framework ISD all multimedia elements.
model because it is based upon sound pedagogi- 4. Implementation phase: During this phase,
cal principles of instructional development. This an implementation plan is developed. This
model provides the systematical steps needed to plan establishes the implementation timeline
ensure that sound and theoretical based instruction and procedures for training the facilitators or
is being delivered. When planning instruction, the learner, and delivering the final product.
ADDIE provides a process for addressing the 5. Evaluation phase: A systemic process that
instructional challenges and learner needs. determines the quality and effectiveness of
The phases involved in the ADDIE model are the instructional design as well as the final
defined as follows: product. Evaluation is an ongoing activity
conducted at each phase of the ADDIE
1. Analysis phase: Determine the components model.
necessary for the next phases of develop-
ment. Seek answers to a variety of questions Educators, who are familiar with the ADDIE
including: Who is the learner? What is the model and use it as the instructional design process,
may find they are selecting instructional technol-
ogy that will support and enhance learning to help
Figure 1. The ADDIE model student achieve the instructional goal. Instructors
are then able to provide a learning environment
that will encourage active learning and higher
level thinking skills, especially reflection, problem
solving, flexible thinking, and creativity (Hopson,
Simms, & Knezek, 2002).
The ADDIE model enables standardized de-
velopment of learning solutions as the educator
moves through the five phases or steps. Each
step of the process, from the analyses of the
learners to the final evaluation of the learner’s
instructional experience, should be thoroughly
planned and monitored to identify solutions for

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Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

the instructional need. The ADDIE model should 8. Students prefer the convenience of using
be used as a continuous process that allows the technology at home even though they may
educator to monitor and update instructional and not have access to the latest software and
assessment components to meet the needs and hardware required by the instructors
expectations of the learner. The ultimate goal
in applying the ADDIE model, as it is with any Based on the students’ expectations previously
instructional design model, is to plan and design listed, it is clear that technology integration into
instruction that provides the student the content the instructional process is very important. In-
and resources needed to help them to achieve the structional technology should be utilized as a tool
instructional goals. for learning. In the interviews and focus groups
students anticipated that they will apply the same
Students’ Expectations of Instruction skills used in the classroom as they will use in the
workplace to analyze, manipulate and summarize
With ISD methods, instruction is planned based on information. The use of instructional technology
the students’ needs and expectations. Therefore, it should be more than just drill and practice, tuto-
is important to identify some of the expectations rial, games and simulations. Educators should
of students today. plan to integrate instructional technology when it
In 60 interviews and three focus groups with supports the overall goals of the instruction, im-
post secondary students, the following summarizes proves communication, and provides the students
the basic instructional needs of learners: greater access to the instructional information and
course content.
1. Students not only anticipate, but expect tech- Advances in technology are changing the
nology to be integrated into the instructional dynamics of teaching and learning in education;
process all educational levels are using technology as
2. Students see technology as both motivating a learning tool (Hains, 2000). Today’s younger
and challenging students are also using technology, but they are
3. Students expect to learn the technology first using it more for non-academic activities (Center
in order to apply the technology toward for Media Research). The 2005 American Kids
learning the subject matter content Study was conducted to evaluate American chil-
4. Students expect their time and resources to dren ages 6-11 multimedia and product usage.
be adequately used to help them learn Approximately 5,400 children responded to the
5. Students expect their instructors to be famil- questionnaires sent to households with children
iar with the latest technology and be moti- 6-11 years old. They were interviewed for MRI’s
vated to use technology in their classroom Survey of the American Consumer. The survey
instruction period was March 8-August 1, 2005.
6. Students expect technology to allow them to As shown in Table 1, it was found that gaming
have access to the instructor, their classmates is the top online activity, CD players outnumber
and to course information MP3 players for music listening. In the American
7. Students expect the convenience of commu- Kids Study, it was reported that during the sur-
nicating with their instructors by submitting vey period more than half, 59%, of the 6-11 age
their homework, assignments, and quizzes group went online in the last 30 days and 8.1%
via technology went online every day. Forty-two percent of the
respondents played games online, while 23.1%

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 Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

percent actually worked online for academic Therefore, instructors are able to offer
reasons. More girls than boys were reported us- more meaningful instruction.
ing e-mail and just 2.6% of all of the respondents • Instruction that is well-designed should
visited a chat room during the reporting time. lead the student to be successful in the
Today’s students are using technology more in assessment. The assessment methods are
their daily activities. Students are using technol- identified and are based on the goal and
ogy in a variety of ways including entertainment objectives clearly stated early in the ISD
and communications. Even though the numbers process.
are low for younger students, some students are • Technology is seen as a tool used in the
beginning to use technology in their academic ISD process. Technology is beneficial to
interests. This will result in the need to integrate help the learner understand and apply the
technology in their lessons to help students to concepts.
research, explore, and find solutions to problems • Finally, ISD methods offer continual test-
throughout their academic careers. ing and feedback for each phase of the
instruction design process. Therefore, in-
Implications for Technology struction and assessments can be adapted
Integration to meet the changing needs of the learners.

The primary goal of instruction is to make students When instruction is planned or designed with
as successful as possible in learning the content technology integration, the instructor’s role in the
of the course. The benefits of instructional design learning process will become that of a facilitator
methodologies for instructors include providing of learning. True integration of technology will
clear and well define instructional components that promote different advantages and disadvantages
are well-organized to help the students achieve for the student/learner. According to reports
the goal of the instruction. When the instructional in the NBEA Yearbook 2004, advantages will
materials are planned well, presented sequentially, include: (1) incorporating all five senses of the
designed to address student needs, the students learner, (2) student comprehension is increased,
will be more successful in the classroom and the “Comprehension is raised to 80 percent when
instructor can assess that learning has occurred. one sees, hears, and interacts with instructional
Faculty who are interested in designing instruc- materials” (p. 219). This comprehension rate is
tion using technology reports that ISD methods very high when compared to 20-30% with just site
are beneficial to educators in several ways. These and sound respectively, (3) students have better
include: control of their own learning, (4) cooperative
learning can also be an advantage when integrat-
• Instruction is developed more with the stu- ing technology, (5) technology integration offers
dents needs in mind. This includes identi- instructors the opportunity to offer a student more
fying any prerequisite skills that may be individualized instruction and finally, (6) the use
lacking and need to be addressed before of a variety of communication methods such as
the student is moved into an academic are- bulletin boards, e-mails, online discussion boards,
na ill prepared. blogs, and chat rooms.
• Instruction is usually more organized and Some of the disadvantages associated with
is sequential because the instruction is planning instruction that integrates technology
planned based on the learning outcome. include: (1) lack of access to the most advanced

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Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

Table 1. Source: Mediamark Research, The American Kids Study, 2005

Selected Findings, 2005 American Kids Study

% All Kids % Boys % Girls
Online usage
Gone online in last 30 days 59.0 56.3 61.8
Goes online every day 8.1 7.6 8.7

Online activities in the last month

Played online games 42.6 40.0 45.4
Did stuff for school/homework 23.1 20.8 25.5
Used e-mail 10.5 7.6 13.6
Used instant messenger 6.5 5.6 7.4
Went to chat rooms 2.6 2.7 2.5

Listen to music via...

Car radio 74.0 72.0 76.1
CD player 62.8 56.5 69.5
Portable CD player 48.4 44.8 52.3
Stereo 39.5 39.2 39.8
Computer 25.5 23.1 28.1
Walkman that plays tapes/cassettes 8.3 8.2 8.4
Portable MP3 player 4.2 4.3 4.1
MP3 player 4.1 4.2 4.0

Gaming
Played video, Internet, computer game, last 30 days 84.2 89.3 78.7
Play video, Internet, computer game every day 20.3 28.9 11.1

Things you have in your room

CD player 59.8 54.1 65.8
TV 56.3 59.0 53.4
Video game system 36.1 47.1 24.4
Stereo 28.6 28.0 29.2
DVD player 26.7 27.6 25.6
Computer 16.8 17.9 15.6
Internet access 6.6 7.0 6.1

technology. Despite great strides in incorporating students and teachers (Means, 2002); (2) lack of
technology into U.S. schools, we still fall short educator’s ability to stay up-to-date on the latest
of providing a seamless, convenient, robust, technology; (3) lack of time to devote to planning
and reliable technology support structure for all and designing instruction that integrates technol-

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ogy; (4) the technology that is integrated may learning environment with the use of case-based
be too advanced for the learners and that could reasoning, electronic portfolios, threaded discus-
decrease the students’ ability to learn; (5) some sions, reflective journals, and other instructional
course content and instructional activities do not strategies. Traditional face-to-face instruction will
readily lend themselves to the use of technology. be further enhanced with the use of the course
managements systems and the tools they offer.
The traditional face-to-face instruction such as
FUTURE TRENDS lectures, role modeling, simulations, team/group
work, will be integrated into the learning environ-
The need for flexible learning environments and ment via the use of technology.
approaches to teaching reflects a transformation of In addition, the acceptance of learning out-
how instruction will be conducted and delivered comes will be a crucial requirement of the future.
in the future. This flexibility will be noticed in Students will need to be able to transfer courses
areas such as offering distance-learning courses and knowledge to different educational institutions
to provide instruction in a variety of locations, and different learning environments. Therefore,
as well as providing more mobile and accessible diversity and the evolution of technological savvy
instructional components for students. Time and students are continuing trends for the future.
location are quickly becoming a non-issue when
it comes to accessing instructional information.
For example, a student may download streamed CONCLUSION
audio or video lectures and have access to those
components through ipods at any time. Effective teaching begins with effective planning.
Emphasis for the future will be in more online Instructional design represents the systematic
course development, distance education com- planning process for instructional events including
ponents, ethics in an e-learning environment, technology integration. Planning and integrating
instructional materials and the Internet use in technology into the instructional process can
the classroom, pedagogical and technological indeed provide an opportunity for higher student
challenges of the Internet, managing and measur- motivation, increased speed of communication,
ing technology based courses, and intellectual improve students’ technology skills, and ease of
property rights with educational delivery (NBEA access to resources.
Yearbook, 2004). In addition to these trends, there Bringing real-world problems into the class-
will be the challenges of constant technological room is a very important asset of technology inte-
change, public accountability, competition for gration. Problem-solving environments have been
students, opportunities for professional develop- developed to help students to better understand
ment, restricted and decreased funding, and the the workplace they will be a part of in the near
need to educate all students regardless of their future. Technology integration offers interactivity
financial status and location. that makes it easier for students to revisit specific
Furthermore, teaching and learning have parts of the instruction to explore, test ideas and
evolved to the use of instructional technologies receive feedback.
in the educational process across all disciplines. Learning through real-world resources that are
Various disciplines are currently accessing course provided in technologically-rich instruction is not
management systems such as Blackboard™, Web a new idea. For a long time, schools have made ef-
CT™, or Angel™ to integrate technology into the forts to give students concrete experience through

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Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

field trips, laboratories, and work-study type pro- systems. This model can be just as effective when
grams. Technology integration into the learning designing instructional video, audio, text-based,
environment offers powerful tools for addressing and online instructional components. Each step in
time, money, and resource constraints. Because the ADDIE model has an outcome that will feed
of the resource savings as well as the opportunity to the subsequent step. Each step is evaluated,
to enrich the student’s learning, educators should then adjustments and improvements made, as the
plan to integrate instructional technology into the designers continue to move to the desired outcome.
instructional process whenever appropriate.
It is also important to understand that the
instructor must have an understanding of how REFERENCES
people learn and retain information when they
attempt to engage the learner through the use of Bandura, A. (1978). The self system in recipro-
technology. Students expect meaningful learning cal determinism. The American Psychologist, 33,
and the use of technology to develop their criti- 344–358. doi:10.1037/0003-066X.33.4.344
cal thinking and problem solving skills. Students Center of Media Research. (2005). Mediamark
also expect their instructors to be familiar with research, The American Kids Study, 2005. Re-
the technology and demonstrate technological trieved December 13, 2005, from http://www.
skills. Instructors will benefit directly by using mediamark.com/
course management techniques with technology.
At the same time, they will serve as a mentor to Clark, R., & Sugrue, B. (1995). Research on in-
their students demonstrating how technology can structional media. In G. Anglin (Ed.), Instructional
help in problem solving as well as in managing technology: The past, present, and future (2nd ed.)
time and resources. (pp. 348-364).
In addition, instruction will be most effective
Dooling, J. (2002). What students want to learn
when it is planned with the students’ needs and
about computers. In J. Hirschbuhl & D. Bishop
expectations in mind. The instructional design
(Eds.), Computers in education 2002-03 (10th ed.)
process can serve as the step-by-step process for
(pp. 22-26). Guilford, CT: McGrw-Hill/Dushkin.
educators to design and develop their units of in-
struction. By using the ISD model, educators will Ellis, C. (2004). Learning from our students:
offer more enriching instructional opportunities How do they rate our use of Blackboard? Read
for students and will plan and prepare to integrate Bb Matters (5th ed.). January 5. Retrieved March
technology into the instructional process where it 14, 2005, from http://www.file://c:docume~1\
is most beneficial for the learning outcome. pfoten`locals`1\temp/vyspq2po.htm
Finally, a recommendation is for instructors
Embry, L. (2005). Technology survey reveals
to apply the ADDIE model as the instructional
funding and integration into classroom big-
design process when designing instruction that
gest challenges; preparedness of new teachers
integrates technology. Instructors, then, will be
also a concern. National School Boards As-
able to provide a complete learning environment
sociation (NSBA) Web site. Retrieved October
that will encourage active learning and higher
27, 2005, from http://www.nsba.org/site/print.
level thinking skills, especially reflection, prob-
asp?trackid=&vid=2&action= print&cid=
lem solving, flexible thinking, and creativity. The
1591&did=37031
ADDIE model is very effective when planning
instruction with the use of course management

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Friedman, T. (2005). The world is flat: A brief Sherman, T., & Kurshan, B. (2005). Constructing
history of the twenty-first century. New York: learning: Using technology to support teaching
Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. for understanding. Learning & Leading with
Technology, 32, 10–13.
Gentry, C. (1995). Educational technology: A
question of meaning. In G. Anglin (Ed.), Instruc- University of Idaho. (2004). Distance education
tional technology: The past, present, and future at a glance, Guide 3: Instructional development
(2nd ed.) (pp. 1-10). for distance education. Retrieved December 12,
2004, from http:/www.uidaho.edu/eo /dist3.html
Hains, A. (2000). Instructional technology and
personnel preparation. Topics in Early Child-
hood Special Education, 20(3), 132–145.
doi:10.1177/027112140002000302 KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Hopson, M. H., Simms, R. L., & Knezek, G. D. ADDIE Model: A foundational instructional
(2002, Winter). Using a technologically enriched design process that represents five basic com-
environment to improve higher-order thinking ponents of planning and designing instruction:
skills. Journal of Research on Technology in analysis, design, developments, implementation
Education, 34(2), 109–119. and evaluation. This instructional design model
Kruse, K. (2004). Introduction to instructional enables standardized development of learning
design and the ADDIE model. Retrieved December solutions as the educator and the instructional
1, 2004, from http://www.e-learningguru.com/ designer moves through the five phases of de-
articles/art2_1.htm velopment.
Analysis Phase: Determining the needs for
Means, B. (2002). Technology use in tomorrow’s instruction, analyzing the learner’s needs, and
schools. In J. Hirschbuhl & D. Bishop (Eds.), establishing goals of the instruction to begin the
Computers in education 2002-03 (10th ed.) (pp. design phase.
23-26). Guilford, CT: McGrw-Hill/Dushkin. Design Phase: The designer continues with the
Morrison, G., Ross, S., & Kemp, J. (2001). De- subject matter analysis and then moves into the
signing effective instruction (3rd ed.). New York: application of instructional strategies according
John Wiley & Sons. to the content type, the user interface is designed
and needed materials are collected.
National Business Education Association Year- Development Phase: Production begins with
book, 2004, No. 42. a continued review of the current course content,
Roblyer, R. (2000). Integrating educational tech- creating new content, organizing content, selecting
nology into teaching (2nd ed.). NJ: Merrill. delivery methods and technology requirements
Implementation Phase: Create an implemen-
Salomon, G. (1981).Communication and edu- tation timeline, establish procedures for training
cation, social and psychological interactions. the facilitators or the learners, and make revisions
Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. as needed (after the evaluation phase) to prepare
Seels, B., & Richey, R. (1994). Instructional tech- the final product.
nology: The definition and domains of the field. Evaluation Phase: A systemic process that
Washington, DC: Association for Educational determines the quality and effectiveness of the
Communications and Technology. designed instruction as well as the final product.

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Instructional Design Methods Integrating Instructional Technology

Evaluation is an ongoing process—it occurs Instructional Designer: An individual who

throughout the ID process. applies a systemic methodology based on in-
Instruction Design Models: Systematic structional theory to design and develop content
guidelines instructional designers follow in order and curriculum, learning support resources, and
to facilitate the transfer of knowledge, skills, and delivery and assessment methodologies.
attitude to the recipient. The ID models typically Instructional Systems Design: The analysis
specify a method that will create well-planned, of learning needs and systematic development of
logical, attainable, and sequential instruction. instruction. ISD is the process and the framework
ID models are visualized representations of an for systematically planning, developing and adapt-
instructional design process. (Example of ID ing instruction based on identifiable learner needs
models include: Dick & Carey Model, ADDIE and content requirements.
Model, Kemp Model, ICARE Model, and AS- Instructional Technology: Defined as the
SURE Model.) theory and practice of the design, development,
Instructional Design Theory: Guides the utilization, management, and evaluation of the
practice of the instructional designer and offers processes and resources for learning.
explicit guidance on how to better help learners
to achieve the instructional goals established for
the lesson or instructional activity.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 15-27, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 1.11
Using Design Patterns to
Support E-Learning Design
Sherri S. Frizell
Prairie View A&M University, USA

Roland Hübscher
Bentley College, USA

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

Design patterns have received considerable atten- The instructional design of e-learning course
tion for their potential as a means of capturing and materials directly affects student learning out-
sharing design knowledge. This chapter provides a comes, but research suggests that many of the
review of design pattern research and usage within instructors developing online courses have not
education and other disciplines, summarizes the received training in interaction or instructional
reported benefits of the approach, and examines design (Braxton, 2000; Clark, 1994; Tennyson &
design patterns in relation to other approaches to Elmore, 1995). Hirumi (2002) found that novice
supporting design. Building upon this work, it course designers find it difficult to incorporate the
argues that design patterns can capture learning types of meaningful interactions needed in online
design knowledge from theories and best practices courses. Also, inexperienced educators can have
to support novices in effective e-learning design. difficulties in the application of learning theories
This chapter describes the authors’ work on the to course design. According to Wilson (1997),
development of designs patterns for e-learning. theories are written as hard science, and novices
It concludes with a discussion of future research require a different type of representation to sup-
for educational uses of design patterns. port their initial learning needs. As further stated
in Wilson (1999), “the plurality and multiplicity
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch111 of models and theories can be daunting to both

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

researcher and practitioner.” As a result, making They further describe a design pattern as “a three
the transition from this wealth of information to part rule, which expresses a relation between a
actual design practice can be difficult for all but certain context, a problem and a solution” (Al-
experienced educators and instructional designers. exander, 1979). In a definition almost 20 years
Design patterns have emerged as an approach later from the field of software engineering, a
for capturing design knowledge from theories and design pattern is described as a “particular prose
best practices in a form that is understandable and form of recording design information such that
useful for novices (Alexander, Ishikawa, Silver- designs which have worked well in the past can
stein, Jacobson, Fiksdhl-King, & Angel, 1977). be applied again in similar situations in the future”
Design patterns and their use in the development of (Beck, Coplien, Crocker, Dominick, Meszaros,
effective learning designs are currently important Paulissch, & Vlissides, 1996).
areas of research. Originating in the field of architecture, design
The purpose of this chapter is to introduce patterns have been used to capture expert knowl-
design patterns as a strategy for representing and edge, experiences, and design best practices within
disseminating instructional design and learning many different domains (Alur, Crupi, & Malks,
theory research. First, a review of the literature 2001; Borchers, 2001; Gamma, Helm, Johnson,
provides a definition for a design pattern and gives & Vlissides, 1995; Graham, 2003; Tidwell, 2005).
the history of design patterns usage and reported A large part of their value is attributed to their
benefits in other disciplines. We then examine ability to serve as a design aid to disseminate this
how design patterns can be used in education to knowledge to a novice designer. Although many
represent and disseminate learning theory research formats and templates exist for formulating a
and educator best practices in the context of e- design pattern, four elements are typically present:
learning design. We discuss our current research
with design patterns for e-learning design, which 1. The pattern name identifies the pattern and
advocates the development of an underlying design provides a way to communicate about the
framework and support environment for design pattern. Choosing a good name is consid-
pattern development and use. Examples of design ered vital as it becomes a part of the design
patterns developed from this work are provided. vocabulary (Gamma et al., 1995).
Finally, we conclude with areas of future research. 2. The problem section describes when to ap-
ply the pattern explaining both the design
problem that is addressed and the context
BACKGROUND surrounding it.
3. The solution section describes the elements
What Is a Design Pattern? that make up the design to solve the problem.
References to other design patterns that sup-
Design patterns have been defined in the literature port the solution are also typically provided.
in a number of ways. As provided in one of the 4. An example section provides specific imple-
earliest definitions from the field of architecture, mentations of the solution. Depending on
a design pattern “describes a problem which the discipline, the examples may be textual
occurs over and over again in our environment, descriptions or pictures.
and then describes the core of the solution to
that problem, in such a way that you can use this Formulating design knowledge in terms of
solution a million times over, without ever doing problems and solutions is regarded by some to
it the same way twice” (Alexander et al., 1977). provide designers with more concrete design

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 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

information not readily available in other forms use of design patterns (Erickson, 2000). Another
of design knowledge representation such as de- cited reason for the popularity of design patterns
sign guidelines or design principles (Mahemoff as discussed in Erickson (2000) is in their ability
& Johnston, 1998a; van Welie, van der Veer, & to provide a “lingua franca,” a common language
Eliens, 2000). The objective of most design pattern that can be read and understood by those even
research is in the development of a collection of outside the design profession the pattern language
design patterns that provide a vocabulary for rep- addresses.
resenting and communicating design knowledge In many disciplines including education, de-
in a field. Different classifications have been used sign guidelines and principles have been used to
to describe a pattern collection often depending represent design knowledge. It has been argued
on the degree of structure and connectivity the that guidelines suffer problems involving selec-
pattern collection possesses (Appleton, 2000). tion, validity, and applicability (van Welie et al.,
A pattern language is a collection of design pat- 2000). Mahemoff and Johnston (1998b) state that
terns that have been connected and interlinked design patterns are concrete in contrast to abstract
(Alexander et al., 1977). Mahemoff and Johnston design guidelines and principles and when based
(1998a) assert that generativity is the chief benefit on underlying design principles, they can capture
of a pattern language. Because the patterns in the the philosophies of good design. Chung, Hong,
language form a cohesive structure, the designer Lin, Prabaker, Landay, and Liu (2004) describe
is able to begin with a certain context and work three ways design patterns differ from other for-
through all of the relevant patterns to generate mats such as guidelines and heuristics for capturing
a design. A pattern catalog typically refers to a and presenting design knowledge:
pattern collection that has a relatively low level of
structure and organization. Little cross-referencing First, patterns offer solutions to specific problems
exists among patterns, and each pattern gives a rather than providing high-level and sometimes
relatively independent solution (Appleton, 2000; abstract suggestions. Second, patterns are gen-
Schmidt, Johnson, & Fayad, 1996). Derntl and erative, helping designers create new solutions by
Botturi (2006) also discuss the notion of a pattern showing many examples of actual designs. Third,
system, which includes a pattern language and patterns are linked to another hierarchically,
tools to support use of the language. They define helping designers address high-level problems as
a pattern system as “a conceptual system, which well as low-level ones.
consists of the pattern language and some formula-
tion of meta-language features, e.g., instructions
about how to use the patterns, the underlying value
system and philosophical background, as well as USAGE OF DESIGN PATTERNS
other relevant information and requirements.”
A key question in examining the literature Architecture Design Patterns
on design patterns is: Why patterns? Three main
benefits for pattern usage are often cited: (1) they Design patterns originated in the field architec-
serve as a design tool; (2) they provide for concise ture as an approach for improving the design of
and accurate communication among designers; modern architectural structures (Alexander et
and (3) they disseminate expert knowledge to al., 1977). The objective was to create a body
novices (Viljamaa, 1997). The reuse of design of knowledge of design solutions to reoccurring
solutions is one of the most cited rationales for the problems encountered in architectural design and

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

to present this knowledge in an understandable Software Engineering

and useful form that could be used by architects Design Patterns
and the general public. Christopher Alexander
and colleagues represented this knowledge in The greatest impact of design pattern usage can be
what they termed a “pattern,” a narrative form seen within the software engineering community.
consisting of textual descriptions and pictures The goal has been to use design patterns to create
that describe a design problem and its solution. a collection of design best practices to support
A pattern language consisting of 253 design pat- software architecture and design. Gamma et al.
terns was developed to support both architects (1995), often referred to as the Gang of Four (GoF),
and the public in designing quality architectural published the first influential collection of design
structures, a quality they contend was being lost in patterns in the software engineering community.
modern architectural design. The design patterns They developed a catalog of 23 design patterns
range from addressing large design issues such that capture and present solutions to problems
as the design of neighborhoods and communities in object-oriented software design. More than a
to smaller scale patterns that deal with the design decade later from the GoF text, design patterns and
of houses and rooms. The patterns were ordered resulting research have a strong presence within
hierarchically within a pattern language with software engineering, most notably to support
each pattern referencing the smaller scale patterns object-oriented software development (Alur et
that support it and the larger scale patterns that it al., 2001; Metsker & Wake, 2006).
supports. All patterns are presented in the same The presentation of design patterns changed
narrative structure and format consisting of the with their adaptation to software engineering.
following elements: Gamma et al. (1995) introduced a new format for
presenting design patterns (see Table 1). Instead
• The name of the pattern of the narrative format used in architecture, a
• A validity ranking indicating the degree to longer and more explicitly labeled template was
which the authors have confidence in the used. Another change is the lack of the strict hi-
pattern’s solution erarchical ordering that existed in the architecture
• A picture showing an archetypical example design patterns. According to Viljamaa (1997),
of the pattern this change can be contributed to the iterative
• The context for the pattern nature of software development, which makes
• The problem statement and description it difficult to impose a hierarchical structuring.
• The solution to the problem Software engineering design patterns also contain
• A diagram of the solution software code to illustrate an implementation of
• References to smaller scale patterns need- the pattern, and due to their technical content,
ed to complete the pattern they are not easily understood by users without
some software development training.
In one of the volumes of this work, The Or-
egon Experiment, readers are provided with the Design Patterns in Interaction
application of the design patterns in an experi- Design
ment to redesign the campus of the University of
Oregon (Alexander, Silverstein, Angel, Ishikawa, Design patterns have been used within the hu-
& Abrams, 1975). man–computer interaction (HCI) field to support
different levels of interaction design ranging from

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 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Table 1. Software engineering design pattern template (Gamma et al., 1995)

Name and The name conveys the essence of the pattern and the classification is based on the pattern’s purpose in
Classification the design process.
Intent Explains what the pattern does, its rationale, and the design problem addressed.
Also known as Gives other names for the pattern if any exist.
Motivation Illustrates the design problem and shows how the pattern solves the problem.
Applicability Gives the situations in which the pattern can be applied and gives examples of poor designs that the pattern can
address.
Structure Gives a graphical representation of the classes in the pattern.
Participants Lists the classes and/or objects participating in the design pattern.
Collaborations Shows the way the objects and classes collaborate.
Consequences Addresses how the pattern supports its objectives along with the trade-offs and results of using the pattern.
Implementation Gives the pitfalls and techniques needed when implementing the pattern.
Sample Code Code fragments on how the pattern might be implemented in C++ or Smalltalk.
Known Uses Examples of the pattern found in real systems.
Related Patterns Addresses how the patterns are related and identifies other patterns to be used.

user interface and hypermedia design to social and and a rationale for how and why the design pat-
cognitive design issues (Borchers, 2001; Thomas, tern works. They state that without the rationale
Danis, & Lee, 2002; Tidwell, 2005). One objective section, it is impossible to see whether or why the
has been to use design patterns to embody HCI solution given is good.
guidelines and design principles, which have been Borchers (2001) suggests that the concept of
considered by some as not very useful in solving design patterns can be applied to not only archi-
specific design problems (Mahemoff & Johnston, tecture, software engineering, and HCI, but can
1998a; van Welie et al., 2000). be used to capture design knowledge in any ap-
Van Welie et al. (2000) introduced a categori- plication domain where software is being created.
zation for HCI design patterns based on the kind In this research, design patterns were used to
of design problem the design patterns address. capture software and user interface design issues
They suggest that just as architectural patterns as well as the knowledge from the music domain
have the focus of creating quality living environ- in the design of interactive musical systems.
ments, HCI patterns need to have a focus, and There has been no clear consensus on the struc-
it should be on usability. They also argue that ture or focus of HCI design patterns. A taxonomy
design patterns should focus on problems of the for HCI design patterns has been proposed by
end users, not necessarily problems of the design- Borchers (2000b) along three main dimensions,
ers. For example, within education, the student including:
participating in the learning experience would be
considered the end user. They state that, “each • level of abstraction - Interaction design
pattern that focuses on the user’s perspective is patterns can address very large-scale is-
also usable for designers but not vice versa” (van sues that comprise a user’s complete task
Welie & Traetterberg, 2000). As shown in the user or they can address smaller scale, slightly
interface design pattern presented in Figure 1, they more concrete topics that describe the style
include the design principle in the design pattern of a certain part of the interaction. They

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Figure 1. User interface design pattern: Warning (van Welie et al., 2000)

can also deal with low-level questions of others deal with issues of sequence (dis-
user interface design that look at individual crete series of events, e.g., a sequence of
user interface objects. dialogs), or with continuous time (such as a
• function - Patterns can be classified into design pattern about good animation tech-
those that address mainly questions of (vi- niques in the user interface).
sual, auditory, etc.) perception (interface
output), and those that deal with interface Pedagogical Design Patterns
input, or, more specifically, manipulation
of some kind of application data, or navi- The goals of design pattern research in educa-
gation through the system. tion have been twofold. One objective has been
• physical dimension - Some patterns will to use design patterns as a teaching tool to assist
address questions of spatial layout, while students in gaining design skills as in the computer

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 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

science education research of Borchers (2002) 1. Patterns for Active Learning – A pattern lan-
where designs patterns were used to teach user guage that focuses on pedagogy to promote
interface design skills to undergraduate students active learning.
and in similar research where design patterns 2. Patterns for Experiential Learning – A pat-
have been used as a teaching tool for computer tern language that focuses on pedagogy that
programming related courses (Gelfand, Goodrich, promotes experiential learning.
& Tammasia, 1998; Nguyen & Wong, 1999; Preiss, 3. Teaching from Different Perspectives – A
1999). The second and most prevailing objective pattern language provides some successful
is in using design patterns to capture knowledge strategies to assist teachers in helping learn-
in teaching and student learning to assist in the ers examine course material from different
design of successful learning opportunities for perspectives.
students. This knowledge may be captured from 4. Feedback Patterns – A pattern language
instructional design and learning theories and provides some successful strategies to assist
expert best practices and experiences. Such de- teachers in providing feedback to students.
sign patterns are often referred to in the literature
as pedagogical design patterns, learning design A detailed discussion of how the pattern
patterns, or e-learning design patterns when de- languages evolved from the original collection
veloped for online course design. of proto-patterns is also provided in Sharp et al.
The Pedagogical Patterns Project (PPP), which (2003). The design patterns have also changed in
began in 1996 evolved out of this latter objective presentation (see Figure 3) to the format originally
to use design patterns to capture the knowledge used in architecture because they felt it was more
of experienced educators in learning and teach- informative and provided better support for con-
ing object-oriented technology (Sharp, Manns, & necting the design patterns into a pattern language.
Eckstein, 2003). The project began by collecting In this updated form, each design pattern is divided
design patterns from various pattern authors, into four sections separated by “***”; the first
which varied in focus from curriculum issues to section establishes the context for the problem, the
teaching and learning specific object-oriented second section describes the forces and the design
concepts. The example design pattern presented problem addressed, the third section presents the
in Figure 2 is from the earlier work of the project solution with consequences and limitations to the
and addresses the problem of exposing students solution, and the last section provides examples
to complex programming problems. These earlier and additional information concerning the solu-
design patterns are referred to as proto-patterns tion (PPP, n.d.). The work of the PPP has not been
because they had not gone through a rigorous without criticism regarding the scale, scope, and
review process and were not a part of a pattern method for the development of design patterns
language (Sharp et al., 2003). (Fincher & Utting, 2002). However, there is no
In the most recent work of the PPP, the effort consensus in the literature on the format, content,
has changed in scope moving from the collection or level of detail of pedagogical design patterns.
of proto-patterns that were largely focused on
object-oriented teaching to the development of
four pattern languages to address various issues
of teaching and student learning (PPP, n.d.; Sharp
et al., 2003). The four pattern languages include:

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Figure 2. Pedagogical design pattern: Fixer Upper (abridged) (PPP, n.d.) ©2000 Joseph Bergin. Used
with permission

HOW EFFECTIVE ARE DESIGN Phillippsen, and Tichy (2002) describe the first
PATTERNS? controlled experiments with design patterns in the
area of software maintenance. They report that
An examination of the literature reveals limited design patterns aided users in completing software
empirical data on the effectiveness of design maintenance tasks faster and with fewer errors.
patterns in supporting novice designers and the Borchers (2002) describes his experience
quality of the designs produced by pattern users. with using patterns to teach interaction design
Mostly from within the software engineering to undergraduate students. Design patterns were
community, descriptions of positive experiences covered as part of the course content and given
with design patterns have been reported (Beck & to students to use during their first design as-
Cunningham, 1987; Beck et al., 1996; Cline, 1996; signment. He reports that most students were
Schmidt, 1995). Prechelt, Unger-Lamprecht, able to relate several design patterns to problems

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 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Figure 3. Pedagogical design pattern from the patterns for experiential learning language: one concept,
several implementations (PPP, n.d.)

they were facing with their designs and that the supporting the creation of higher-quality designs.
patterns helped the students to retain the design Again not statistically significant, they report the
knowledge. Dearden, Finley, Allgar, and McMa- designs created by participants who used design
nus (2002) describe a study to evaluate design patterns were generally rated higher by judges
patterns as a tool for participatory design. They and that the design patterns helped novice and
claim novice Web designers were able to produce experienced designers, assisted in communication
feasible design sketches of a travel Web site using between designers, and aided designers in avoid-
design patterns and that using the patterns enabled ing some design problems early in the process.
participants without experience in Web design to We believe that data from control studies
participate in the design of a Web site. However, on design pattern effectiveness is limited due
no claims were made to the quality of the designs to experimental design difficulties. Spector and
produced by the users due to the limited amount Song (1995) discuss the difficulties of measur-
of time participants worked on them and because ing the effectiveness of design support methods
they were only paper-based sketches. Also from due to the fact that design-based tasks can be
the HCI community, Chung et al. (2004) describe very individualized and quite time consuming to
two studies to evaluate the usefulness of design develop. Prechelt et al. (2002) also discuss these
patterns in supporting the design tasks of novice challenges and note that difficulty often arises in
designers in ubiquitous computing. They also experiments that attempt to evaluate a specific
evaluated the usefulness of the design patterns in form of an information source. Because of these
improving communication between designers and challenges, the design of such studies is a nontrivial

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

task. We have encountered this difficulty within be used to support effective e-learning design,
our research (Frizell, 2003, 2006), an issue we but that this knowledge needs to be captured
discuss in a subsequent section. and presented in a way that supports instructors
in its use (Frizell & Hübscher, 2002a). We also
advocate that e-learning design patterns should
DESIGN PATTERNS USAGE be based on an underlying design framework or
IN E-LEARNING philosophy, an issue first discussed by Mahemoff
and Johnston (1998a) regarding the development
Much of the current research with pedagogical of HCI design patterns. This approach towards
patterns has been in the area of Web-based in- the development of design patterns is considered
structional design or e-learning design. E-learning a value-laden approach where the values inform
design can be defined as “the application of learn- the development of the patterns (E-LEN, n.d.;
ing design knowledge when developing a concrete Fincher & Utting, 2002). The E-LEN consortium
unit of learning [via an electronic medium], e.g. a notes that e-learning patterns should be used to
course, a lesson, a curriculum, a learning event” express educational values and that it is better
(Koper, 2005). Learning design knowledge in this to be explicit about the educational values than
context encompasses beliefs about teaching and claiming the development of value-free patterns.
student learning derived from a number of sources
including educator experiences, best practices,
and educational theories. Design patterns have PROPOSED E-LEARNING
been proposed to capture and disseminate design DESIGN PATTERNS
knowledge from all the aforementioned sources to
support both e-learning design and development In developing the design patterns, we examined
(Avgeriou, Papasalouros, Retalis, & Skordalakis, the literature on learning theories and instructional
2003; E-LEN, n.d.; Goodyear, 2005; Jegan & Es- design to identify pedagogical best practices and
waran, 2004; Retalis, Georgiakakis, & Dimitriadis, design principles that support effective learning
2006). Our research lies within this realm and is design. Through this process, we identified 10
discussed in the following section. design principles that provide a framework for the
development of e-learning patterns. The frame-
work presented in Table 2 contains principles that
TOWARDS A PATTERN LANGUAGE advocate the design of collaborative and active
FOR E-LEARNING DESIGN Web learning environments (Bransford, Sher-
wood, Hasselbring, Kinzer, & Williams, 1990;
In this section, we describe our research towards Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989; Jonassen, 1999;
the development of a pattern language for e- Kearsley, 1999; Kearsley & Schneiderman, 1999;
learning design. We have currently developed Oliver & Herrington, 2000). There is also a focus
26 design patterns that cover various issues in on providing rich and diverse course content to
e-learning design (Frizell, 2003). The focus is to students (Merrill, 2002; Spiro & Jehng, 1990).
support novices in the design of collaborative and Pedagogical principles that emphasize the im-
active e-learning environments, which incorporate portance of incorporating structure, support, and
the support and guidance a student may need to be guidance into a course’s design are also included
successful in such an environment. Our research in the framework (Gagné, 1985; Kearsley, 1999;
is based on the view that principles from learn- Merrill, 2002). In developing the framework, we
ing theory and instructional design research can considered the information content, learning ac-

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 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Table 2. Design framework for e-learning patterns

face in designing effective online environments.
1. Design for interactivity Content design patterns assist with design prob-
2. Provide problem-solving activities lems related to the presentation and structure of
3. Encourage student participation
4. Encourage student expression
course materials. In developing the design patterns
5. Provide multiple perspectives on content to be included in this category, the focus was on
6. Provide multiple representations of data
7. Include authentic content and activities
providing rich and diverse course content and on
8. Provide structure to the learning process providing structure and guidance in the presenta-
9. Give feedback and guidance tion of course materials. Currently, nine design
10. Provide support aides
patterns have been developed to address design
problems pertaining to these design goals. Learn-
ing Activity design patterns provide solutions to
tivities, and support structures that can be included
problems concerning the creation of collaborative
in a course to enhance student-learning outcomes.
and active e-learning environments. Currently,
Table 3 provides an overview of the e-learning
eight design patterns have been developed that
design patterns that have been developed based
address building learning communities, encourag-
on this design framework. The name and a state-
ing student participation, encouraging student
ment of the design intent of each pattern are
expression, and problem solving. Learning Sup-
listed. The design patterns embody the design
port design patterns address problems with prov-
philosophy represented by the 10 principles
ing support to students. The focus was on the
listed above and provide novice course designers
creation of design patterns concerned with provid-
with a useful way of looking at this often difficult
ing guidance and feedback to students.
to understand pedagogical information. We do
Due to space limitations, we present only two
not suggest that this collection of design patterns
of the design patterns in detail. A complete de-
cover all possible design problems that may arise
scription is available in Frizell (2003). The design
in course design and while an initial study with
pattern shown in Figure 4 named Information
users has been conducted (Frizell, 2006), the
Representation provides a strategy for providing
design patterns can benefit from continued critiqu-
diverse course content. The design pattern named
ing or shepherding to refine the patterns and to
Post Requirement (see Figure 6) provides a strat-
identify additional patterns.
egy for involving students in course activities and
We categorized the e-learning design space
addresses the problem of getting all students to
based upon the model presented by Oliver and
participate. A format consisting of six elements—
Herrington (2000) for the design of Web-based
name, context, problem, solution, examples, and
learning environments based on principles from
references—was chosen to describe each design
situated learning theories. Using this model, the
pattern. We believe this format provides designers
design patterns are structured into three distinct
with those key features needed to fully understand
but congruent design categories: (1) design pat-
a design pattern without including too much infor-
terns that focus on design problems related to
mation so that the pattern becomes difficult to read
course content, (2) design patterns that focus on
and follow. The reference section is used to validate
student learning activities, and (3) design patterns
the pattern and provides additional resources for
that focus on providing a learning support struc-
those users who are interested in the theory behind
ture. This categorization allows for the develop-
the pattern. Borchers (2000a) speaks to the need
ment of e-learning patterns that focus on both the
for patterns to give empirical evidence of their
problems students face in being successful in
validity without making the pattern unreadable
online environments and the problems instructors

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Table 3. E-learning design patterns (Frizell, 2003)

Content Patterns Design Goal

• Course Goals Provide students with course objectives
• Course Layout Organize course design decisions
• Course Path Organize and link course content
• Foundation Help students recall previously learned information
• Information Bridge Help students make connections between lessons
• Information Chunks Provide structure to course content
• Information Representation Provide content in multiple representational forms
• Points of View Provide students with multiple perspectives on course content
• Syllabus Inform students of course content and expectations
Learning Activity Patterns
• Active Student Encourage student expression and increase student participation by getting them
involved in course activities
• Course Interactions Increase course interactions
• Group Work Increase course interactions through group activities
• Learning Community Encourage students to communicate
• Peer Evaluation Encourage student expression
• Post Requirement Encourage student participation in group discussions
• Problem Practice Provide problem-solving activities
• Real World Provide problem-solving activities in the context of real world usage
Learning Support Patterns
• Communication Tools Support student communication
• Discovery Orientation Support student exploration
• Facilitated Discussion Support student communication
• FAQ Provide students with immediate feedback
• Feedback Give students feedback on course activities and assignments
• Learner Guidance Provide support to students in understanding and completing course activities
• Moderated Discussion Support student communication
• Question Time Provide students with immediate feedback
• Student Input Gather student feedback on the course

with lots of statistical information. The examples novices and to gain insight on problems and limi-
included in the design patterns are obtained from tations that may exist in end user’s abilities to use
the literature or from existing courses. design patterns. Our research questions included:
Are design patterns effective in supporting the
design tasks of novices? Can end users apply the
FIRST EVALUATION OF THE DESIGN knowledge represented in design patterns more
PATTERNS effectively than guideline representation? In this
section, we summarize the design and results of
We conducted a study to investigate the effec- the study.
tiveness of our e-learning patterns in supporting

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 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Figure 4. E-learning design pattern example

Methodology online C++ programming course), but novices to

instructional design.
Participants. Twenty-nine computer science Procedure. The experimental design was
graduate students participated in the study. Based between-groups with the participants being given
on data from the preliminary questionnaire, 45% the same design task to complete. The differ-
has some familiarity with software engineer- ence was in the method of design support that
ing design patterns, while only 17% had some was provided to them. One group had access to
teaching experience mostly as graduate teaching a Web site containing a subset of the developed
assistants. None of the students indicated having e-learning design patterns and the other group had
taken any type of education class that focused on design guidelines. The guidelines were primar-
teaching and student learning. This suggests the ily represented as two to three line paragraphs
participants were knowledgeable on the subject with no accompanying examples. To minimize
matter used in the design task (i.e., design of the effects of having the information not only in
different form but also contain different content,

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Figure 5. E-learning design pattern example (continued)

we looked for guideline information that provided because we wanted to observe the participants
content as similar as possible to the information while they interacted with the design patterns.
represented in the design patterns. However, there We did not consider the 10–20 hours reported in
was no optimal way to reproduce the exact same the literature needed to design a course lesson
information contained in all the sections of the for evaluation feasible for our study (Thomas,
patterns into a guideline without trying to rewrite 2000). Spector and Song (1995) also report on the
the guideline as a design pattern. significant amount of time ranging from weeks
The design task for the study consisted of the to months it can take users to produce a course
selection and justification of useful and applicable module that warrants evaluation. Based on the
design patterns or design guidelines by participants design task, the factors considered in evaluating
for the design of an online C++ programming design pattern effectiveness include:
course. Participants were asked to provide both
why they considered the guideline or design pattern • Design task results: An analysis of par-
useful and applicable to the course’s design, and ticipant’s task results, which includes the
how they would use this knowledge to affect the number of patterns or guidelines selected,
course’s design. We chose this design task instead the appropriateness of the selections, the
of the design of a course module for evaluation

127
 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

Figure 6. E-learning design pattern example

reasoning given by users for the selection, bility, understandability, learnability, and
and the time taken to complete the task. effectiveness.
• Problems encountered: Any difficulties
observed or reported by users in complet- The study occurred over a 2-week period with
ing the task. subjects participating one at a time. Participants
• User satisfaction: A measure of par- signed up for 75-minute sessions, but were al-
ticipant’s opinions of the design support lowed as much time as needed to complete the
method after completing the design task. design task.
Participants were given a questionnaire Results summary. Participant’s data were
after completing the task and asked to studied for any noticeable differences between
rank the method on usefulness, applica- pattern users and guideline users in the level of

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Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

understanding or applicability in the informa- current research efforts in learning objects, learn-
tion provided when answering the questions of ing design, and learning management systems, and
why an item was selected and on how it would (3) the development of software tools to facilitate
be used. There was no consistency in the data the creation, sharing, and use of design patterns.
provided that would suggest that one group had The structure of design patterns and pattern lan-
a higher level of understanding when compared guages and their use within education is still in
to the other group. However, several participants the exploratory stage. A number of formats and
from the design guidelines group asked for more techniques for the development of pedagogical
clarification on the guidelines and asked the evalu- design patterns have been proposed. The design
ator to provide example usages of the guidelines. patterns that are currently available also vary
One participant from this group commented that significantly in level of detail and focus. Fincher
more details were needed to help fully understand and Utting (2002) have characterized what they
many of the guidelines. Results from the user term the functional and nonfunctional require-
satisfaction questionnaire yielded no significant ments for pattern languages. However, given the
differences between groups regarding the useful- array of what currently exists, further research is
ness, applicability, understandability, learnability, warranted on the development of frameworks or
and effectiveness of the design patterns or design models for the development and use of pedagogical
guidelines. patterns. This research must address standards for
While data analysis of the results was incon- the structure of pedagogical patterns and criterion
clusive in measuring design pattern effectiveness, for the characteristics that must be present.
and no significant differences were found between Within the education literature, there is a shift
design pattern and design guideline usage, users towards reuse of design solutions and in addition
rated the design patterns favorably, reported few to design patterns, research into learning objects
problems in understanding the design knowledge (Wiley, 2002) and learning designs (Koper & Tat-
presented in them, and indicated the design pat- tersall, 2005) exists. While there have been some
terns exposed them to design issues not previously attempts to analyze the relationship among these
considered. An experimental design that focused approaches, further analysis is needed. Several
on the selection and justification of design patterns research efforts have also discussed ways software
by users proved to be insufficient for measuring ef- tools may prove beneficial for developing and us-
fectiveness. In future research activities, we intend ing design patterns (Budinsky, Finnie, Vlissides,
to explore extensions and possible alternatives to & Yu, 1996; Chambers, Harrison, & Vlissides,
the experimental design used in this first study. 2000; Dearden et al., 2000; Greene, Matchen, &
Jones, 2002). Although no formal studies have
evaluated the effects of software tools on design
FUTURE TRENDS pattern usage, tool support may greatly harness
the benefits of design patterns. Chambers et al.
Design patterns have emerged as a powerful ap- (2002) found that the problem that may exist
proach for capturing design knowledge to promote in pattern application is in the designer under-
reuse of designs and provide design support to standing his problem and deciding which design
novices. To support wide spread adoption and use patterns help solve it best. We have explored the
of design patterns within education, we highlight combination of e-learning design patterns within
three main areas of future research: (1) standard- a design environment that supports the process of
ization of the design pattern form in education, selecting and applying design patterns and have
(2) the integration of design pattern research with investigated techniques for integrating design

129
 Using Design Patterns to Support E-Learning Design

pattern into learning management systems (Fri- Alexander, C., Ishikawa, S., Silverstein, M., Ja-
zell & Hübscher, 2002b; Mondle, 2005). Further cobson, M., Fiksdhl-King, I., & Angel, S. (1977).
research is needed to gain more insight on user A pattern language: Towns, building, construction.
experiences with design patterns and to evaluate New York: Oxford University Press.
the designs created with design patterns. This data
Alexander, C., Silverstein, M., Angel, S., Ishikawa,
can benefit the development of pattern support
S., & Abrams, D. (1975). The Oregon experiment.
tools and design environments as we gain more
New York: Oxford University Press.
insight into the process users follow when using
design patterns and how those activities can be Alur, D., Crupi, J., & Malks, D. (2001). Core
effectively supported J2EE patterns: Best practices and design strate-
gies. Prentice Hall.
Appleton, B. (2000, February 14). Patterns &
CONCLUSION
software: Essential concepts & terminology. Re-
trieved March 29, 2008, from http://www.enteract.
This chapter has described the concept of design
com/~bradapp/docs/patterns-intro.html
patterns and provided a historical overview of
their use in a number of different disciplines to Avgeriou, P., Papasalouros, A., Retalis, S.,
capture and disseminate design knowledge. The & Skordalakis, M. (2003). Towards a pattern
use of design patterns has moved from architecture, language for learning management systems
most notably into software engineering, and also [Electronic version]. Educational Technology &
to the HCI and education communities. Software Society, 6(2), 11–24.
engineering design patterns differ from the original
Beck, K., Coplien, J. O., Crocker, R., Dominick,
architectural design patterns in that they provide
L., Meszaros, G., Paulissch, F., & Vlissides, J.
specific implementation details and are best un-
(1996). Industrial experience with design pat-
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and also specific implementation details are left terns languages for object-oriented programs.
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This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Learning Design and Learning Objects: Issues, Applications,
and Technologies, edited by Lori Lockyer, Sue Bennett, Shirley Agostinho and Barry Harper, pp. 144-166, copyright 2009 by
Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 135

Chapter 1.12
Visual Design of Coherent
Technology-Enhanced
Learning Systems:
A Few Lessons Learned
from CPM Language

Thierry Nodenot
Université de Pau et des pays de l’Adour, France

Pierre Laforcade
Université du Maine, France

Xavier Le Pallec
Université de Lille, France

ABSTRACT code (i.e., IML-LD players), others have been

developed to support the creativity of designers
Visual instructional design languages currently while exploring their problem-spaces and solu-
provide notations for representing the intermedi- tions. This chapter introduces CPM (computer
ate and final results of a knowledge engineering problem-based meta-model), a visual language for
process. As some languages particularly focus the instructional design of problem-based learning
on the formal representation of a learning design (PBL) situations. On the one hand, CPM sketches
that can be transformed into machine interpretable of a PBL situation can improve communication
within multidisciplinary ID teams; on the other
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch112 hand, CPM blueprints can describe the functional

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Visual Design of Coherent Technology-Enhanced Learning Systems

components that a technology-enhanced learning support for designers to build a final representa-
(TEL) system should offer to support such a PBL tion complying with the IMS-LD specification.
situation. We first present the aims and the funda- Initially, designers had to use XML editors (like
mentals of CPM language. Then, we analyze CPM XMLSpy) to benefit from all IMS-LD expressive
usability using a set of CPM diagrams produced capabilities (levels A, B, C). Reload, a tree and
in a case study in a ‘real-world’ setting. form based authoring tool, was the first editor to
significantly improve this situation. ChapterXV of
this handbook provides an extensive presentation
INTRODUCTION of currently available IMS-LD compliant tools
(Tattersall, 2007):
For several years, the IMS-LD specification
(IMS, 2003b) has been the subject of converging • LD-editors like Reload (Reload, 2005),
theoretical and practical works from research- CopperAuthor (CopperAuthor, 2005), etc.
ers and practitioners concerned with Learning • Visual tools to support practitioners in
Technologies. the creation of IMS-LD compliant designs
The IMS-LD specification is now well docu- by means of using collaborative pattern-
mented (Hummel, Manderveld, Tattersall, & based templates (Hernández-Leo et al.,
Koper, 2004; Koper et al., 2003; Koper & Olivier, 2006).
2004) and widely used for the semantic represen- • Authoring environments for IMS-
tation of learning designs. A learning design is LD designs like the ASK Learning
defined as the description of the teaching-learning Designer Toolkit – ASK-LDT (Sampson,
process that takes place in a unit of learning (Ko- Karampiperis, & Zervas, 2005).
per, 2006). The key principle in learning design is • Runtime engines able to interpret a LD-
that it represents learning activities and support scenario like CopperCore (Vogten &
activities being performed by different persons Martens, 2003).
(learners, teachers) in the context of a unit of • learning management systems able to in-
learning. These activities can refer to different terpret LD scenarios: dotLRN (Santos,
learning objects that are used/required by these Boticario, & Barrera, 2005), LAMS
activities at runtime (e.g., books, software pro- (Dalziel, 2006), Moodle (Berggren et al.,
grams, pictures); they can also refer to services 2005), etc.
(e.g., forums, chats, wikis) used to communicate
and collaborate in the teaching-learning process. However, standards like IMS-LD (2003)
Thus, IMS-LD is an educational modeling and IEEE LOM (2002) start from the principle
language that provides a representation of the that even though learning theories are not peda-
components of a learning environment in a stan- gogically neutral, neutral reference models and
dardized XML schema that can be executed by standards can still be designed: ‘The aim is not
compliant e-learning platforms. According to to set up a prescriptive model but an integrative
the classification framework defined in Botturi, pedagogical meta-model which is neutral since
Derntl, Boot, and Gigl, (2006), IMS-LD is an it models what is common with any pedagogical
example of a finalist-communicative language: model’ (Koper, 2001); this assumption promotes
it is not intended to enable designers to produce the concept of de-contextualized learning objects
intermediate models of the learning design being that can be specified once, and then reused to
studied, nor to provide significant methodological design learning scenarios relying on instructivist

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(acquisition metaphor) or constructivist (knowl- Situated learning presupposes that meaning is

edge creation metaphor) principles. both incorporated within the learning design as
This chapter proposes another way to address well as being prone to interpretation and shared
the design of learning scenarios. On the one hand, understanding (Stahl, 2006): “a blind spot of
we consider that socio-constructivist learning sce- activity-centered models is their missing ability
narios must be designed in context. On the other to describe the relation between the program (the
hand, we think that even the final results of an learning design) and its context” (Allert, 2004).
instructional design (ID) process should clearly Thus, modeling coherent social systems for
state the mapping between the contextualized learning requires going beyond selecting and
activities specified by designers and the function- sequencing activities and resources, but also de-
alities provided by a given learning management ciding and documenting for what purposes they
system (LMS). are being used. This means that roles and activi-
In the first section, we present various on-going ties are to be represented and assessed in context
research work focusing on languages defined to (Derntl & Hummel, 2005). With this purpose in
help designers represent and share ideas about a mind, Allert (2005) introduces the concept of
learning scenario under study. Such languages second-order learning objects (SOLOs) which
are called ‘generative-reflective languages’ in are resources that provide and reflect a strategy
(Botturi, Derntl et al., 2006). The second section (generative strategy, learning strategy, problem
introduces CPM (cooperative problem-based solving strategy, or decision-making strategy).
meta-model) language, a visual design-language SOLOs provide means for structuring information
focusing on the design of problem-based learning or modeling certain aspects of the real world: they
(PBL) situations; we present its syntax and seman- represent sets of interrelated concepts that can be
tics that rely on UML language. Then, we try to used to describe the domain of concern. The use
understand CPM usability from an analysis of a of different SOLOs will thus allow a designer to
set of CPM diagrams produced in the framework look at a system from different points of view
of a real-world case study. This study illustrates (e.g., organizationally, structurally, and from
CPM language expressivity; it also states that even social points of view).
though designing PBL situations with CPM nota- Pawlowski (2002), Pawlowski and Bick (2006)
tion remains a complex knowledge engineering introduce the didactical object model (DIN) which
activity, good practices can concretely improve extends the aims of current educational modeling
designers’ efficiency and confidence. Finally, languages by introducing specifications for con-
the concluding section summarizes both CPM texts, experiences and acceptance. The concept of
characteristics and proposals for improvement. reusability is, in this case, extended since it should
be possible not only to share scenarios as technical
specifications but also to exchange didactical ex-
BACKGROUND pertise about such scenarios (from the knowledge
of their context of use, of concrete experiences
In this section, we only focus on current research reported by the actors involved in its use).
work that could lead practitioners (teachers, edu- Schneemayer (2002), Brusilovsky (2004), and
cators, designers) to consider ID languages as Paramythis and Loidl-Reisinger (2004) extend the
adequate tools to explore their problem-spaces, context notion to the environment context which
not only to share ideas within a design team, but clarifies the real characteristics of the LMS (or any
also to prepare the implementation of coherent other software) from which the learning situation
technological enhanced learning systems. is being exploited. This leads to an approach for

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the engineering of learning situations aiming to On the other hand, such instructional languages
specify the learning situation together with the must not neglect didactics, which is the science
LMS which will later enable students to learn of learning and teaching; even if in the domain
from this situation. of training (reproductive forms of learning), the
Works of Botturi (2003), Botturi, Cantoni, learning design is often limited to the planning and
Lepori, and Tardini (2006) promote the adaptation sequencing of non-contextualized activities and
of fast prototyping for the specific issues of e- resources. Pawlowski and Bick (2006) state that
learning project development with very particular designing situated-learning requires languages
stress on human-factor management (i.e., the eLab that can precisely describe the context and the
model). They developed a visual design language dynamics of the tutoring/learning activities and
called E2ML (cf Chapter VII of this handbook) resources.
to support fast prototyping to enable a develop- Our work on visual ID languages started just
ing interdisciplinary team to function (including before Koper (2001) published his first results on
educators and teachers). Outcomes of the language the Educational Modeling Language (the precur-
include better communication within the design sor of the IMS-LD specification). From the very
team, availability of precise design documenta- beginning, we intended to propose a visual design
tion to evaluate designs and figure out agreed and language that could be useful for both educators
more feasible solutions. and developers of TEL systems. From the point
Despite having quite different objectives, the of view of educators, the language requirements
works that we have listed in this section (including were:
those conducted in the framework of the IMS-
LD initiative) share the fact that they address the 1. To enable designers to represent learning-
complexity of ID. Developing future technology- tutoring activities in context.
enhanced learning (TEL) systems requires an 2. To reduce complexity by reflecting instruc-
interdisciplinary team with both pedagogical tion (and the process of ID).
and technical skills: communication and minimal
agreement on means and ends are conditions for In the following sections, we shall first present
success within such a team. the characteristics of the language; then we shall
From the point of view of teachers and educa- study the language usability from an analysis of
tors, ID languages can be communication catalysts its use on ‘real-world’ case studies.
(Botturi, Derntl et al., 2006) if these actors feel
that the concepts of the language are in tune with
the characteristics of the learning situation to be CPM LANGUAGE
described and will enable them to explore, docu-
ment and share their design decisions with others. CPM stands for cooperative problem-based learn-
On the one hand, Allert (2005) states that ing meta-model. It is a visual design language
teachers and educators need dedicated languages that we developed at the LIUPPA Laboratory
which reduce complexity by reflecting instruction (Laboratoire Informatique de l’Université de Pau
(and the process of ID) according to specified et des Pays de l’Adour, France) as a specialization
criteria (p. 41): i.e., formalization, compatibility of UML language. CPM language focuses on the
and interoperability criteria (IMS, 2003b) are to design of problem-based learning (PBL) situa-
be considered since most educators are now aware tions. We decided to work on such a dedicated
that the introduction of technologies in education language because we consider with Allert (2004)
has important consequences on any design process. and Pawlowski and Bick (2006) that:

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1. Pedagogical meta-models are not neutral the object of any PBL activity is an ill-structured
2. There is an important need for design problem under study and the expected outcomes
languages that specifically address genera- of a PBL activity are (Miao, 2000):
tive learning (learning in context, situated
learning). • Acquiring knowledge and skills which can
be transferred to solve similar problems at
According to the ID classification scheme individual level.
defined in Botturi, Derntl et al. (2006), it is a • Constructing shared knowledge and pro-
visual (notation level), layered (stratification moting mutual understanding at group
level), semi-formal (formalization level) language level.
promoting multiple perspectives (more than one
view) upon the same entities. In the next para- To address such objectives, our challenge was
graphs, we present the aims of the language and to explore UML modeling capabilities for the PBL
the information model captured by CPM language. domain and to adapt the semantics of this language,
Fundamentals of both its abstract syntax (the CPM when required, using meta-modeling techniques.
meta-model) and its concrete syntax (the CPM UML is a standard controlled by the object
profile) are then discussed. Finally, we briefly management group (OMG) which is widely
present three real-world case studies, which have known as a design catalyst within teams of soft-
enabled us to experiment on the usability of CPM ware developers Costagliola, De Lucia, Orefice,
language. and Polese (2002), Ferruci, Tortora, and Vitello
(2002). Readers needing a basic understanding of
Aims of CPM Language the UML language will find a useful introduction
in chapter IX of this handbook.
Even though learning by doing activities pro- UML language can be used as a sketch, blue-
moted by a PBL scenario may seem to be natural print or programming language (Fowler, 2005).
activities, PBL situations must be scripted. In the In sketch usage, developers use UML to com-
context of PBL, the support focuses on mentoring, municate some particular aspects of the system
motivating, creating simulated crises, showing being studied. In the blueprint usage, the idea is
how failures result from poor communication to build a detailed design for a programmer to use
and lack of foresight, identifying and promoting in coding software. Blueprints may be used for all
areas in which teams and individuals have to make the details of a system or the designer may draw
progress. Thus, PBL is different from traditional a blueprint for a particular area. In programming
instructional methods which emphasize the con- language usage, developers draw UML diagrams
tent: This means the main focus is on the learner that are compiled directly into executable code,
and genuine problems (Norman & Spohrer, 1996). and UML becomes the source code.
Guided by tutors who take only a facilitator role, Our studies demonstrated that UML is too
learners are engaged in active and meaningful general to correctly address PBL domain and
cooperative learning. They collaborate with each interdisciplinary issues (Sallaberry, Nodenot,
other by using tools to represent problems, to Marquesuzaà, Bessagnet, & Laforcade, 2002). Yet,
generate solutions, to discuss different perspec- UML activity diagrams are explicitly considered
tives, to lead experiments and simulations, or to in (IMS, 2003a) as useful formalisms to capture
write reports, etc. The driving force is the prob- requirements and build learning specifications.
lem given, the success is the solution of it, and A UML-based language proved to supply more
apprenticeship is a condition for success. Thus, support to the interdisciplinary team of developers

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 Visual Design of Coherent Technology-Enhanced Learning Systems

by means of well known (but debatable) UML our CPM models, abstractions of LMSs are our
features: standard notation, communication power, favourite platform-independent models. The idea
gateway between models and implementation consists in mapping conceptual design models
platforms including software components and with components representing abstract views of
services. the services provided by an LMS: such a map-
Thus, we developed CPM, a specialization of ping leadsdesigners to use the CPM language in
UML language for PBL which we implemented order to specialize and contextualize the services
by means of a profiling mechanism (OMG, 1999). supplied by an LMS according to the specificities
This language addresses most of the design pro- of the activities to be fulfilled.
cess, covering the different stages of conceptual
and functional designing. This was a matter of The CPM Information Model
differentiating two target audiences.
On the one hand, educators and designers use CPM relies on an information model depicted
CPM language to draw models (similar to UML in Figure 1 (Nodenot, 2005). It is composed of
sketches) focusing initial requirements of a PBL three blocks:
situation including the PBL domain, situated roles Block 1 (gray area at the top) deals with the
of learners/teachers, learners skills, predicted modeling of the situated roles played by the very
obstacles which the educators want learners to actors involved in a PBL situation. Roles can be
overcome, goals and criteria for success within the assigned to individuals or to groups of actors. All
PBL situation, resources available to learners, etc. roles do not imply the same knowledge and know-
On the other hand, CPM language addresses how; according to their learning goals and respon-
instructional engineers. Their work involves de- sibilities, roles will often use specific resources
signing a viable solution, in coordinating all the to perform their learning/tutoring activities.
actors involved in the development team. Knowl- Block 2 (gray area at the left) deals with the
edge of UML is a prerequisite for such engineers work organization (rules that can constrain the
who use CPM language to draw various models way activities will be conducted by roles). This
which capture different points of view or outlooks work organization, including collaborative work,
on the same PBL situation (pedagogical, structural, can be decided by designers (learning scenario) or
social, or operational). This set of models makes it can be in charge of the actors at runtime. When
up the learning/tutoring scenario which can be described at design stage, the organization rules
planned (in terms of steps and learning/tutoring may constrain the activities and resources at the
events) but cannot be totally predetermined at de- learners’/tutors’ disposal. Activities can be further
sign time since PBL addresses generative learning detailed in terms of steps, enabling designers to
(Allert, 2005). The blueprints they produce are elicit the way important learning/tutoring events
expressed in terms of the concepts appearing in the should be taken into account when they are raised
sketches produced by educators, thus facilitating at runtime.
discussion and agreement. Block 3 (white area at the bottom right) deals
CPM sketches and blueprints prepare the de- with the resources used by actors. Knowledge can
tailed design stage that involves mapping those represent activity prerequisites/post requisites,
agreed CPM models with platform-independent information about what can be learned from
models (PIM), e.g., IMS-LD (Laforcade, 2004) or available documents, etc. A language is useful
LMS abstractions (Renaux, Caron, & Le Pallec, to the extent it forces actors to use a fixed set of
2005). Even though we implemented a toolset to vocabulary when they try to reach agreements in
generate Level A IMS-LD compliant models from collaborative activities or when they are asked

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Visual Design of Coherent Technology-Enhanced Learning Systems

Figure 1. The CPM conceptual information model

to describe what they know, what they would located in packages and sub-packages (see Figure
like to know, etc. Documents and tools represent 2): the CPM_Foundation (defined as a subset of
contextualized artifacts enabling actors to conduct UML 1.5) and the CPM_Extensions which adds
assigned activities. the necessary concepts needed to describe PBL
situations.
The CPM Toolset Among CPM extensions, cognitive concepts
necessary to trace the learning/tutoring behaviors
From the CPM information model (to be com- of the actors are included in the PedagogicalPack-
pared with the IMS-LD Information model), we age. This package deals with information used to
first built the abstract syntax of the language (the model the components of a PBLS: misconceptions
CPM meta-model) whereas its concrete syntax of the learners, predicted obstacles that a teacher
was represented through the CPM profile. wants the learners to overcome, goals and success
criteria of the PBLS, resources available to the
The CPM Meta-Model learners, etc. The StructuralPackage includes

To construct the CPM meta-model, an interdisci-

Figure 2. The packages of the CPM meta-model
plinary team started with 35 concepts and divided
them into two groups. First, concepts were selected
which related to the necessity for the educators to
produce a PBL situation’s conceptual design (using
terminology from works by (Develay, 1993) and
(Meirieu, 1994) and includes notions like Learning
Goal, Obstacle, Success Criterion, etc.). Then,
several concepts were identified which are useful
to describe a) the learning scenario (its structure
and its dynamics) or b) the tool-environment pro-
vided to actors to conduct their learning/teaching
activities. These concepts are borrowed as often
as possible from the IMS-LD terminology (e.g.,
Activity, Activity-Structure, Role, etc.). They are

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concepts necessary to describe the PBL scenario archy of scenes from which different roles
and to break it down into simpler learning/tutor- will carry out particular activities.
ing activities. Lastly, the SocialPackage deals • The ActivityStructure and Activity concepts
includes all the concepts necessary to manage are also specializations of ActivityConcept;
co-operative work including sharing of resources they respectively represent a group of ac-
and of learning/tutoring activities. tivities and a particular activity assigned
There are interconnections between the con- to one role. Activity Structures can be of
cepts within these packages. Figure 3 presents two different types (i.e., the structureKind
extracts: on the left, a Structural Package extract meta-attribute).
and on the right a Social Package extract. Grey • The CollaborativeActivity concept also
concepts refer to elements from the CPM_Foun- specializes the ActivityConcept; the meta-
dation package (see UML 1.5). model states that such an activity is per-
formed by one and only one role (a role
• ActivityConcept particularizes the UML can be assigned to a group of concrete
concept of operation; it is a general con- actors). Cooperation is not explicit in our
cept to depict any hierarchy of activities. meta-model since we decided to describe
• Learning Phase is used to sequence a learn- cooperation by means of role sharing and
ing scenario; its semantics are close to the resource sharing (i.e., the CPM conceptual
Act IMS-LD Concept, except that an IMS- information model presented in Figure 1).
LD Act can only be broken down into one
and only one sublevel. Since it specializes The CPM Profile
the ActivityConcept, the LearningPhase
concept can be used to describe a scenario To enable designers to draw diagrams that are con-
with a hierarchy of acts including a hier- sistent with such a meta-model, we implemented

Figure 3. Interconnections between the concepts of the CPM meta-model packages

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the CPM profile. A profile uses the extension We provided designers with an authoring
mechanisms of UML in a standardized way, for a environment supporting CPM language. This
particular purpose. It merely refines the standard was developed alongside the Objecteering/UML
semantics of UML by adding further constraints CASE tool. This prototype allowed us to verify
and interpretations that capture domain specific the coherence between the CPM profile entities
semantics and modeling patterns. (concrete syntax) and the CPM meta-model
Like any UML profile, the CPM profile pro- meta-types (abstract syntax). It also enabled us
motes Stereotypes which are defined for each to store complete case studies (e.g., the SMASH
specific meta-class of the UML meta-model. Thus, case study) as well as reusable design patterns in
for each concept of the CPM_Extensions package, the objecteering shared repository. The current
we defined a particular stereotype attached to a release of this CPM language is available within
specific UML meta-class (the Base meta-class) a module that can be integrated in and used with
which the CPM concept directly or indirectly par- the free-of-charge-version of the Objecteering/
ticularizes. We also defined alternatives which are UML Modeler.
other UML meta-classes to enable designers to use In the next sections, we shall denote a CPM
a CPM concept in alternative UML diagrams than stereotype with the << >> symbol (e.g., the
those suited to its Base meta-class. For example: <<activity-structure>> stereotype. A UML
metaclass will be highlighted in italics (e.g., the
• A Role is a stereotype defined for the ObjectFlowState metaclass). For the purpose of
UseCases::Actor meta-class (i.e., Figure the case studies that we shall be presenting here,
5) (a UML actor is something or some- model elements which are instances of the CPM
one who supplies a stimulus to the system stereotypes will appear in italics (e.g., the Testi-
operations). monies analysis <<activity-structure>>).
• But we also promoted alterna-
tive meta-classes (i.e., Figure 6):
ActivityGraphs::Partition (to enable de- REAL WORLD CASE
signers to use the CPM Role concept in STUDIES DESIGNED WITH
UML activity-diagrams), Core::Classifier THE CPM LANGUAGE
(to enable designers to use the CPM
LeaningPhase concept in UML Class Chronologically, we started with the SMASH PBL
Diagrams). situation that addresses 10 to 12 year- old pupils
who must piece together eye-witness accounts
This mechanism which was already used in to identify the causes of a bicycle accident. We
OMG(2002a)meansthatActivityGraphs::Partition set up an interdisciplinary team including two
and Core::Classifier are proxy notations of the teachers, two CPM specialists, and two develop-
UseCases::Actor meta-class. ers mastering the Moodle LMS. This team used
Icons are associated with stereotypes to reduce CPM language to formalize the teaching/learning
the designers’ cognitive load and to enhance vi- objectives, to imagine and to detail a cooperative
sual appropriation of the CPM models. Tagged learning scenario that could take advantage of
values are attached to the different stereotypes; available communication tools (chat, forum, etc.).
they represent meta-attributes (e.g., phaseKind, The proposed scenario was then tested in real con-
structureKind, roleKind, etc.) of the CPM_Exten- ditions during four half days within a classroom
sions concepts. where groups of pupils assisted by their teacher

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had to cooperate according to the constraints of the will help us give concrete expression of the les-
specified learning/tutoring activities (using dedi- sons learned from CPM language.
cated resources—see Figure 3). Dedicated tools
(e.g., a dedicated e-whiteboard to help pupils share The Act 2 of the SMASH PBLS:
their understanding of the actors’ spatial position What is this Scenario About?
when the accident occurred) were then developed
to support learners activities; the scenario was During Act 2 (i.e., the IMS-LD terminology),
then partly implemented for the Moodle LMS. learners (who were previously divided into differ-
Proposed by Vignollet, David, Ferraris, Martel, ent groups) have to analyze allocated testimonies.
and Lejeune (2006), the PLANET-GAME case While some groups (that is, Investigator role 1
study focused on the didactic transposition (see to 3) have access to a limited set, others can read
the initial requirements analysis in Figure 2; see the full set of testimonies (i.e., Investigator role
also the account in Chapter XII) of a learning 4). The scenario leads all groups (there are several
game about astronomy. Assisted by a primary concurrent groups playing Investigator role 1 to
teacher, we used CPM language to describe the 3 while a unique group of learners plays the In-
conceptualization level that 12 year-old pupils vestigator role 4) to exchange information about
can reach and, in the meantime, we selected dif- what they learned/understood from the accounts
ferent scientific properties of these planets: their of the testimonies (each group will produce a
distances from the sun, their day durations, their belief graph) and then to write a single accident
year durations, their compositions, their average report that all groups must finally acknowledge.
temperatures, etc. This domain study led us to set The learning scenario is supervised by the Session
more detailed learning/tutoring objectives from manager role and by a tutor (i.e., the PoliceChief
which we defined a learning scenario and tutoring role) whose job is to help learners develop an
strategies (Nodenot & Laforcade, 2006). exhaustive analysis of the available testimonies
The GEODOC case study is an on-the-road at their disposal.
project that leads us to formalize CPM scenarios From a pedagogical viewpoint, such scenario
putting the focus on learning/tutoring objectives script encourages the groups of learners to confront
dedicated to text comprehension as applied to ge- their own ideas of road safety (knowledge, know-
ography. Learning activities which we formalized how, attitudes) with the safety rules promoted by
with CPM language include actual and inferential road regulations (Highway Code).
questions about what is being read (identifica- In the subsequent text, the reader will find
tion and localization of toponyms, topological several figures produced with CPM language to
identification, mapping-out of routes, etc.). This specify the Act 2 learning scenario. The model
project investigates not only the specialization of elements produced during the design process
LMS services according to formalized learning/ were all stored in the repository provided by the
teaching scenarios, but also the use of on-the-shelf Objecteering UML Case tool (i.e., Figure 5) from
computational applications in relation with the the set of CPM diagrams produced by the ID Team
taught domain (e.g., Postgis and GoogleEarth). in charge of the project. Each model element
In the next section, we briefly present the stored in the repository can be used in several
script of a learning scenario and we refer to the diagrams: use-case diagrams, class-diagrams,
figures denoting the CPM diagrams produced in activity diagrams, state-machines diagrams, etc.
the course of the design of such a scenario. This Among the different diagrams that were produced

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in the course of this project, the following were Several observations led us to formalize these
chosen for this chapter: lessons. To give concrete expression to these ob-
servations, we shall rely on CPM models from the
• Figure 6 and Figure 7 describe the roles SMASH PBL; we shall particularly focus on the
taken by the actors and the coarse-grain Act 2 learning scenario (the end of the previous
activities they performed during Act 2. section) leading learners to investigate the causes
• Figure 8 describes the resources that of a bicycle accident from a set of eye-witness
Investigator role 1 can use and produce testimonies:
when performing their dedicated activities.
• Figure 9 details the sequencing of the dif- Lesson U1: Although CPM adopts the jargon that
ferent coarse-grain activities and the con- many pedagogues and educational designers al-
ditions that resources must fulfill to accept ready use, producing a set of coherent CPM models
transitions from one activity to another. for a given case study is still a complex activity.
• Figure 10 and Figure 11 detail the Testimonies
Analysis <<activity-structure>>. During the conducted case studies, we noticed
that designers encountered difficulties when seek-
In the next section, we shall use these figures ing to organize efficiently the different kinds of
to elicit the lessons that we learned about CPM model elements that they were eliciting at design
language usability. However, from the information time (see Lesson U1, Observation 1). From the
given about Act 2 in this subsection, we strongly analysis of encountered difficulties and observed
encourage the reader to begin by analyzing the solutions, we propose a structuring model, which
semantics conveyed by this set of interrelated proved useful to organize the different model
CPM diagrams. elements under study within cohesive packages.
We also noticed (see Lesson U1: Observation
Lessons Learned from 2) that without human assistance, most educational
CPM Language designers did not know which notation was the
most appropriate to represent their design intents.
This section presents the lessons we learned about Yet, when the same educational designers gained
the usability of CPM language to edit/produce a experience about both the UML notation and
learning scenario. From the three case studies sum- about the CPM meta-model, most could produce
marized above, we drew two important lessons: expressive yet simple CPM diagrams.
Finally, Lesson U1—Observation 3 shows
• Although CPM adopts the jargon that that designers were sometimes frustrated because
many pedagogues and educational design- they were confusing CPM with a drawing tool: in
ers already use, producing a set of coherent particular, some did not clearly understand why the
CPM models for a given case study is still provided toolset (editors and wizards) considered
a complex activity. some diagrams whose model elements did not
• Even though most pedagogues are not able conform with the CPM meta-model as erroneous.
to produce a set of CPM coherent models
by themselves, both pedagogues and de- Lesson U1, Observation 1: Relevant model ele-
velopers can contribute to and benefit from ments must be conveniently organized by designers
such design models. within packages. CPM diagrams must also be
attached to packages.

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Real world case studies that we specified will be observed that the package structure is the
with CPM language had in common that they same as the one at root level: Act 2 shows a Local
could not be mastered by a single designer. All Roles Package, a Local resources Package, a Lo-
the modeling elements could not be represented cal Learning Roles Package, and an Act 2 Scenes
in the same UML class diagram; learner, tutor Package which contains all the scenes within Act
roles, learning goals and success criteria had to 2. This structuring promotes the contextualization
be contextualized according to the steps of the of roles, learning goals, resources and learning
learning process; both dynamics and structure activities. For example, the expanded Act 2—Local
of resources and activities had to be specified, Roles Package shows different Actor stereotypes,
etc. Relying on our experience in designing such which are model elements used during Act 2 to
case studies, we argue that in most cases, what is specialize the tutor role and the Learner role (i.e.,
needed is an approach that structures the design the Global Roles Package).
of complex learning scenarios at different levels. It is worth noting that this approach is in tune
Packages are UML constructs which enable the with Derntl & Motschnig-Pitrik (2007), which
grouping of model elements, making UML dia- encourages designers to elicit hierarchies of both
grams simpler and easier to understand. Packages learning goals and documents.
themselves may be nested within others; they are
depicted as file folders and may be Subsystems or Lesson U1, Observation 2: Among available
Models. When we designed CPM language, we CPM diagrams, designers must adequately choose
decided to provide designers with two stereotypes those which can help them to produce some simple
(see caption in Figure 5 which extends the Pack- yet coherent perspectives of the relevant model
age metaclass: the Learning Process stereotype to elements.
break down the learning process into subprocesses
and the Learning Package stereotype to group First, let us recall that UML is a language
other model elements. In the course of our case enabling designers to describe an abstraction of a
studies, we learned efficient ways to exploit these system that focuses on interesting aspects (mod-
stereotypes for organizing model elements. For els) and ignores irrelevant details. A perspective
instance, Figure 5 describes the packages used in (view) focuses on a subset of a model to make it
the SMASH PBLS: understandable.
This is a snapshot of the browser which enables Choosing UML to describe learning scenarios
a designer to edit the SMASH learning scenario. requires rethinking current uses and to elicit new
At root level, experience led us to create three uses of UML diagrams for dealing with the com-
learning packages whose model elements are plexity of learning scenarios. From an educational
exploited by the Learning Process package called point of view, a learning scenario is a system that
the SMASH Scenario Process. At the bottom of must be described in terms of learning roles, learn-
the figure, worth noting is the SMASH Scenario ing goals, resources made available to the learners,
denoted as an activity diagram used to generally learning and tutoring interactions/activities, events
describe how the different acts of the SMASH used to regulate learners’ activities, etc.
Learning Process are sequenced. From previous works (Sallaberry et al., 2002)
The model elements (and graphical views) of we predicted the new uses of UML diagrams
these four acts are then detailed within the SMASH that CPM language encourages. As stated in the
Scenario Process. section devoted to the presentation of the CPM
In the snapshot of Figure 5, the details of the profile (see Figure 4), a CPM stereotype such as
Act 2 Process were expanded. At this level, it the <<Role>> Stereotype can extend either the

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Figure 4. An extract of the stereotypes provided

How are they involved in the Work Organization
to designers by the CPM profile
that the learning scenario promotes? What are their
responsibilities in the various (possibly collabora-
tive) activities suggested to be performed in the
scenario? What kind of resources do they exploit
to carry out such activities? Applied to Act 2 of
the SMASH PBLS, Figure 6 and the following
are CPM diagrams which focus on the different
perspectives listed above.
In Figure 6, SMASH roles specialize the Class
metaclass. This class diagram shows that the
Learner role and the Tutor role (from the Global
Roles Package) were specialized to enable de-
signers to denote all actors playing an important
roles during Act 2. All roles are played by human
beings except the PoliceChief role (we chose a
detailed view of the Tutor role model element to
make the roleKind tag-value visible). Figure 7
offers another perspective for these SMASH roles:
Actor metaclass (to represent it in use-case dia- In this use-case diagram, roles specialize the
grams, or the Partition metaclass (to represent it Actor metaclass. This perspective focuses on
in Activity diagrams) or the Classifier metaclass the activities carried out by roles during Act 2.
(to represent it in Class diagrams). Each role either performs activities or assists
During the course of our experiments, we other roles performing those activities. Like in
noticed that designers (educators and computer- IMS-LD, activities that can be broken down into
scientists) encountered two types of difficulties simpler ones (e.g., Testimonies analysis, Time
when trying to map their design intentions with and document management or Production of
available notation (those provided by the different the investigation reports) are depicted with the
types of diagrams available). First, most design- stereotype <<Activity-structure>>.
ers were inclined to start from a visual notation Figure 8 is another class diagram which de-
(e.g., the notation for class diagrams) and then signers sketched to focus on the resources used
tried using this specific notation to represent all and produced by each role during Act2 (there
perspectives of the model being studied, even if is a dedicated class diagram for each leaf role
such a notation was not convenient for all aspects that appears in Figure 6). Resources which are
of the model. Second, we noticed that designers produced have the tag-value output while others
had questions about the notation they would be have the tag-value input.
advised to use, particularly at the beginning of a The different figures provided in this sec-
learning scenario design process. tion clearly show that the different perspec-
The case studies we have conducted provide tives provided to describe the roles in Act 2 are
useful answers to these difficulties. Let us focus on complementary (all of them can be reached from
the intention, “role models involved in a learning the model elements browser presented in Figure
scenario.” If we consider the CPM information 5). Other types of diagrams will be presented in
model given in Figure 1, designers should address Figure 10 (an Activity diagram) and in Figure 11
different perspectives for roles. What are these? (a state-machine diagram) to respectively detail

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Figure 5. The SMASH PBLS browser

the Testimonies analysis model element and the
belief graph model element that appeared in Figure
7 and Figure 8.
These figures also show that UML notations
must be understood by designers to enable them
to produce simple yet coherent perspectives of
the learning scenario being studied. Table 1 pro-
vides a synthesis of the practices we noticed
during our case studies. To build this table, we
took into account only diagrams which appeared
in the last version of the design produced for each
of our case studies.
The reader may be surprised that we do not
recommend the use of the object diagram for the
definition of roles and of resources. In fact, ex-
perience led us to consider that concrete roles
appear only when the scenario is deployed on a
platform (LMS) and used by concrete (groups of)
learners. It is only at deployment time that the
Investigator role 1 stereotype is instantiated and
played by concrete learners. And for similar rea-
sons, the resources produced and used by Inves-
tigator 1 are represented as classes (i.e., Figure
8) and not as objects.

Lesson U1, Observation 3: To succeed in produc-

ing a perspective, designers must agree on both
the UML notation and the CPM meta-model which

Figure 6. A class diagram representing a hierarchy of SMASH actors

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Figure 7. A use-case diagram representing the activities in which the different roles are involved

Figure 8. A class diagram describing the resources used and produced by the role Investigator 1

Table 1. Best practices for CPM diagrams

Use
External analysis of the learning scenario
Activity Diagram Description of collaborative activities
Internal analysis of activities and activity-structures
Activity cut-out
Use Case Diagram
Role identification
Learning goal description
Role description
Class Diagram Resource description
External analysis of activities and activity-structures
Description of the concepts from the domain model
State Machine Diagram Description of the active classes (resources, roles, learning goals, activities)
Instances from the domain model (concepts being studied, knowledge and know-how that learners must
Object Diagram
acquire)

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both define the rules that the model elements in framework of our latest project (the GEODOC
a CPM diagram must fulfill. case study), we also provided designers (educators
and computer-scientists) with the best-practices
During our experiments, designers were at of CPM diagrams and with a set of sample CPM
first surprised (and a bit confused) that they were diagrams for each design intent listed in Table 1.
constrained by both the rules of UML notations Our first experimental results show that such a
and of the CPM meta-model. On the one hand design team was more efficient (time and design
rules from the UML notations, they could not quality) than another team that did not have such
add, for example, any information about the documents at their disposal.
timeline in the class diagrams being sketched. But it is already clear that our toolset is still a
On the other hand, the CPM meta-model forced research prototype that proved expressive capabili-
them to respect, for example, the following rule: ties but cannot be distributed to an interdisciplin-
when the <<activity>> and the <<resource>> ary team without care and human guidance. Even
stereotypes both extend the Classifier metaclass though the current state of research presented in
(i.e., the class diagram in Figure 8), connection this section can provide substantial support in
links between such stereotypes must be of type understanding PBL scenarios, in designing and
<<Relation>> (the tag-value can either be input or documenting new scenarios, it is clear that our
output). Most designers did not understand such approach is specified by rather technically ori-
CPM rules, because they did not realize that the ented computer science people and a lot of work
same stereotype (e.g., the <<activity>> stereotype) is still necessary to transform educators into CPM
could represent different metaclasses when used autonomous designers.
in different types of diagrams. For example, in
Figure 7, the Testimonies analysis model element Lesson U2: Even though most pedagogues were
extends the UseCase metaclass while, in Figure 8, not able to produce a set of CPM coherent models,
it extends the Classifier metaclass (i.e., Figure 4 for both pedagogues and developers can contribute
the available metaclasses of the CPM stereotypes). to and benefit from such design models.
The three types of observations presented in
this section show that designers need time to gain Through educational expressivity of CPM
the necessary experience required to relevantly diagrams, Lesson 1 pinpointed some difficulties
exploit the CPM language. Our experience also encountered by designers who used the CPM
showed that educators can understand the mean- toolset. In this section, we present some meth-
ing of a set of CPM diagrams but that the (semi) odological principles which can help an ID team
formal nature of CPM language could hinder control the design process complexity.
some educators’ commitment in producing such In the course of the conducted case studies,
visual designs. They ask for cognitive assistance we first observed that, at any level of the learn-
during the design process: since CPM editors do ing scenario analysis (conceptual design, func-
not allow free drawing, designers require some tional design), designers might produce simple
feedback enabling them to do some opportunistic yet expressive CPM diagrams (i.e., Lesson U2,
productions: to-do lists, checklists, wizards, etc. Observation 1): it is a matter of focusing on one
The first cognitive tools developed were con- and only one perspective at a time.
textual menus that could infer the metaclass to be We also noticed that a correct stratification of
used from the knowledge of both the diagram type the learning scenario was important (i.e., Lesson
and the stereotype chosen by the designer. In the U2, Observation 2) to ensure a smooth transition

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between the perspectives drawn during learning In this figure, the reader will notice all activi-
scenario conceptual design and those drawn to ties and all activity-structures that already ap-
address the functional design of a TEL system that peared in the Act 2 use-case diagram presented
could manage such a learning scenario at runtime. in Figure 7: these model elements are grouped
Both observations will lead us to elicit a design together according to the scene during which they
process in tune with CPM language characteristics. are performed by these actors. The information
flows between states as ObjectFlowStates: these
Lesson U2, Observation 1: Complexity of models represent some events that should be true either
can be mastered by designers using the following at the beginning (prerequisite) or at the end (post-
rule: Design only what is necessary for a given requisite) of each scene. These different scenes
purpose and recognize overdesign. (e.g., the Act 2- Scene 2 process) are structuring
model elements that can also be easily located in
Our experience is that most pedagogues can our SMASH Browser (i.e., Figure 5).
concretely draw various CPM diagrams if they We consider that such a diagram can also
keep in mind that each diagram should focus on illustrate what over-design means. At the con-
one perspective that remains simple and expres- ceptual design level where educators play the
sive. Consider the Testimonies analysis model most important role, it would be useless to try to
element which appears in Figure 7 and in Figure represent exception-handling in such a predicted
8. None of these perspectives provides information learning scenario. At runtime, such a script can
about the activity sequencing planned during Act raise many exceptions (potentially meaningful for
2. Adding such an information within Figure 7 is educators) that need to be managed (particularly
difficult since use-case diagrams are not suited to those in relation with the Time and document
the description of activity sequencing: in general, management <<activity-structure>>). But adding
UML specialists add OCL constraints (OMG, exception handling in such a diagram would be
2002b) to address such difficulty. Drawing another likely to complicate the perspective and could
perspective focusing on such activity sequencing mask the key ideas of the scenario, which were
is much easier as stated in Figure 9: already spotted in Figure 9.

Figure 9. An activity diagram describing the sequencing of the activities performed during Act 2

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As a consequence, we consider that educators Figure 10, we can notice that the Testimonies
relying on CPM for conceptual design should strive analysis <<activity-structure>> exposes four
for an 80% solution: at this stage, visual design activity-structures (e.g., the Analysis available
should be used to represent the intermediate and testimonies <<activity-structure>>) that can be
then the final results of the design, thus providing further detailed using a top-down approach, some
means of communication between educators and collaborative activities (e.g., Replies to Questions
computer scientists. All diagrams presented above asked <<collaborative activity>>), some re-
are still intermediate results of design which helped sources (e.g., the Belief Graph <<Resource>> to
educators clarifying and sharing their initial ideas. be assessed when it is updated by any real actor
CPM activity diagrams are other important per- playing the <<role>> called Investigator role 1
spectives to consider because they are a (natural) to 3).
bridge between the use-case diagrams (which are Figure 10 also denotes how designers can de-
useful to represent educational roles, goals and scribe collaborative activities (i.e., activities with
activities) and the class-diagrams (that develop- a c flag); in the scenario, Investigator role 1 to 3
ers need to implement required functionality on cannot initiate any synchronous conversation but
a learning platform). During our experiments, this role can read information and answers ques-
such diagrams represented an interesting com- tions asked by Investigator role 4 (at implementa-
munication trade-off between our business logic tion stage, and will lead developers to specialize
experts (educators and interaction designers) and a chat service according to these requirements).
information technology experts (software design- An ObjectFlowstate denoting a <<Resource>>
ers, learning platform specialists, etc.). can be described with a UML State-machine
For example, Figure 10 is an activity diagram diagram. For example, Figure 11 represents the
that details the Testimonies analysis <<Activity- lifecycle of the Belief Graph model element
structure>>. elicited in Figure 10.
Three swimlanes are used to identify the spe- The underlying semantics is the following:
cific activities performed by each role; these each time an investigator adds a belief in his
swimlanes are consistent with the roles assigned belief graph (e.g., a representation of the follow-
to the Testimonies analysis <<activity-structure>> ing belief: “the white car bumped into the back
in the use-case diagram presented in Figure 7. In of the bicycle”), the state of the belief graph

Figure 10. An activity diagram to represent the details of the Testimonies analysis activity-structure

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Figure 11. A state-machine diagram to represent the lifecycle of the Belief Graph <<resource>>

changes to “to be assessed” (since the PoliceChief This is particularly true when drawing activ-
role is played by a machine—that is, the class ity diagrams. In our experiments, some of these
diagram in Figure 6, such a decision will entail proved to be potential deadlocks that frustrated
particular design concern about the assessment most educators during the design process. Dedi-
process elicitation). cated cognitive tools (wizards, to-do-lists, etc.)
We noticed that educators encountered vari- could probably give them more confidence; but
ous difficulties when seeking to draw some CPM we consider that the correct answer will rely on
activity diagrams by themselves. It is true that efficient communication in the ID team. With
these diagrams are not simple to create but they this in mind, sketches (even when they represent
allow complex system/interaction processing to be intermediate design results) can now play a central
represented efficiently. In order to get round this role in enhancing such communication.
obstacle, we advised educators to produce a use-
case diagram (in our example, a use case-diagram Lesson U2, Observation 2: CPM contributes to
detailing the Testimonies analysis <<<activity- producing both stratified and multiple perspectives
structure>>) for identifying the activities of inter- for a given learning scenario. This combination is
est and their relationships; information technol- a key-factor to enable a designer team to collab-
ogy designers used such sketches for discussion oratively determine the constraints under which
purposes with them; and together they produced a Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL) system
the final 80% solution presented in Figure 10. is to be designed.
Interestingly enough, once this deadlock was
broken, educators were able to go further in the UML is a widely accepted language to describe
conceptual design process. software systems. With the different perspectives
From this set of observations, we learned that of a TEL system that CPM offers, our profile
when using CPM diagrams for modeling a learn- adopts the same fundamentals (UML notation,
ing/tutoring scenario, it is important to capture UML semantics which we specialized with the
the requirements at a high level of abstraction. CPM meta-model semantics) to also describe the
Whatever the diagram, the perspective must re- educational context:
main simple. Such an approach allows designers
to emphasize important model elements while • At conceptual level, the language address-
hiding low-level processing details. Indeed, es the need to manage educational require-
such details may even obscure the model’s true ments effectively.
purpose, which is: • At functional level, the language addresses
the need to describe the required function-
• To identify key activities and dependencies ality of a TEL System in tune with such
• To promote exchanges and communication educational requirements.
in the ID team.

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Whatever the design level (conceptual vs. quiz component, a lecture component, a forum
functional), it is very important therefore to com- component, a whiteboard component, etc.) or
municate design decisions (and understanding) in they may be specialized components in relation
an unambiguous form to all partners involved in with the domain to be taught (e.g., a Geographical
the ID Team (including educators, information Information System viewer).
technology specialists and platform of learning In Figure 13, the <<CPL>> stereotypes denote
developers). different functionalities that specialize a forum
In the previous subsections, we showed that component: Depending on his role, a concrete
CPM enables designers to produce multiple actor will register differently; the teacher role has
perspectives for a learning scenario. These per- rights to add a topic in the forum while the
spectives favor coherent, unambiguous (within learner role can write entries for the topic that is
the limit of the UML semantics) but intelligible currently covered.
design decisions. The conducted case studies have Both figures were produced in SMASH PBLs
also demonstrated that to reach such a goal, these to denote the Reciprocal teaching pattern (Palinc-
multiple perspectives of a learning scenario should sar and Brown 1986). The term “reciprocal” de-
be correctly stratified. During the GEODOC case scribes the nature of the interactions each person
study, we noticed that, from the very beginning of has in response to the other(s). Teacher and student
the design process, some geographers were trying take turns assuming the role of a dialogue leader
to map some educational goals with functionalities (see Figure 13); sequencing of the concrete ac-
of the Geographical Information System viewer tivities performed by both roles is formalized by
which they had been used to working with previ- the dedicated swimlanes in Figure 12. The ID
ously. Such design decisions were problematic team chose this pattern because the designers
because on the one side, educational goals had wanted the students to improve their reading
yet to be further detailed and on the other, such a comprehension of the available SMASH testimo-
detailed analysis failed because the designers were nies; the designers also wanted them to learn to
mixing conceptual and functional model elements. monitor their own learning and thinking. Thus,
The main gains of a correct stratification are in SMASH PBLs, learners’ peers are key actors
modularity and design simplicity (i.e., Lesson in the reciprocal teaching pattern. These actors
U2-Observation 1 in the previous subsection). successively play the role of the teacher and the
Modularity allows easier adaptability when chang- role of the student when trying to understand texts
ing requirements; it also allows clear separation or interviews. Figure 12 details how they move
of the domains of trust. By starting with the most from one role to another and what the responsi-
fundamental educational factors (conceptual bilities of each role within the collaboration are.
design) and designing them to be contextually For each text (interview), the teacher role has to
appropriate, we were able in the course of the select one text. The specification states that the
conducted case studies to build successive layers teacher role is the one that formulates statements
design and eventually reach functional design. about his reading and understanding but that the
Figure 12 is an activity-diagram which ex- student role is the one that can ask questions and
emplifies the frontier between conceptual and which, at the very end of the discussion, will
functional design. In this figure, some activities formulate the agreed statements that can be in-
denote a <<CPL>> stereotype that represents ferred from the reading.
a functionality offered by concrete software Detailing how such functionalities should be
components. Such components may be those implemented in a specialized forum is outside the
provided by most learning platforms (e.g., a scope of CPM. But the layered nature of CPM

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Visual Design of Coherent Technology-Enhanced Learning Systems

Figure 12. An activity diagram for the reciprocal teaching pattern

Figure 13. UML state-machine diagram describing both steps of the reciprocal teaching pattern

contributes to the smooth (top-down or bottom-up) methods focus on the specification of the static
transition between the different domains of trust. structure of software objects. A noticeable defi-
Both lessons presented in this section lead us ciency of these methods is that they do not provide
to the following conclusions: even though CPM any help on how requirements are refined, how
was specified as a language and not as a design class diagrams can be derived from scenarios, how
method, experience gained from our case studies to specify the active/dynamic parts of a system,
enables us to promote a design process in tune with or how such a specification may be transformed
the characteristics of the CPM language. UML is into an implementation.
a language; so is CPM. Current object-oriented

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During conceptual design, the analysis of the servation 2). Equally, the combination of these
different case studies that we have conducted two mechanisms promotes collaboration within
promotes the idea of bridging the gap between a team of designers (Lesson U2—Observation 2).
educational needs elicitation (including require- Finally, as CPM is dedicated to a specific type of
ments elicitation, requirements refinement using learning situations, it allows the designer using
a combination of use-case diagrams, of activity it to be more likely to be able to describe such
diagrams, of class diagrams and state-machine situations more quickly than with more general
diagrams), and the more formal specification educational languages like IMS-LD. According to
of class diagrams which are required to prepare model-driven approaches like OMG-MDA (OMG,
the implementation of a TEL System (Nodenot, 2003), these specialized (but limited) languages
Marquesuzaà, Laforcade, & Sallaberry, 2004). The offer conceptual frameworks for preliminary
way we used CPM language is as follows. The analysis of learning situations before transform-
specification process starts from the definition of ing the resulting models into more operational
use-cases. Each use-case diagram is refined either languages.
by other use-case diagrams or by one ore more Lessons presented in this chapter also reveal
activity diagrams (representing teaching/learning some possible ways to improve CPM.
scenarios). All model elements used in these dia-
grams are not unrelated parts; they are attributes, Improvements of CPM
messages, etc. which are finally declared in the
class diagrams. The behavior of each class is repre- Computer Support for
sented by a set of scenarios (activity diagrams/state Design Processes
machine diagrams) covering the events declared
in the specification part of the class. Modeling learning situations is not an easy or
usual task for practitioners. Among the several
reasons that account for this, we might mention
CONCLUSION AND PERSPECTIVES the two most obvious ones. First, practitioners
seek to adapt their courses to learners in situ, as
CPM is a visual, layered, semi-formal, multiple events occur/happen (opportunistic approach) and
perspectives language dedicated to the description they tend to prefer to think in terms of content and
of collaborative learning scenarios with special coarse-grained activities. Second, in educational
emphasis on problem-based learning (PBL). By sciences, models are driven by learning events
means of the layering mechanism, designers may to detect and to react upon, rather than by a mere
more easily tackle a complex situation using this sequence of activities which are more typical
graphical and conceptual feature: they start with within the computer world (i.e., workflow sub-
a coarse-grained description to grasp the global domain). So practitioners are not used to getting
situation and can then decompose each element involved in highly structured course modeling
to get a complete and detailed description (Les- in their everyday routine. Because we are aware
son U2 Observation 1). Next, with the multiple of this, we have already proposed guidelines
perspectives mechanism, the designers may focus related to CPM through ‘best-practices’ (Lesson
on the sequencing of activities, the behavior of U1-Observation 2) and a design process (Lesson
a particular activity, role responsibilities, etc. A U2-Observation 3) in order to help practitioners.
complex situation may be described through a Kent (2002) already pointed out the problem
set of simple and clear views (Lesson U1—Ob- of ‘how to define a model’. He defines it as a

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Visual Design of Coherent Technology-Enhanced Learning Systems

main hindrance for the emerging model driven Model Transformations

engineering trend. While he generally highlights
work about macro-processes (‘the order in which The different CPM perspectives are not entirely
models are produced and how they are coordi- bound together. The attribute Testimonies analy-
nated’), Kent affirms the need for the MDE com- sis of Investigator role 4 (i.e., Figure 10) is not
munity to work on micro-processes, that is to say automatically but manually ‘deduced’ from the
‘guidelines for producing a particular model’. We link performs between Investigator role 4 and
consider therefore that we need to improve CPM Testimonies analysis (i.e., Figure 7). If the link
micro-processes. A related perspective must be to performs is removed, the previous attribute will
provide a computer support for our guidelines. not be automatically removed. Not to impose
First, such a support will make the application constraints about the ubiquity of model elements
of guidelines easier (and accelerates it). Next, can provide much freedom, and hence flexibility
it limits the occurrence of errors caused by the while defining models, especially for practitioners.
misinterpretation of guidelines. Finally assisting But in addition to being a source of mistakes, it
the definition of a model allows designers to learn does not render explicit the repercussion of each
guidelines in a better way than by only reading action which the designer is performing. To ad-
the related document. dress these two problems, we might consider, for
We have already worked on the computer example, developing dynamic transformations
support for a method dedicated to IMS-LD (Le between all perspectives so that each action from
Pallec, Moura, Marvie, Nebut, & Tarby, 2006). We a perspective should induce logic repercussion
intend to transpose this previous work to CPM. on other perspectives. These transformations
would be proposed to designers through click-
Templates able operations.

Starting from scratch is another barrier to practi- Towards Other Conceptual

tioners when defining models. The Objecteering Frameworks
repository provides a way of reusing existing and
approved fragments of CPM models (i.e., Figure UML and its profile mechanism offers a frame-
12). UML templates address this issue much better. work which may prove quickly efficient. First it
A UML template is a set of parameters to be applied provides several types of diagrams which enable
to model elements before use. Such models have many aspects to be described. Second, several
the advantage of clearly rendering explicit both design processes have emerged from the UML
the fixed part and the changing part of a model. community over the last decade. They describe
Equally, defining a template is driven by reusability best-practices related to navigation between
and modularity which is not the case when defin- previous types of diagrams. Nevertheless, there
ing new model elements duplicated with copy/cut/ are some weaknesses. First, defining new model-
paste. The application field of a template is conse- ing concepts with a UML profile requires using
quently broader. However, using this mechanism, (through inheritance) existing UML metaclasses
particularly when defining a template, is not an like Class or Actor. UML profile designers do not
easy task, especially for a non-UML specialist. necessarily need all inherited attributes or methods.
Even if Objecteering may provide a UML tem- They have to block access to these undesirable
plate mechanism, future work will likely involve properties both in conceptual and graphical ways
embedding it into a more user-friendly interface. to respect the semantic of the language they are

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162

Chapter 1.13
History of Distance Learning
Professional Associations
Irene Chen
University of Houston Downtown, USA

INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND of learning online. Each strategy suggested has

some measure of support among the professional
Most of the distance-learning professional associa- associations’ participants, and represents a way
tions were founded in the 1990s, at a time when to improve opportunities for distance education,
most Internet backbone speeds were T1 or slower. and training:
Although scientists in universities, corporate, and
military used the Internet for supercomputing ca- 1. Developing strategic alliances to support
pabilities, the predominant academic application and encourage project-oriented coalitions
was electronic mail. The public was generally amongst members as the need and oppor-
unaware of the Internet’s existence. tunity arise.
The explosive growth of information and 2. Recommending standards of quality
telecommunications has combined to strengthen 3. Institution promotion under a common logo
and diversify the options for school, skills de- within the region and beyond
velopment, technical and professional training, 4. Identifying support markets that are currently
postsecondary credit courses, and special interests. unserved.
New associations are established everyday to pro- 5. Sharing technological and human resources
mote innovative educational strategies, as well as for development and delivery
ways to leverage technology to provide new ways 6. Conducting applied research and develop-
ment of distance-education technology and
instructional design.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch113

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

7. Developing and maintaining a system to pro- to its membership via an e-mail newsletter called
vide a central source of current and relevant “FARNET’S Washington Update.”
information on courses and programs, the In 1996, FARNET received an NSF award to
credit transfer system, and student assistance build a clearinghouse for tracking information
programs. infrastructure development on a state-by-state
basis. The purpose of the States Inventory Project
(located at http://www.states.org/) is to promote
MAIN FOCUS: DISTANCE the exchange of information among state and local
LEARNING PROFESSIONAL policymakers so that states may develop their own
information infrastructures more efficiently. The
North America State Inventory Project clearinghouse currently
has over 4,000 entries in its database, divided
United States into nearly 100 categories for each state, territory,
and province.
In the U.S., the Director of the Office of Educa- One of the early associations, the Coalition
tional Technology in the Office of the Secretary for for Networked Information (CNI, http://www.
the U.S. Department of Education is responsible cni.org/timeline.html), was founded in 1990 by
for coordinating programs and policies on virtual the library and information technology com-
education and e-learning, the National Education munities to enhance scholarship and intellectual
Technology Plan, Technical Assistance Grants productivity. At the end of its first year, CNI has
under Enhancing Education Through Technology, 118 member institutions. In the early years, on
and the use of technology to further the mission their meeting agenda were contemporary issues
of the Department and the No Child Left Behind such as economics of information, Rights for
Act (2006). Electronic Access and Delivery of Information
Founded in 1987, FARNET, the Federation of (READI) project, Elsevier TULIP Project (one of
American Research Networks, was a primary in- the earliest examples of instrumented large-scale
formation source for the government and industry experiments in electronic journal delivery), Wide
during the preprivatization days of the Internet. Area Information Servers (WAIS), introduction of
FARNET’s original mission was to coordinate Gopher (an early tool to find and retrieve direc-
regional and backbone high-speed networks, tories of information on the Internet), Electronic
to promote the general advancement of science Theses and Dissertations, and the demonstration of
and education by assisting in the interchange of NCSA’s Mosaic, the first graphical Web browser.
information and research using high-speed com- In 1996, CNI cosponsored a conference, Net-
munication. worked Information in an International Context,
Later on, FARNET developed into a forum for with the UK Joint Information Systems Com-
state networks to share information. Beginning mittee, the British Library, CAUSE and the First
in the early 1990s, FARNET hosted a series of ACM International Conference on Research and
workshops discussing how the National Informa- Development in Digital Libraries. As the result of
tion Infrastructure (NII) and the Internet might the conference, the Internet 2 Project was launched.
impact the public sector, including healthcare, CNI was represented on the Applications Coun-
libraries, and K-12 education. cil to launch the Internet 2 Project, and worked
In 1995, FARNET opened a policy office in closely with this effort to help identify advanced
Washington, D.C. to monitor the regulatory envi- networking applications. These associations to-
ronment and communicated developments back gether facilitated the starting plans of Internet 2,

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 History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

which is an effort to establish higher education’s • To promote more effective planning, man-
leadership role in Internetworking. agement, and evaluation of all information
EDUCOM is another early organization for technologies in colleges and universities.
the enhancement of information technology in • To help individual member representatives
higher education. The mission of EDUCOM is as develop as professionals in the field of
follows: “EDUCOM is a nonprofit consortium of higher education technology management.
higher education institutions, which facilitates the
introduction, use, and access to and management of In direct response to the changing nature of
information resources in teaching, learning, schol- campus computing organization and manage-
arship, and research. EDUCOM’s work is done ment, CAUSE expanded its mission to reflect an
in cooperation and partnership with the broader expansion from an earlier focus on administrative
education and library communities, professional computing to incorporate the planning and man-
societies, and information industries.” agement of administrative computing, academic
In the 1990s, EDUCOM focused on: computing, telecommunications, and other infor-
mation technologies in colleges and universities.
1. Increasing individual and institutional intel- EDUCOM and CAUSE were consolidated
lectual productivity through access to and in July 1998 with a mission to advance higher
use of information resources and technology. education by promoting the intelligent use of
2. Assuring the creation of an information information technology. While CAUSE’s FAR-
infrastructure that will meet society’s needs NET primarily has concentrated on issues related
into the twenty-first century. to Internetworking, EDUCOM’s NTTF has been
actively involved in a broader range of telecom-
EDUCOM’s Networking and Telecommu- munications policy issues. Both FARNET and
nications Task Force (NTTF) monitored the NTTF have played distinct and important roles
education telecommunications-related changes in the initial development of the Internet in the
of the federal government. NTTF was created in academic and broader public sector communi-
1986 as a vehicle to provide leadership and focus ties. In early June 1998, FARNET merged with
for colleges and universities in identifying and then- EDUCOM’s NTTF to become Net@EDU,
communicating strategic networking and tele- the networking arm of EDUCAUSE, to ensure
communication policy issues. Its membership is that the organization maintained an effective
composed primarily of chief information officers policy presence in Washington. Their union within
from leading universities. EDUCAUSE allows EDUCAUSE to be more ef-
In 1988, NTTF organized the first in what fective as a policy and information resource for
has become an annual conference in Washington, its members in the academic/research community.
D.C. This conference brought together leaders The membership of EDUCAUSE is open to
from government, industry and the public sector institutions of higher education, corporations serv-
to discuss the latest developments in telecom- ing the higher education information technology
munications policy. market, and other related associations and organi-
CAUSE is the Association for the Management zations. Its programs include professional develop-
of Information Technology in Higher Education ment activities, print and electronic publications,
(http://www.cni.org/docs/infopols/CAUSE.html). strategic policy initiatives, research, awards for
The mission of CAUSE is: leadership and exemplary practices, and other
online information services. As of spring, 2007,

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the EDUCAUSE membership has grown to more There are numerous distance-learning profes-
than 2,100 colleges, universities, and educational sional associations on the regional level. To name
organizations, including 200 corporations, with a few, the Texas Distance Learning Association
16,500 active members. EDUCAUSE has major (TxDLA, http://www.txdla.org/) is a private, non-
offices in Boulder, Colorado, and Washington, profit association for distance-learning profession-
D.C. It hosts conferences, seminars, and institutes. als. TxDLA membership is open to all individuals,
The EDUCAUSE regional conference on statewide, nationwide, and around the world, who
Information Technology in Higher Education are interested in promoting the implementation of
includes the following: effective distance learning. The Centre for Dis-
tance Learning Research located at Texas A&M
• EDUCAUSE Mid-Atlantic Regional, University also sponsored an annual conference
Midwest Regional, Southeast Regional, Distance Education Conference in Texas (DEC,
Southwest Regional (formerly EduTex). http://www.cdlr.tamu.edu/)
Western Regional, and NERCOMP (An
EDUCAUSE Affiliate). Canada
• The CAUDIT -EDUCAUSE Institute is an
international event offered every year in Canada has a long tradition in distance educa-
Australia/New Zealand. tion, arising from the need to provide access to
education across the vast expanses of the country.
In addition to CNI, EDUCOM, and EDU- The Commonwealth of Learning (COL, http://
CAUSE, there are several other associations www.col.org/) is an intergovernmental organi-
that promote distance education. United States zation hosted in Canada by the government of
Distance Learning Association (USDLA, http:// Canada with headquarters located in the Province
www.usdla.org) promotes the development and of British Columbia. It was created by Com-
application of distance learning for education monwealth Heads of Government to encourage
and training. It is a non-profit national associa- the development and sharing of open-learning/
tion formed in 1987 by Patrick Portway, Smith distance-education knowledge, resources and
Holt, and Ralph Mills. The constituents it serves technologies. As of spring 2006, COL’s partners
include K through 12 education, higher education, include other Commonwealth agencies, members
continuing education, corporate training, and of the UN System (UNESCO, UNICEF, UNIFEM,
military and government training. The Distance UNDP, and the World Bank), national and regional
Education and Training Council (DETC, formerly distance education associations, and industry.
the National Home Study Council, http://www. Computer Using Educators of British Colum-
detc.org/), founded in 1926, is an association bia (CUEBC) http://www.cuebchorizons.ca/, and
of accredited distance learning/correspondence Canadian Association for Distance Education
schools that is dedicated to promoting the high (CADE) http://www.cade-aced.ca/, are another
quality in learning opportunities to learners of all two associations in Canada that promote innova-
ages, regardless of where they live. tive educational strategies, as well as ways to lever-
American Distance Education Consortium age technology to provide new ways of learning
(ADEC, http://www.adec.edu/) is a consortium of online, in the classroom, and in the workplace.
higher education institutions in the United States NODE Learning Technologies Network (Net-
that provide distance-education programs via ICT, work for Ontario Distance Educators) or the NODE
provides links to member universities, learning (http://www.thenode.org) was established in 1996
resources, and courseware tools. as the Network for Ontario Distance Educators.

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 History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

The initial objectives were to promote coopera- Australian Association of Distance Education
tion among distance educators in universities and Schools (AADES, http://www.aades.edu.au/) was
community colleges in the province of Ontario, formed in 1993 and, as of spring 2006, has in ex-
Canada, and to provide leadership for their explo- cess of 1,200 members in all Australian states and
ration of new learning technologies. Soon their New Zealand. It is the professional organization
efforts attracted a wider audience of international representing K-12 school level distance education
community of educators. in the region.
Other Canadian associations such as Alberta The Open and Distance Learning Association
Distance Education and Training Association of Australia Inc. (ODLAA, http://www.odlaa.org/)
(ADETA) (http://www.athabascau.ca/html/collab/ is a professional association of members interested
adeta/), and Canada’s Campus Connection (http:// in the practice and administration of distance
www.schoolnet.ca/campus/en/index.html) are col- education and open learning. Its membership
laborations between the postsecondary institutions is open to all persons, organizations and groups
voluntary, non-profit association of individuals interested in the practice and the administration
and corporate members who are interested in of distance education.
distance education and training. The Distance and eLearning Association of
New Zealand (DEANZ, http://www.deanz.org.
Australia/New Zealand nz/) is a national association committed to fostering
growth, development, research, and good practice
The Australian National Conference on Open in distance education, open learning, and flexible
and Distance Education (ANCODE) held its delivery systems for education. Its membership is
first meeting in October, 1993. This conference open to individuals or institutions with an interest
was established to succeed the National Distance in distance education and open learning.
Education Conference set up by the then Depart-
ment of Education, Employment, and Training Europe
(DEET). In 1996, the name of the conference
was changed to the National Council on Open Established in 1991, the European Distance and
and Distance Education (NCODE) as part of a E-Learning Network (EDEN, http://www.eden-
process of defining the mission of NCODE. online.org/eden.php), is one of the oldest European
NCODE-Flexible Learning Australasia was associations for open, distance and e-learning. Its
created in 2000 as a result of the restructuring of aim is to foster developments in this constantly
the former NCODE. In December 2000, the mem- evolving field of distance education. Its members
bers voted to extend membership to universities in include a wide range of institutions including the
the region and change the name of the organiza- following countries: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria,
tion to NCODE-Flexible Learning Australasia. Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia,
NCODE - Flexible Learning Australasia became Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Finland, France,
the Australasian Council on Open, Distance, and Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia,
E-learning (ACODE, http://www.acode.edu. Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania,
au/) in December 2002 with the ratification of Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland,
a constitution and a new name. The mission of The Netherlands, Ukraine, United Kingdom.
ACODE is “to enhance policy and practice in open, Institutions from other parts of the world such as
distance, flexible and e-learning in Australasian U.S., Israel, South Africa, Canada, and Mexican
higher education.” have also joined.

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History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

EDEN supports several workshops, confer- tion between European organizations dedicated
ences, and journals and publications. Among to higher education through distance-teaching
them, the European Journal of Open and Distance methodology.
Learning (EURODL) is an online journal on open Established in 1998, European Federation
and distance and e-learning. for Open and Distance Learning (E.F.ODL
The European Commission adopted several http://www5.vdab.be/vdab/test/efodl/top.htm)
action plans to promote the development of online is a pan-European network of open and distance
education by European universities. learning that provides services to organizations
Adopted in 2000, the “eLearning: Designing involved in the development, distribution, and use
Tomorrow’s Education Action Plan” aims at pro- of technology-based open and distance learning.
moting digital literacy in Europe. This 3-year plan The European Open and Distance Learning
envisions communication technologies like digital Liaison Committee (ODL, http://www.odl-liaison.
television and satellites playing a larger role in org/) is another influential non-government organi-
European higher education and training systems. zations in Europe. Established in 1998, the liaison
The “eEurope 2005 Action Plan” was endorsed committee agreed to meet on a regular basis and
by the Council of Ministers in the eEurope Reso- to create a common platform that would be an
lution of January 2003 aiming to develop modern added value for the networks.
public services for business and education alike The founder members of the ODL Liaison
through widespread availability of broadband ac- Committee are:
cess at competitive prices and a secure information
infrastructure. • Association of European Correspondence
One of the e-learning projects supported by the Schools (AECS), since 1999 new name:
European Commission is EQUEL, which stands European Association for Distance
for “e-quality in e-learning.” This project estab- Learning (EADL).
lishes a virtual center of excellence that involves • Coimbra Group
key researchers and e-learning practitioners from • EuroPACE 2000
European institutions of higher education. • European Association of Distance Teaching
One of the latest initiative, “i2010” (Euro- Universities (EADTU)
pean Information Society in 2010, http://europa. • European Distance and E-Learning
eu.int/information_society/eeurope/2005/index_ Network (EDEN)
en.htm), will provide an integrated approach to • European Federation for Open and
information society and audiovisual policies in the Distance Learning (EFODL)
EU, covering regulation, research, and deployment • European Universities Continuing
and promoting cultural diversity. Education Network (EUCEN)
In addition to the government initiatives, • International Council for Open and Distance
the European Association of Distance Teaching Education - Europe (ICDE-Europe)
Universities (EADTU, http://www.eadtu.nl/) is • Network of Academics and Professionals
the representative organization of both the Eu- (NAP)
ropean open- and distance-learning universities
and of the national consortia of higher education Other European associations of distance educa-
institutions in distance education and e-learning. tion are such as Research and Training Institute
Based in the Netherlands, EADTU was established of East Aegean (http://www.ineag.gr) and The
in January 1987 by the principals of Europe’s Open Learning Foundation (OLF, http://www.
distance-teaching institutions to foster coopera- olf.ac.uk/) is a consortium of UK and European

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universities and colleges dedicated to improving the rapidly expanding sector of e-learning in the
the effectiveness and flexibility of higher educa- Spanish-speaking world. EXPOCAMPUS is a
tion. Site includes details of current projects and a parallel event that takes place alongside the Online
catalogue of publications geared to specific online EDUCA Madrid conference (http://aedisi.org/).
courses, graded by level, in order to provide a This is another forum for e-learning experts of
cost-effective way to develop flexible learning the main Spanish and Latin American universi-
materials and staff development in their uses. ties, which adds further academic value to this
There are hundreds of distance-education pro- international gathering of e-learning professionals
fessional associations on the national and regional in Latin America.
level in Europe. For example, the Irish Learning Consorcio - Red de Educacion a Distancia/
Technology Association (ILTA, http://www.ilta. Inter-American Distance Education Consortium
net/) has been in existence since spring, 2001, (CREAD, http://www.cread.org/) was founded
and has a membership throughout the island of in 1990 at the International Council for Distance
Ireland. The British Association for Open Learn- Education World Conference in Caracas, Ven-
ing Limited (BAOL, http://www.baol.co.uk) is ezuela. CREAD is composed of a vast network
an association for open learning in the United of individuals and institutions throughout North,
Kingdom. Its goals are to build a community with Central, and South America, conjoining resources
global reach, committed to innovation, excellence, and expertise to redefine educational partnerships
and best practice in learning. in the 21st century.
Here is a brief list of other European distance Asociacion Iberoamericana de Educacion Su-
education professional associations: perior a Distancia (AIESAD, http://www.uned.es/
aiesad/) is another distance education professional
• British Educational Communication and association in Latin America.
Technology Agency (BECTA, http://www.
becta.org.uk/) Middle East
• Open Distance Learning Quality Council
(ODLQC, http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/ Among the various distance-education profes-
odlqc/) sional associations in the Middle East, the Middle
• Online EDUCA Berlin (http://www.on- East E-Learning Technologies (MELT) is also
line-educa.com/) called the Middle East Learning Technologies
Forum. It is a series of conferences and exhibi-
Latin America tions coupled with a trade show in Dubai and the
Middle East region for e-learning in the Middle
In the series of Online EDUCA conferences, East world. The mission of MELT is as follows:
Online EDUCA Madrid (http://www.online-
educa-madrid.com/) is organized in Spain with • To provide e-learning buyers/users with
the aim to encompass Spain, Central and South objective, well-documented learning from
America, and the rest of the Spanish speaking international e-learning experiences in
populations in the e-learning industry. The official enterprise.
conference language is Spanish. Since 2003, over • To provide e-learning buyers/users with
500 distance education administrators in higher objective, well-documented learning from
education, business, and government from more international e-learning experiences in
than 30 countries come together at Online EDUCA enterprise.
Madrid, making it the key networking venue in

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• To provide business executives with a governments, to translate these approaches into

clear overview of e-learning, its potential, practice.
its benefits, critical success factors, com- In view of the fact that developing countries
ponents, and lesson’s learned so far. have not benefited from the growth of online
• To provide ME e-learning professionals resources on distance education, UNESCO has
with in-depth tracks on hot topics such partnered with World Bank in developing a con-
as managing and measuring the benefits, solidated information database in sub-Saharan
instructional design, localization,and so Africa called the Sub-Saharan African Open and
forth. Distance Learning Knowledge Base (http://www.
africaodl.org/). The purpose of this knowledge
Other major conferences in the area include base is to offer an integrated knowledge guide to
the Middle East Forum on Learning Technology, distance education and open learning. The com-
the Global Training and Human Resource Devel- ponents of the knowledge base include selected
opment Forum, the Gulf Education and Training readings, reports of good practice, and other
Exhibition, (GETEX), and the Middle East Forum information tools.
on Academic Research and Reflection. Confederation of Open Learning Institutes of
The Arab Open University (AOU, http://www. South Africa (COLISA, http://www.col.org/10th/
arabou.org/) is developing a Web-based curricula, best/colisa.html) was founded by the University
and partnering with UNESCO to establish a of South Africa, Vista University, and Technikon
telecom network between university branches in Southern Africa. It aims at communication be-
nine countries. It was established in 1996 under tween the constituent parties on both academic
the umbrella of the AGFUND (Gulf Program for and administrative levels, organizing workshops,
United Nations Development Organizations). It discussions and conferences, creating a forum
has been adopted as a private Arab institution for sharing of expertise, and establishing a De-
of higher education of special status. The AOU velopment Fund for the furtherance of the Joint
launched its teaching programs in October 2002 activities.
in a number of Arab countries including, in the Adult Education Network (AEN, http://home.
first stage, Kuwait (where the AOU Headquarters global.co.za/~proplib/) promotes the activities of
is seated), Lebanon, Jordan, Bahrain, Egypt, and its members, which include clubs, associations,
Saudi Arabia. AOU has a goal of reinforcing soli- special interest groups, and service organizations
darity and unity between Arabs through culture in South Africa.
and education. The main objective of the Acacia Initiative (the
South African Academic and Research Network,
Africa http://web.idrc.ca/en/ev-5895-201-1-DO_TOP-
IC.html) is to provide a computer network that
One of the earliest African distance organizations, works to the standards of the Internet, for the
South African Institute for Distance Education use of every academic, researcher, and student
(SAIDE, http://www.saide.org.za/) was formed in in South Africa.
1992 to assist in the reconstruction of education
and training in South Africa by promoting open Asia and Pacific Islands
learning principles and the use of quality distance
education. SAIDE cooperates with educational One of the earliest professional distance educa-
institutions, as well as national and provincial tion organizations, Asian Association of Open

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 History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

University (AAOU, http://www.aaou.net/) was skills and expertise promoted. The APEID-related
founded in 1987 by a number of open universities functions of the Associated Centres include:
in the Asian region as a non-profit organization of
higher learning institutions with distance educa- • Sharing of innovative experiences with
tion programs. As of January 2005, there are 71 other centres in the network
members in AAOU including 38 full members, • Organizing national, sub-national or re-
31 associate members, and 2 individual support- gional APEID activities such as training
ing members. workshops, seminars, and development of
Funded by the Chinese government, the China instructional materials
Education and Research Network (CERNET, • Participating in the design, conduct, evalu-
http://www.edu.cn/HomePage/english/index. ation and follow-up of the inter-country/
shtml) is the first nationwide education and re- inter-project visits and studies
search computer network in China. CERNET plays • Participating in the exchange of personnel
a pioneer role in China’s information initiative with other centres
such as online enrollment and admission system • Facilitating the dissemination and ex-
for universities around the country. change of information on educational in-
Since its establishment on 27 February novations related to development.
1997, South-East Asian Ministers of Education • Cooperating with other centres in projects
Organisation Regional Open Learning Center of mutual interest and concern
(SEAMOLEC, http://www.seamolec.or.id/) has a
mission: To assist SEAMEO Member Countries As part of its support for international distance
in identifying educational problems and finding education, COL has sponsored research and
alternative solutions for sustainable human re- planning into the design of telecommunications
source development through the dissemination networks, specifically targeted to the needs and
and effective use of open and distance learning. resources of smaller distance education organi-
Its member countries include representatives from zations.
Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, The Indira Gandhi Open University (IGNOU,
Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and http://www.ignou.ac.in/) was established in 1985
Vietnam. with a networking of Regional Centres and Study
The educational division of the UNESCO- Centres, all over India. IGNOU has also set up
Bangkok office fosters educational innovation and a collaborative project with open universities in
research in support of development by sponsoring Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. It has also
the Asia-Pacific Programme of Educational In- crossed national boundaries, providing higher
novation for Development (APEID, http://www. education as well as assisting other developing
unescobkk.org/education/aceid/apeid.htm). countries.
APEID promotes regional cooperation by form- Pacific Islands region contains a large propor-
ing a network of institutions, called Associated tion of small states, concentrated in the South and
Centres, across the region to facilitate educational Western Pacific, as well as many key distance-ed-
innovations and, assist Member States build na- ucation institutions. The Pacific Islands Regional
tional capacities according to the self-perceived Association for Distance Education (PIRADE,
needs of the countries themselves. Associated http://www.col.org/pirade/) is sponsored by Com-
Centres benefit from the exchanges of insights, monwealth of Learning.

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History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

FUTURE TRENDS AND • National Association of Distance

CONCLUSION Education Organisations of South Africa
(NADEOSA)
International Center for Distance Learning (ICDL, • West African Distance Education
http://www-icdl.open.ac.uk/) of the Open Univer- Association (WADEA)
sity of UK has established a research center for • Zambia Association for Distance Education
teaching, consultancy, information, and publishing (ZADE)
activities, based at the Institute of Educational • Zimbabwe National Association of
Technology (IET). It hosts an extensive database Distance and Open Learning (ZINADOL)
containing more than 300 distance-learning pro-
viders worldwide, over 12,000 thousand books, The International Association for the Study
journal articles, research reports, conference of Cooperation in Education (IASCE, http://
papers, dissertations, and other types of literature www.iasce.net/) is an international non-profit
relating to the theory and practice of distance educational association dedicated to the study
education; contains a link to free online distance and practice of cooperation in education, a field
education database. that includes the increasingly popular coopera-
International Council for Open and Distance tive classroom methods by which students work
Education (ICDE, http://www.icde.org/) is a long together in learning teams to master academic
established international association affiliated with content and collaborative skills.
SEAMEO and recognized by UNESCO. Its goal
is to provide leadership and facilitate cooperation,
development, and communication at the global REFERENCES
level in distance and virtual learning. It has global
membership of educational institutions, national Arab Open University. (2006). Retrieved April
and regional associations, corporations, educa- 30, 2007, from http://www.arabou.org/
tional and agencies in the fields of open learning NationalEducation Technology Plan. (2006) Re-
and lifelong learning trieved April 30, 2007, from http://www.ed.gov/
COL has supported the communications of about/offices/list/os/technology/plan/index.html
associations for distance-education professionals,
and has facilitated the formation of a pan-Com-
monwealth federation of these associations called
Federation of Commonwealth Open and Distance KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Learning Associations (FOCODLA, http://www.
col.org/focodla/members.htm). The following Commonwealth of Learning (COL): The
regional associations have joined FOCODLA: Commonwealth of Learning (COL, http://www.
col.org/) is an intergovernmental organization
• Distance Education Association of hosted in Canada by the government of Canada
Southern Africa (DEASA) with headquarters located in the Province of Brit-
• Distance Education Association of ish Columbia. It was created by Commonwealth
Tanzania (DEATA) Heads of Government to encourage the develop-
• Open Learning and Distance Education ment and sharing of open learning/distance edu-
Association of Eastern Africa cation knowledge, resources, and technologies.
(OLDEA-EA) As of spring 2006, COL’s partners include other

171
 History of Distance Learning Professional Associations

Commonwealth agencies, members of the UN Its programs include professional development

System (UNESCO, UNICEF, UNIFEM, UNDP, activities, print and electronic publications,
and the World Bank), national and regional strategic policy initiatives, research, awards for
distance-education associations, and industry. leadership and exemplary practices, and other
EDUCAUSE: EDUCOM and CAUSE online information services. As of spring, 2007,
were consolidated in July 1998 with a mission the EDUCAUSE membership has grown to more
to advance higher education by promoting the than 2,100 colleges, universities, and educational
intelligent use of information technology. The organizations, including 200 corporations, with
membership of EDUCAUSE is open to institu- 16,500 active members. EDUCAUSE has major
tions of higher education, corporations serving the offices in Boulder, Colorado, and Washington,
higher education information technology market, D.C. It hosts conferences, seminars, and institutes.
and other related associations and organizations.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 1079-1087, copyright 2009
by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

172
 173

Chapter 1.14
Using Games to Teach
Design Patterns and
Computer Graphics
Pollyana Notargiacomo Mustaro
Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil

Luciano Silva
Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil

Ismar Frango Silveira

Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie, Brazil

ABSTRACT factor they inherently have. This learner-centered

approach not only contributes to personalizing the
This chapter discusses some possibilities of using knowledge-building process but also permits the
computer games to effectively reach didactic goals consideration of learning styles to adapt different
in undergraduate teaching. Nowadays, under- ludic environments and/or real-world situations
graduate students belong to the Net generation and according to topics of the course. To demonstrate
usually play different kinds of games on consoles, the possibilities of this educational scenario, two
computers, and the Internet. Some elements such case studies were conducted. One focuses on
as creativity and abstraction could be included in Design Patterns contents in a computer science
computer science and information technology cur- course, and the other spotlights computer graphics
riculums through the use of games as educational topics in an information technology course. The
methodological resources, due the motivational results gained in these processes demonstrate the
students’ involvement in the proposed activities
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch114

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

and the capacity to apply the lessons learned in itself) to play the game, face the challenges, and
diverse situations. go through the next level (in other words, succeed
in academic life). By exceeding curriculum de-
mands, students could be able to enjoy a lifelong,
INTRODUCTION meaningful learning experience (Ausubel, 1962).
In the role of gamer characters or game devel-
The acquisition of skills related to creativity opment, learners have the opportunity to compare,
and abstraction, indispensable to any computer analyze, and experience situations similar to the
science and information technology curriculum, real ones. When a student plays in this controlled
constitutes unquestionably a didactical challenge. environment or constructs them, it is possible to
From the educational point of view, the use of present fully inspiring situations where actions
games in this process is a motivational element only occur in the virtual world, which contributes,
that could help to make the knowledge-building among other factors, to reduce cognitive load.
process more personalized. It is also possible to Another consideration in this proposal is
take into account students’ learning styles, thus based on Shaffer’s (2007) works, which focus
establishing an adaptive and flexible environment real problem solving by role-playing a profes-
where any skill, subject, or even concept can be sional character that uses new digital technologies
effectively learned (Prensky, 2007; Gee, 2003; to assume his or her own learning process and
Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000). institutes attitudinal changing by implementing
Another aspect that must be considered is epistemic games.
that actual undergraduate students belong to the Nonetheless, teachers and students barely
so-called “Net generation” (Tapscott, 1998). Ac- consider games as something detached from
cording to Tapscott, “N-Geners” could be char- entertainment. The sole tentative of introducing
acterized by having autonomy sense, intellectual “serious,” non-entertaining games into a curricu-
openness, technology inclusion (or the facility to lum often causes the inverse effect, since these
use technological elements even though never hav- sorts of games tend to be tedious as they do not
ing any previous contact with them), freedom of prime for the entertainment-related aspects that
expression, curiosity, immediacy, and mainly trust. are responsible for retaining students’ attention.
This scenario perfectly fits into a game universe- It must be remembered, although obvious, that
based andragogic proposal, because nowadays the act of learning does not have to be a boring,
it is necessary to institute mechanisms that take unexciting situation that students are exposed for
advantage of technological culture over where a significant part of their lives (Johnson, 2005).
they are steeped and transform it into learning Instead, it must be a stimulating and—why not?—
resources. The same author also points out the need funny, entertaining activity to be performed by
for an interactive learning posture where focus is students. Thus, recovering the ludic side of learn-
learner centered and related to interaction with ing is primordial to motivate students to learn the
hypermedia-based systems in order to promote a issues curricula tell them they have to.
lifelong learning from a customized—and mainly Specifically in computer science and informa-
fun—point of view. tion technology areas, students often are already
In this situation, professors could be, in a gamers; thus, they are completely aware of game
metaphorical way, considered analogous to game strategies, terminology, and play. The introduction
masters that guide and encourage players (the of game-related situations in their curricula has be-
students) into a game (the educational process ing a well-accepted operation, since games belong

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 1. Adapted Dale’s Cone of Experience

to their cognitive comfort zone. Thus, given such
(Mustaro et al., 2007)
familiarity with the pedagogical instrument—the
game—even uncomfortable, hard-to-be-taught
syllabi could make use of games in order to ap-
proximate curriculum subjects to students’ social
context (Sweedyk & Keller, 2005; Squire, 2002).
According to the elements previously present-
ed, this chapter’s main objective is to show how
ludic aspects of electronic gaming could be used
as motivation for advances studies in computer
science and information technology undergraduate
courses. This involves three aspects: the theoretical
aspects of game playing as a contributing factor
for constituting more autonomous, self-criti,c
and inquirer students; how game-driven activities
could be inserted in traditional curricula of such
1969). According to this idea, it is possible to
courses; and the demonstration of theory reviewed
adapt Dale’s scheme to the contemporary scenario
and discussed through analysis of two case studies
(see Figure 1).
about applying games in syllabi.
From the elements presented in the adaptation
of Dale’s Cone of Experience, games could be
classified as activities with high levels of par-
THE USE OF GAMES IN
ticipation, which also amplifies information reten-
EDUCATIONAL PROPOSALS
tion, making them more significant to students.
This occurs because, through video games, learn-
An educational proposal based on games requires
ers can “interact with real rules while imagining
a different instructional design approach. In this
a fictional world” (Juul, 2005, p. 1). Furthermore,
special case, it is necessary to consider not only
game playing could be considered “an activity of
learning objectives, learning styles, contents, pro-
improving skills in order to overcome…chal-
cedures, and other elements related to structure,
lenges, and playing a game is therefore funda-
such as methodology, evaluation, outcomes, and
mentally a learning experience” (Juul, 2005, p.
feedback (Mustaro, Silveira, Omar, & Stump,
5).
2007; Reighluth, 1999). Games for education also
According to Juul (2005) games present es-
demand the use of narratology—screen written and
sentially two forms of providing challenges for
creativity components to develop a result that could
players. The first is based on a combination/
be motivating, challenging, and enjoyable—being
variation of a small set of rules (called emer-
able to engage learners in a process where learn
gence); the second is related to the level-based
and play are combined into one.
structure and sequence of events (denominated
This architecture can be established through
progression). Besides, the game universe de-
the use of a learner-centered educational approach
veloped for educational purposes also needs to
with adaptive systems that could take advantage of
consider knowledge and background abilities
interactive media. The type of media or resource
of students to present challenges that match the
used in educational proposal influences learners’
contextualization requirements, and they must
activity levels during the learning process (Dale,
also take into account Vygoysky’s (1978) theory

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 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

about the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). METHODOLOGY

This combination requires exploration of serious
games’ characteristics. Both case studies were taken in the context of
Bergeron (2006) pointed out that a serious undergraduate courses at a private university in
game is mainly an interactive computer applica- Brazil, namely Mackenzie Presbyterian Univer-
tion that presents challenging goals, fun elements sity. The first case study was carried out from 2005
of engaging, and some score concepts, as well as to 2006 with three different groups of students
provides knowledge, skill, or even attitudes that from the fourth year of a CS undergraduate course,
could be used in real-world situations. These involving approximately 120 students. The sec-
concepts could be complemented with the follow- ond case study included nine different groups of
ing sentence: “To play a game is to improve… IT undergraduate students during the same year,
repertoire of skills, and the challenge of game involving around 550 students.
design is to work with the skill set of the player The approach presented here is mainly based
through the game” (Juul, 2005, p. 5). on Problem-Based Learning (Barrows & Tamblyn,
However, not only providing games to stu- 1980; Barr & Tagg, 1995; Wilkerson & Gijselaers,
dents could be effective, but it is also relevant 1996), which is an instructional theory that moti-
to motivate them to develop their own games vates students to work in a collaborative way to
if possible, especially in computer science (CS) propose solutions to real-world problems. In both
and information technology (IT) undergraduate cases, students were faced with different sorts of
courses. This approach can merge the Real Prob- game-related problems.
lem Solving approach proposed by Shaffer (2007) In the first case, the students had to have a
with Problem-Based Learning (PBL) developed software engineering vision about games, having
by Barrows and Tamblyn (1980), thus exploring to propose different solutions for the problem of
constructivist elements when considering previous modeling games in an object-oriented way, using
knowledge and concepts of each student through extensively Responsibility Assignment Patterns
the whole process of learning construction (Hal- (Larman, 2004) and Design Patterns (Gamma,
verson et al., 2006). Helm, Johnson, & Vlissides, 1995). According
In this situation, it is possible to retrieve con- to the learner’s evolution, the modeling evolved
cepts and knowledge, or even pieces of informa- together.
tion to establish a relationship with new content. Nowadays, a growing demand for some up-
In a complementary way, it also allows one to dates and changes in the curricula of software
experience solving problems that are similar or engineering-related courses is being noticed in CS
even equal to those that students usually find in and IT undergraduate courses, in order to include
their professional lives. According to Norman modern software development techniques. In this
and Schmidt (2000), the use of PBL in curricula sense, inclusion of Design Patterns in such cur-
could improve knowledge retention, students’ mo- ricula is being considered as an urgent necessity.
tivation, and self-learning capacity, and presents However, the Design Patterns’ learning process
the capacity to transfer learned concepts to new demands students to have a high level of abstract
scenarios. Because of that, the present research reasoning, in addition to a certain degree of matu-
combines PBL with games to increase intrinsic rity on software engineering issues, which makes
motivation of students, thus instituting a significant this task a non-trivial effort to be performed.
learning scenario. The main purpose behind Design Patterns
(Gamma et al., 1995) is to provide to software

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

development community a set of problem-solution Case Study #1: Design Patterns

pairs so they are generic enough to serve as and Software Metrics
guidelines to solve recurrent problems in differ-
ent application domains. Together with such a This section will show some experiences from
set, a common high-level vocabulary also arises, the years 2005 and 2006 in which games were
which makes integration easier among develop- used to teach patterns to CS students. These ex-
ment teams, leading to a software development periences will be divided in two phases: the first
process with higher abstraction levels. one, introductory, shows how games could be
Using Design Patterns is an extremely good used in order to stimulate students in their first
practice in the sense that it improves one’s skills contact with basic software patterns, specifically
about object-oriented system design, and since it Responsibility Assignment Patterns—some of
allows the evolution from a low-level reasoning, them supported by object-oriented metrics—and
dealing with isolated classes and their object, to Architectural Patterns. The second phase deals
a more abstract way of thinking, where software with the same students being taught GoF Design
is usually planned in a macro-structured way, and Patterns (Gamma et al., 1995), a more sophisti-
patterns can be applied in a plug-and-play manner. cated subject of study. Games were also used in
In the second case, students were meant to face this second phase.
the problems related to computer graphics issues To explore this scenario, it is relevant to con-
when creating a game scenario. Such modeling was sider some elements. The increasing of process-
supposed to evolve while students were presented ing power of computers, the spreading of mobile
new computer graphics techniques. devices, and all the Internet phenomena are fac-
Modeling and rendering are major issues in tors that contribute to the demand each time for
a computer graphics course. However, IT under- more complex and sophisticated software. Since
graduate courses have some specific character- software is becoming increasingly complex, it is
istics that often make the teaching of computer expected that its design follows the same path.
graphics topics a hard task, since many students Thus, professionals are required to act in a market
consider the matter as uncoupled, isolated from with increasing demands for sophisticated designs
the rest of curricula. Besides, computer graphics (Cayley, 1999).
learning frequently requires from students a very In this scenario, an average student of a regular
good basis in Math, as well as dealing with a fam- CS course would not be completely able to ingress
ily of non-trivial algorithms for both modeling in such a software engineering market. With few
and rendering. exceptions, these students lack expertise in more
Games were used in this case study in order realistic situations involving software develop-
to improve students’ sense of motivation, as long ment. The fact of not knowing Design Patterns
they were learning and applying sophisticated could lead such students to propose simplistic,
techniques to create a game scenario (Rucker, naïve solutions for problems that otherwise would
2003). Simple board games were chosen, since require complex solutions. Such a gap in students’
they usually rely on a family of accomplishable formations could be partially explained by the
challenges for undergraduate IT students, regard- low level of abstraction that is commonly used
ing their simple, but comprehensive modeling in regular software engineering courses. In spite
process of pieces and the board itself, as well as of it being very useful to teach basic principles
the fact that they open a wide range of possibilities about object orientation paradigm, such strategies
for studying rendering techniques.

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are shown to be inefficient when applied to larger, new flying saucers, requiring simply players’
more complex systems. quicker reactions.
A wide range of didactical aspects must be Students’ first attempts to propose a class
considered when dealing with such a category diagram for this game, based on their previous
of subject, often considered too abstract and high knowledge about object orientation, resulted of-
level for undergraduate students, who must be ten in simplified models, whose cores dealt only
motivated in some manner to build the knowledge with that which is known as resource tier in a
related to these topics. Motivation, as stated by five-layered architecture. Some of these attempts
Gagné, Briggs, and Wager (1992), is a key fac- can be seen in Figures 2 and 3, which depict two
tor to learning, and it can be achieved through a different diagrams for the same subject. Since they
variety of strategies. For instance, a recent book are made by Brazilian students, all projects were
about Design Patterns (Freeman, Freeman, Sierra, originally written in Portuguese. For the sake of
& Bates, 2004) tries to promote motivation through readability, all class diagrams in this chapter show
the usage of a metacognition-based approach, translated versions of the originals.
while an earlier publication (Duell, 1997) already Both cases show how students cope with the
tried to present Design Patterns’ main concepts concept of classes in the Object Orientation
by associating them to non-software real-world paradigm: they are merely representations of
examples. In the context of the experience, games visually perceived “real” objects that are present
are used as motivational factors, acting as triggers in the application domain. Even though this is a
to the learning process. conceptually correct first concept, to reach
The complexity of the subject is easily per- higher levels of abstraction, students would have
ceived, if confronted with—barely not naïve—ap- to be able to recognize classes that are not neces-
proaches first-year students usually apply when sarily direct representations of “physical” ele-
modeling object-oriented systems. To depict this, a ments. Thus, invariantly, at this time students are
first case study was carried out in 2005 with a class able to present diagrams that would better fit as
of fourth-year students. Students were confronted data-tier elements in a multi-tiered approach.
with a simple but not trivial challenge: given a Some interesting questions arose from a first
software already completed and how to analyze analysis of these diagrams made in the classroom.
it, extract its main characteristics and, through a For instance, which class would be responsible for
reverse engineering-based process, infer which controlling the game? Which would be responsible
would be a good object-oriented design for this for creation of other objects (the student that au-
software, particularly dealing with UML Class thored Figure 3’s diagram tried to solve it using
Diagrams. In order to improve students’ motiva- a “self-creating” class-like level)? Since students,
tion, a game was proposed as the subject software at that point, were not yet presented to GRASP
for this study (Berguin, Reilly, & Traynor, 2005; Patterns (Larman, 2004), they were unable to ap-
Björk & Holopainen, 2005; Nguyen & Wong, ply patterns like Pure Fabrication, Controller, or
2002). The targeted game is known as Extreme Creator to solve these problems, which remained
Farm Simulator,1 a very simple game done in unsolved until the next step forward.
Adobe Flash©. It is a third-person shooting game, Starting from this point, students were invited
with a solely—and funny—goal: a farmer, con- to present and discuss their diagrams with col-
trolled by the player, must shoot a flying saucer leagues. Such discussion took place at two differ-
that tries to abduct his cows. Although simple, it ent times: first in the classroom, where students
is a multi-phased game, in which new levels add were stimulated to have a critical approach to

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 2. Simple class diagram for the game Figure 3. Simple class diagram for the game
(example #1) (example #2)

(Adams, 1988). Students were invited to rethink

their designs after having contact with this pat-
colleagues’ proposals, and afterwards through a tern. One of the results can be seen in Figure 4.
virtual environment-based forum (Moodle2 was It must be noted that Figure 4 represents an
used in this case). The discussion allowed students overall improvement from those depicted in Fig-
to be presented to a high-level Architectural Pat- ures 2 and 3: by having made contact with the
tern, namely Three-Tiered Architecture, based concepts around tiered architectures, students now
on the MVC (Model-View-Controller) Pattern go beyond the simple representation of a data/

Figure 4. A more elaborated class diagram, applying the Three-Tiered Architectural Pattern

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 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

resource tier by thinking in specific classes for It was good to have tried to divide in tiers, although
encapsulating business rules. However, interface I’m not sure if it is correct.
issues are not yet well addressed in these phases.
More than just modeling, in this educational After having contact with some basic concepts
approach, students were also invited to criticize regarding architectural patterns, the next set of
colleagues’ works. Again, the fact of using popular patterns studied was Larman’s (2004) GRASP
games as subjects of modeling was decisive, as (General Responsibilty Assignment Software
their domains are widely well known by everyone. Patterns), which is a set of nine general-purpose
Below is an intervention (translated from Portu- patterns. Such patterns serve as guidelines for
guese) of a student about the design proposed by software development, as well as being the foun-
a colleague in the semester before. In this case, dations for Gamma’s Design Patterns.
students were faced with various diagrams, from In order to motivate the use of GRASP con-
which they had to choose the best one according cepts, it was proposed that the students choose a
to their own criteria. Using a virtual environ- game and build a class diagram to represent it,
ment, they were asked to expose the reasons of with posterior applying of two object-oriented
their choices. metrics—LCOM and CBO—from the well-known
set of metrics proposed by the classical work of
I think the diagram of students X and Y is the one Chidamber and Kemerer (1994). These metrics
that better represents the game, since it has the were chosen since they support the application of
best class definition, keeping clear the idea about two GRASP patterns, respectively High Cohesion
how game is structured. On the other hand, Z’s and Low Coupling (Larman, 2004).
diagram is without methods and attributes, mak- One of the students choose Tetris (from Russian
ing vague the idea about how the game works. Тетрис), a well-known game whose pieces are
composed of four square blocks, called tetrami-
In the Game class I could not understand why noes (Figure 5), that fall down on the playing field.
there are methods like shoot(), moveRight(), or The basic mechanics of the game are to ma-
moveLeft(), since they are already defined in nipulate these tetrominoes, by moving each one
the following classes: Flying Saucer, Cow, and sideways and rotating it by 90-degree units, with
Farmer. the aim of creating a horizontal line of blocks
without gaps. When such a line is created, it dis-
Where are the methods related to cow’s ab- appears and the blocks above (if any) fall. As the
duction??? And those one related to flying game progresses, the tetrominoes fall faster, and
saucers’shoots? the game ends when the player “tops out”—that
is, when the stack of tetrominoes reaches the top

Figure 5. Possible configurations for Tetri’s tetraminoes

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 6. An intermediate Tetris configuration

The Coupling Between Object (CBO) is a
during a game session
count of the number of other classes to which a
class is coupled. It is measured by counting the
number of distinct non-inheritance-related class
hierarchies on which a class depends. Excessive
coupling is detrimental to modular design and
prevents reuse. The more independent a class is,
the easier it is to reuse it in another application.
The larger the number of couples, the higher the
sensitivity to changes in other parts of the design,
and therefore maintenance is more difficult. Strong
coupling complicates a system since a class is
harder to understand, change, or correct by itself
if it is interrelated with other classes. Complex-
ity can be reduced by designing systems with the
weakest possible coupling between classes. This
improves modularity and promotes encapsula-
of the playing field and no new tetrominoes are tion. Computation of CBO is often done through
able to enter. the class diagram being represented as a directed
A non-end configuration of a Tetris session is graph, where edges represent dependencies among
depicted in Figure 6. classes. An individual node’s CBO is its outer
To contextualize object-oriented metrics, the degree. One result devised from the proposed
following section revises LCOM and CBO metrics. experiment is depicted in Figure 7.
The Lack of Cohesion Metric (LCOM) is an The proper application of GRASP could lead
object-oriented metric and states the dissimilar- students to a satisfactory project for the games
ity of methods in a class by instance variable they have chosen. By means of PBL and Col-
or attributes. Lack of cohesion or low cohesion laborative Learning, students themselves could
increases complexity, thereby increasing the build these solutions and, through criticism, sup-
likelihood of errors during the development pro- ported by LCOM and CBO metrics, they were
cess. Classes with low cohesion could probably able to decide if they had made the correct
be subdivided into two or more subclasses with choices during design phases.
increased cohesion. A highly cohesive module This first attempt to bring a higher level of
should stand alone, and high cohesion indicates maturity to students concerning object-orientation
good class subdivision. High cohesion implies issues owes a considerable part of its success to
simplicity and high reusability, and indicates good the fact of using well-known games as subjects
class subdivision. LCOM measurement is not a of modeling. Such a decision allowed students to
trivial problem, since it requires classes’ methods be motivated by dealing with a ludic, stimulating
to be already well defined in an algorithmic way. problem, which was also a chance for them to
Besides, there are currently different methods to model a “complete” system, due to its simplicity.
perform it, leading to different interpretations of After this first approach, students were able
this metric. A comprehensive analysis of these dif- to deal with more sophisticated concepts, like
ferent methods can be found in Lakshminarayana Design Patterns. Recently, the use of patterns, as
and Newman (1999). defined by Gamma et al. (1995) and Alur, Crupi,

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 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 7. A class diagram with applied Design Patterns and corresponding object-oriented metrics

and Malks (2003), among others, is increasing previous phase—for instance, the awareness of
in the software industry. In some countries, the cohesion and coupling issues, and the separation
study of patterns, especially Design Patterns, is of concerns, among others. Nonetheless, the
to be considered as standard in the core of under- results produced by students are not yet satisfac-
graduate courses (Astrachan, Mitchener, Berry, & tory if compared with professional expectances
Cox, 1998; Wick, 2005). In other countries, such of complex software. An example of this, shown
initiatives are in their early stages. In Brazil, for in Figure 9, is presented by two students to model
instance, the official Curricular Guidelines barely the classic Checkers game.
mention Design Patterns (Menezes et al., 2001). It can be noted that, in spite of being concep-
To satisfactorily understand and apply De- tually correct, this diagram primes for simplicity.
sign Patterns, a set of previous skills is required It presents a proper three-tiered organization—
of students. Many of them were developed in a business rules are dealt by CTR–Controller

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 8. Modeling Checkers with GRASP

classes (Larman, 2004), objects creators are well- and some punctual interventions of professors,
defined, and so on—although its implementation, students were able to absorb the main concepts
if carried through up-to-date frameworks or APIs, involving such patterns. The text below shows
would present a considerable gap between con- one of these interventions, and Figure 9 shows
ceptual design and implementation project. the final version of the diagram from Figure 8
Based on this, games were used again to move after some months studying GoF Design Patterns.
a step forward in direction to a more sophisticated This new version for the diagram is better than
set of patterns, namely GoF Design Patterns previously presented in classroom. However, there
(Gamma et al., 1995). Using students’ criticisms are still some issues to be addressed:

Figure 9. Discovering the Command Pattern in a game of Checkers

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 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

• What’s the need of having a class for black Groups from a fourth-year IT course had been
pieces and another one for reds? submitted to one experiment: modeling and ren-
• There is no relationship among Player, dering of a board game. Initially, the groups had
Action, and Piece? chosen which game they wanted to work on, and,
• Coupling of CTR_Piece is over the dia- using concepts of modeling and rendering, had
gram’s average. produced a final project of a game in two phases.
In the first phase, the objective was to apply
By means of the triad of criticism, intervention, extensively concepts of polygonal modeling,
and auto-criticism, students were able to discover NURBS, and generative curves, in such a way
by themselves, in the application domain of the to show the difficulties and applications of each
game, some of the patterns taught. For instance, of these types of modeling.
Figure 9 shows part of the diagram made by the Some concepts involving modeling are some-
same students that authored the previous diagram times extremely abstract to students in general,
(Figure 8). Figure 9 shows how students were able specifically to IT undergraduate students, which
to properly identify and apply the GoF Command are meant to face computer graphics issues not
Pattern (Gamma et al., 1995). as full developers of algorithms and techniques,
but instead as having a comprehensive knowledge
Case Study #2: Computer Graphics about techniques and methods.
A relevant unit on this course is about modeling.
Teaching computer graphics in the context of an On this topic, students were meant to be presented
IT undergraduate course has been the topic for to a range of modeling techniques, which vary from
discussion. Now we ask, how do we teach highly direct polygonal mesh modeling to procedural
algorithmic content to students that are not really techniques (Foley, van Dam, Feiner, & Hugues,
motivated to it? IT courses educational purposes, 1995; Watt, 1999). One of these techniques is CSG
different from CS courses, are usually more driven (Constructive Solid Geometry), which is based
to the application of technology than the behind- on combining pre-built solid primitives accord-
the-scenes content CS courses are used to having. ing to a set of Boolean operators. A solid is thus
In the 1970s the issue was already being dis- described by its scene graph, in which leaves are
cussed, and a large range of APIs and frameworks the primitives and internal nodes are the operators.
appeared in order to make computer graphics CSG is a very easy technique to learn. However,
learning easier in different contexts (Knowlton, the more formal specification through scene graphs
1972; Towle & DeFanti, 1978). More recent works is not always an easy topic for IT students, since
proposed alternatives to the omnipresent OpenGL it requires basic knowledge about trees, besides
through the use of widespread languages that give basic algebra and set theory.
support to 2D-3D basic modeling tools, such as This topic was addressed over three semesters
Java (Mukundan, 1999) and Java plus Java3D by proposing to students the modeling of some
API (Zhang & Liang, 2005; Tori, Bernardes, & board games’ pieces using CSG. According to the
Nakamura, 2006), or even languages that were game chosen, some pieces were extremely easy to
not as widespread like Ada (Brown, 2004). Other create—checkers, for instance. Ludo, dominoes,
tests focused on modeling software like Maya or some chess pieces, for instance, require a little
and Blender (van Gumster, 2003; Zhu & Owen, more modeling effort, being a proper issue to be
2004). The present case study was carried out addressed with CSG techniques. To achieve this
using Blender. goal, a modeling tool was used.

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Tools instead of direct programming with APIs NURBS (Non-Uniform, Rational B-Splines, see
like OpenGL have been used in an effective man- Piegel & Tiller, 1997) is a non-trivial topic when
ner to improve student’s learning of hard topics teaching computer graphics, since it is a kind of
in computer graphics. The works of Abdullah, curve that require students to have some knowl-
Suyoto, and Ahmad (1997) and Song, Ou, and edge about the concept of continuity (positional,
Shiau (2000) show experiences that used tools to tangencial, and curvature). Besides, they are
teach computer graphics concepts to undergradu- expected to cope with a curve’s weighted control
ate students. points and its knot vector. More than this, NURBS
More than just using tools, the experience surfaces require an extra degree of complexity.
in these classes was meant to stimulate students NURBS curves are extremely useful in some
to use such tools. It is well known that complex modeling techniques, such as sweeping through
modeling tools have inherently also complex, revolution. Students were stimulated to model
user-unfriendly interfaces, besides being, most some chess pieces using such technique. Again,
of the time, machine-consuming, proprietary, and once the goal was well established, students were
expensive. The solution found to some of these able to understand and apply some intricate con-
problems was using Blender,3 an open source, cepts related to such curves in the chosen tool.
cross-platform suite of tools for 3D modeling Figure 11 shows a chess piece created using a
and rendering. mixed approach, combining sweeping and CSG.
Figure 10 shows some students’ results apply- Having some pieces modeled, students were
ing CSG modeling techniques in some pieces of assigned the task of modeling an entire board
a domino game. Typically, these pieces are the game, with all pieces. Such a game was supposed
result of applying an intersection among a box to be located over a surface, like a table. Some
and a sphere (to generate a rounded-corner piece results obtained by students in this phase are
basis); holes are built by applying a difference be- shown in Figure 12.
tween such basis and a hemisphere, which is built The variety of proposals was sufficiently great,
by again using the difference operator between and the motivation with the use of a game as the
a sphere and a cube; a box is used as separator. subject was very well accepted.
Linear transformations and the union operator are
applied afterwards.
Some other topics that require a deeper knowl- Figure 11. Chess horse modeled with NURBS-
edge of math are specially considered as difficult based sweeping and CSG
matters, with no practical application. For instance,

Figure 10. Domino pieces modeled with CSG

185
 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 12. Some of the best results in the modeling phase

After that, in the second phase, the challenge The Lambert illumination model is a more
was to add realistic effect (illumination effects) to simplified model and includes only the diffuse
the models generated in the previous phase. Our component. Both equations for these models are
current program of computer graphics includes two obtained by the formula in Figure 14.
basic illumination models: Lambert and Phong. In this equation, the terms (ka,kd,ks,α) represent
Although they represent the most basic models of the material to be bound to the 3D model and
illumination in computer graphics, they demand quantify the amount of reflected light ia, id, is
certain mathematical maturity to understand them. (ambient, diffuse, specular). The required matu-
The Phong Reflection Model is an illumination rity to understand these models includes methods
and shading model, which allows the assignment from vector calculus and analytic geometry, which,
of shades to points on a 3D model. It represents a not always, are remembered when we are initiat-
simplification of the more general rendering equa- ing the topic of illumination models. For example,
tion, whose computation is a hard computational in order to calculate the normal vector (N), an
task. Essentially, the Phong illumination model important step for both Lambert and Phong Mod-
comprises three components—ambient, diffuse, els, we need to evaluate partial derivatives over
and specular—as depicted in Figure 13. polygonal surfaces (Foley et al., 1995; Watt, 1999).

Figure 13. The components of the Phong Illumination Model

186
Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

Figure 14.

This direct approach often shifts the focus of the courses, students use and explore computers and
discipline for a purely mathematical scenario, technological tools constantly. It is necessary to
which often decreases the motivation of students implement the methodology developed in other
to learn more complex illumination models. areas as social sciences, philosophy, biology,
As the model of illumination of Phong is em- and so on to compare the results and analyze the
pirical, we also follow the same empirical strategy specialties of these experiences.
to teach the model to our students. As a strategy, Another element that can be pointed out is to
initially, groups had been motivated to test several research the possibilities of amplifying the col-
lighting conditions in order to gain mathematical laborative approach combined with massive mul-
and perceptual skills related to photo-realistic pa- tiplayer games to investigate how students work
rameters. Using these skills, they had tried some and structure an autopoietic system to examine
models to get realistic qualities for wood and and solve problems in a game universe.
plastic, among other materials that could appear But not all of these proposals can be developed
in the scenes of the games. The results obtained without a change in the posture of teachers, which
from these experiments are shown in Figure 15. includes increasing the value of ludic (playful) in
Using the common approach of the Phong education and verifying, by use of instructional
model, the students extrapolated the results to design analysis, how different contents can be
include models of texturing, using the qualitative combined in a game universe to contextualize and
equation material = lighting model + texture. The offer a meaningful experience to students. This
textures were generated by procedural models proposal requires an interdisciplinary approach
involving complex models, such as Perlin’ noise and new curricula structures that also consider
(Watt, 1999), for wood and marble. different learning styles and the use of group
The results were very interesting, mainly dynamics to provide an environment where ZPD
because the students had faced the mathematical can emerge.
barriers of the model and had been able to trans-
form them into sufficiently convincing products
of the point of view of realism. CONCLUSION

This chapter showed two case studies carried out

IMPLICATIONS AND by the authors at a university in Brazil in which
FUTURE TRENDS games were effectively used to teach two different
subjects: Design Patterns for a computer science
These case studies demonstrate the effective use course and Computer Graphics for an information
of instructional design elements to elaborate a technology course. To implement this proposal,
proposal of applying games exclusive in un- we used an instructional design approach that
dergraduate courses such as computer science pointed out a learner-centered methodology and
and information technology. In these types of constant analysis of games contexts, contents, and

187
 Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

scenarios development during the course periods Barr, R. D., & Tagg, J. (1995). From teaching to
in a blended solution that amplifies the laboratory learning—a new paradigm for undergraduate edu-
classroom when implementing a virtual environ- cation. Change, (November/December): 13–25.
ment to discuss students projects.
Barrows, H. S., & Tamblyn, R. M. (1980). Prob-
These elements enhanced the proposal because
lem-based learning. New York: Springer-Verlag.
students were challenged to study, in a detailed
way, Design Patterns and Computer Graphics Bergeron, B. P. (2006). Developing serious games.
content so to have the opportunity to create their Boston: Thomson Delmar Learning/Charles River
games architectures and interact with other col- Media.
leagues to find solutions to real projects, not in a
Berguin, S., Reilly, R., & Traynor, D. (2005).
hypothetic or theoretical manner.
Examining the role of self-regulated learning
The use of games as a motivation factor for
on introductory programming performance.
the presented concepts showed importance not
Proceedings of the 2005 International Workshop
only for the ludic aspect, but for the wealth of
on Computing Education Research (pp. 81-86),
exploration elements as well. In both cases, the
Seattle, WA.
exploration factor represents a relevant aspect
for attainment of clear and cheap solutions for Björk, S., & Holopainen, J. (2005). Games and
software, as well as three-dimensional realism Design Patterns. In K. Salen & E. Zimmerman
in models. (Eds.), The game design reader. Cambridge, MA:
MIT Press.
Bransford, J., Brown, A., & Cocking, R. R. (Eds.).
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Teaching introductory computer graphics using
Java 3D, games and customized software: A Design Pattern: A proven solution for a re-
Brazilian experience. Proceedings of the ACM curring problem. Some authors provide a catalog
SIGGRAPH 2006 Educators Program. with 23 Design Patterns (Gamma et al., 1995).
Towle, T., & DeFanti, T. (1978). GAIN: An inter- Instructional Design: Constitutes a systematic
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ences of perceiving and processing information
van Gumster, J. (2003). Blender as an educational in response to educational stimuli.
tool. Proceedings of the ACM SIGGRAPH 2003 Ludic: The Latin word ludus (meaning
Educators Program. ACM Press. “game”) originated the concept of ludic, which
Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The represents a human behavior characteristic that
development of higher psychological processes. synthesizes social and educational principles, and
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. establishes a vehicle of imaginary expression and
action through knowledge and rules appropriations
Watt, A. (1999). 3D computer graphics (3rd ed.). in a pleasant way. Curiously, ludus also refers to
Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley. a “school” for roman gladiators: they used to be

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Using Games to Teach Design Patterns and Computer Graphics

taught to fight and use weapons—daggers, swords, process or the artifacts derived from them. The
tridents, and so on—in ludi (plural form of ludus), object-oriented metrics targeted in this chapter are
by “teachers” (in fact, gladiators’ trainers and often part of a set of metrics proposed by Chidamber
owners) called lanistae (plural form of lanista). and Kemerer (1994), which are meant to give
The “game” gladiators were meant to “play” was some quantitative values over a class diagram.
also called ludus. Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD):
Modeling: In computer graphics, modeling Determined by distance existing between real
is related to the process of representations of n- capacity to solve problems in an autonomous way
dimensional elements in a well-defined language and potential capacity to solve problems with the
or data structure. There are many techniques for help of a partner (another person as teacher, col-
modeling, many of them more suitable to some league, or even a group).
kinds of objects to be modeled.
Rendering: In computer graphics, rendering
is the process of generating a still image from a ENDNOTES
scene, taking in account information about the
geometries present in the scene, as well as view-
1
http://extreme-farm-simulator.freeonlin-
point, lighting, shading, and texture information. egames.com/
Software Metrics: Metrics are a set of param-
2
http://www.moodle.org; university’s distri-
eters used to perform assessment of a product or bution is available at http://ead.mackenzie.
process meant to be measured. Software metrics com.br/moodle
are commonly applied to the software engineering
3
http://www.blender.org

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education, edited by Richard
E. Ferdig, pp. 525-545, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

191
192

Chapter 1.15
Using Video Games to Improve
Literacy Levels of Males
Stephenie Hewett
The Citadel, USA

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

This chapter examines the differences in the According to the 2005 National Assessment of
educational needs of males, the origins of video Educational Progress (NAEP) females scored
games, and the issue of the decline in literacy thirteen (13) points higher on average in reading
achievement levels of male students worldwide. than male students (National Center for Educa-
It promotes the idea that a new literacy which tional Statistics, 2005). Gurian (2001) also cites
includes computer technology and visual literacy statistics indicating that boys:
has changed the scope of literacy and that males
have succeeded at developing the new literacy • Earn seventy percent (70%) of D’s and F’s
skills. The chapter is intended to inform educa- and fewer than half of the A’s,
tors of the literacy skills involved in video games, • Account for two-thirds of learning disabil-
make connections with video game literacy and ity diagnoses,
traditional literacy, and to encourage teachers to • Represent ninety percent (90%) of disci-
integrate video games into their curriculum. pline referrals,

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch115

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

• Dominate such brain-related learning dis- males (NAEP, 2005). The differences in high
orders as ADD/ADHD, with millions now school graduation rates of males and females lead
medicated in schools, to differences in college attendance rates. Women
• Make up eighty percent (80%) of the high earn an average of fifty-seven percent (57%) of all
school dropouts, and BA’s and fifty-eight percent of master’s degrees
• Make up fewer than forty percent (40%) of in the United States (Conlin, 2005). The United
college students. States Department of Education predicts that if
the current trend continues that by 2020, there
The current educational system around the will be 156 women for every 100 men earning
world is failing to meet the educational needs of college degrees. The college attendance rates for
males. In the United States, Black males are three African-American males are even lower with only
(3) times more likely than white students to be thirty-seven percent (37%) of Black males being
labeled as mentally disturbed (www.BET.com, enrolled in college (NAEP, 2005). The college
2005). Males are more often classified as being graduation rate of Black males is lower than any
mentally retarded, having learning disabilities, other group.
and having attention deficit disorders. The research clearly shows that males are
Girls performed better than boys academically getting lost in the educational system. One of the
in the thirty-five (35) countries who participated problems could be that the current curriculum is
in a three (3) year study of knowledge and skills designed for all students to learn the same things
of males and females. The Organization for Eco- at the same time in the same ways. It does not
nomic Co-operation and Development (OECD) examine the cultural expectations of or for the
studied males and females in industrialized coun- males and does not consider the differences in the
tries including the United States, Canada, Euro- males’ brains, learning styles, or developmental
pean countries, Australia, and Japan. The results levels. With the use of the current curriculum, the
show that reading and writing skills brought the unrealistic expectations of teachers for males in
male scores down the most. (Gurian & Stevens, the classroom, inappropriate teaching and pre-
2004) The dismal educational achievement of sentation styles, and the restrictions on student
males continues in the high school dropout rates movement in the classrooms, it becomes easy to
and graduation rates of males. understand why males appear to be angry, aggres-
The difference in graduation rates for males sive, and frustrated.
and females widen within minority groups. There In order to relieve the frustrations of males
is an eleven percent (11%) difference in graduation and to reverse the current educational trends of
rates of African-American males and females, nine males, it is important for educators to consider
percent (9%) fewer Hispanic males graduate than all types of instruction. All students should be
Hispanic females, five percent (5%) fewer white taught utilizing the knowledge of cultural gender
males graduate as compared with white females, differences as well as gender differences in brains
and three percent (3%) fewer Asian males gradu- and interests. Cultural expectations and gender
ate from high school than Asian females (Greene differences are difficult to quantitatively study
&Winters, 2006). During the past decade, the but have been extensively researched by literary
graduation rate for Black women improved while and developmental experts such as Leonie Rowan
the rate for Black males slipped. Fifty-six percent (2002), Elaine Millard (1997), and many others.
(56%) of Black women graduate from high school Research on the brain has vastly expanded with
compared with forty-three percent (43%) of Black new medical technologies available to scan and

193
 Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

learn more about the brain. Neurologists are find- ture, or who tap pencils or otherwise fidget
ing that there are major differences in the char- in hopes of keeping themselves awake and
acteristics of males’ brains and females’ brains. learning. Females tend to recharge and
Evidence supporting brain differences in males reorient neural focus without rest states.
and females is referenced by Michael Gurian and Thus, a girl can be bored with a lesson, but
Kathy Stevens (2004) showing that: she will nonetheless keep her eyes open,
take notes, and perform relatively well.
• “boys brains have more cortical areas ded- This is especially true when the teacher
icated to spatial- mechanical functioning, uses more words to teach a lesson instead
males use, on average, half the brain space of being spatial and diagrammatic. The
that females use for verbal-emotive func- more words a teacher uses, the more likely
tioning. The cortical trend toward special- boys are to “zone out”, or go into rest state.
mechanical functioning makes many boys The male brain is better suited for sym-
want to move objects through space, like bols, abstractions, diagrams, pictures, and
balls, model airplanes, or just their arms objects moving through space than for the
and legs. Most boys, although not all of monotony of words (Gurian, 2001).”
them, will experience words and feels dif-
ferently than girls do. (Blum, 1997; Moir The schools are failing to recognize and re-
& Jenssel, 1989). spond to the current educational gender specific
• boys have less serotonin than girls have, needs of males. In today’s world, computers and
but they also have less oxytocin, the prima- video games play a major role in a student’s life.
ry human bonding chemical. This makes Whether the student is completing work on the
it more likely that they will be physically computer or using it for video games, a major por-
impulsive and less likely that they neurally tion of a student’s day is spent using a computer
impulsiveness to sit still and empathetical- of some type. The education system has embraced
ly chat with a friend (Moir & Jessel; 1989, the use of computers to complete assignments and
Taylor, 2002). conduct research for class projects. The disconnect
• boys lateralize brain activity. Their brains between the educational system and technology
not only operate with less blood flow than occurs with the lack of a complete integration of
girls’ brains, but they are also structured the use of technology including video games for
to compartmentalize learning. Thus, girls instructional purposes.
tend to multitask better than boys do, with
fewer attention span problems and greater
ability to make quick transitions between HISTORY OF USING VIDEO GAMES
lessons (Havers, 1995). FOR INSTRUCTIONAL PURPOSES
• The male brain is set to renew, recharge,
and reorient itself by entering what neu- In examining the history of educational games
rologists call a rest state. The boy in the (video games), it is important to define the term
back of the classroom whose eyes are drift- educational video games. In this chapter, the
ing toward sleep has entered a neural rest definition of the term educational video games
state. It is predominantly boys who drift off is written by Sara de Freitas (2006) in a report
without completing assignments, who stop to the JISC e-Learning Programme in London.
taking notes and fall asleep during a lec- She defines educational games as “applications

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Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

using the characteristics of video and computer CURRENT USE OF

games to create engaging and immersive learning INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNOLOGY
experiences for delivering specific learning goals,
outcomes, and experiences” (de Freitas, 2006, 10). Since the invention of the teaching machine in the
With this definition in mind, a review of the history 1920’s by Sidney Pressey, an educational psychol-
of video games for educational purposes will be ogy professor at Ohio State University, and the
focused on the use of electronic games to enhance problem cylinder by M. E. LaZerte, Director of the
learning. Spacewar was the first computer game to School of Education at the University of Alberta,
be developed. In 1961, Steve Russell used a PDP- the use of technology in the classroom has been
11 at the Massachusetts Institute of technology expanding and developing. In 1960, Programmed
to develop the game that was collaborative and Logic for Automated Teaching Operations (PLA-
exhibited learning capabilities (Herz, 2001). The TO) created the first computer assisted courses at
first games used to support learning and training the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
were simulations. These games were war games From there, distance education classes were de-
and led to the fighting and shooting games of to- veloped where students did not have to actually
day (de Freitas, 2006). In the 1980’s, Brøderbund sit in classrooms to learn the concepts. Students
and the Learning Company are two of the first could use the computer to assist them in master-
companies created who developed educational ing objectives and completing coursework at
software. Reader Rabbit, developed in 1989 by their convenience. In the 1970’s computers were
the Learning Company, is one of the first software first used in elementary classrooms in Canada. In
programs designed to teach children basic read- 1976, the first virtual college was founded in the
ing and spelling skills (http://en.wikipedia.org/ United States. In the 1980’s, PLATO introduced a
wiki/Educational_software, 2007). The personal cartridge to be used at home with the ATARI home
computer promoted the development of software computer escalating the use of home systems for
that could be used to help students learn concepts, instruction. The 1990’s saw an increase in the use
provide practice, and engage students in a fun of computers in schools with the establishment of
activity. Peter Catalanotto first coined the word computer labs in most schools. Teachers were able
edutainment in the late 1990s as he traveled around to individualize instruction with the software pro-
the country edutaining school children about writ- grams that were available. Educational software
ing and illustrating. Edutainment is defined as companies exploded with some school districts
“a form of entertainment designed to educate as forming their own software libraries for teachers
well as to amuse” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ to check out programs for use in the computer
Edutainment, 2007). Edutainment typically seeks labs. As computers became less expensive and
to instruct or socialize its audience by embed- more attainable for schools, computers began to
ding lessons in some familiar form of entertain- appear in classrooms. Teachers began to develop
ment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edutainment, PowerPoint presentations with the introduction
2007). Today, there are millions of video games of computer to television connections and LCD
that are considered as edutainment. Parents and projectors. Learning games became less prevalent
children can use a search engine (google) using as teachers struggled to integrate technology into
the key words “reading video games” and one their daily lesson plans.
hundred twenty-nine million (129,000,000) sites Sandford, Ulicsak, Facer, and Rudd (2006)
can be accessed. conducted a MORI poll of teachers in the United
Kingdom and found that thirty-one and five tenths

195
 Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

percent (31.5%) of teachers have used games the sample population played video games. Eighty
designed for entertainment in their lessons and percent (80%) of the males and twenty percent
fifty-nine percent (59%) of the teachers reported a (20%) of the females played video games for ap-
possibility of considering them in the future. The proximately one hour on weekdays and ninety (90)
study also found that sixty-three percent (63%) of minutes on weekends. On the average, students
the teachers believed that students using games who spent time playing video games spent thirty
actually learned specific content knowledge. percent (30%) less time reading and thirty-four
In a Eutopia survey conducted by Sara Ber- percent (34%) less time doing homework (Cum-
nard, five hundred one teachers responded to mings; Vandewater, 2007). The study also found
the question, “Are computer and video games that for every hour males played video games
effective teaching tools?” (Bernard, Http://www. during the week, they spent two (2) minutes less
edutopia.org/are-computer-and-video-games- time reading. Educators and researchers need to
effective-teaching-tools). Seventy-eight percent understand what draws students, especially males,
(78%) of the responders voted yes that “computer to sit for long periods of time and focus on video
games engage, motivate, and inspire students games. The studies have shown that there is a sharp
and educational researchers and game designers difference in the percentage of males and females
are collaborating to create their ideal niche in who play video games as well as differences in
the classroom” (Bernard, Http://www.edutopia. their video game preferences and amount of time
org/are-computer-and-video-games-effective- spent playing video games. Male video game
teaching-tools). Many teachers agree with the players tend to like person shooters and sports
theory of the benefits of video games without games. These games increase the chances that the
actually integrating them into their curricula. player will be completely absorbed in playing the
This is where there is a disconnect between the game. Game promoters believe that people play
approval and actual application of video games video games to escape from everyday life and to a
into classroom instruction. world of adventure without risk. Adults who play
Video games are definitely part of students’ video games report that video games are mentally
lives, especially the males. The interests of stu- stimulating and that hand-eye coordination is
dents need to be considered in creating an active, improved by playing (Dawson, 2007)
engaging learning environment. The integration of
video games into instructional practices may help
to connect males back to learning experiences. MALES AND READING

Reading assessments throughout the world are

VIDEO GAMES AND MALES substantiating the fact that males are scoring lower
than their female counterparts in reading. The Na-
Males can find the action they seek from using tional Center for Educational Statistics has been
video games. They enjoy fighters, shooters, action reporting reading and mathematics assessment
adventure games, and strategy games. More and results from 1971 to 2005 for the United States.
more, males find the adventure and action they Its report, the National Assessment of Educational
seek not from books but from video games. In Progress, documents that from 1971 to 2004 that
an American study, one thousand four hundred males have consistently scored below females.
ninety-one (1,491) children aged ten (10) to nine- Average scale score differences range from 12.7
teen (19) comprised a representative sample of (1971) to 5.3 in 2004 (http://nces.ed.gov/nation-
adolescents. It was found that thirty-six percent of sreportcard/lttnde/viewresults.asp). In 2006, the

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Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

Canadian Human Resources and Social Devel- Haydon, an author of adolescent books, writes
opment concluded from their assessments that that “Themes that are appreciated by boys this
“females have much superior reading achieve- age [preteen] are action, the more detailed the
ment than males” (http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/cs/ better, some sort of struggle, threat or fighting,
sp/hrsdc/lp/publications/2006-002833/page06. particularly of the heroic sort – whether it is epic
shtml) In the Canadian study, sixty-one percent or in the schoolyard – suspense, puzzles, horror
(61%) of the students in the high achievement and humor, often of the crass kind.” (Brown, 2007)
reading category (75th percentile) were females
leaving males with only thirty-nine percent (39%)
scoring in the seventy-fifth (75th) percentile. Males VIDEO GAMES AND LEARNING
also had seventy-three percent (73%) scoring in AND LITERACY CONNECTIONS
the low achieving category which is below the
twenty-fifth (25th) percentile. Michael Sullivan, the Learning occurs when a person “gains knowledge
director of the Weeks Public Library in Greenland or understanding of a skill by study, instruction,
cited research done by Lanning Taliaferro from or experience” (Webster’s New World Dictionary,
the Journal News stating that “By the time boys 353). James Paul Gee, a University of Wisconsin-
are in the eleventh (11th) grade, they can be three Madison curriculum and instruction professor,
(3) years behind girls in their reading levels” has studied the connection between video games,
(Cicco, 2005) learning, and literacy. He found that learning
In 2002, Smith and Wilhelm summarized their principles and knowledge about human learning
literacy and gender research in their book Read- is incorporated into video games (Gee, 2003).
ing Don’t Fix No Chevys: Literacy in the Lives of Video games captivate players by giving them
Young Men. The conclusions include that: complex problems to solve in real world settings
that get progressively more difficult with each
• Males spend less time reading for pleasure level mastered. The players’ problem solving
than females. skills are tested at each level with the game giving
• Males do not report reading as an enjoy- positive reinforcements for each accomplishment.
able experience as often as females. That description of a video game could be the
• Males are not as confident in their reading description of a learning centered environment
abilities as females. producing successful students. “Playing video
• Males take longer to learn how to read than games evokes a potentially powerful, active
females. learning environment that includes demonstration,
• Males talk about what they are reading less rehearsal, and reinforcement” (Funk et al, 2006).
often than females. Thinking and learning skills can be developed by
• Males like to physically respond to the playing some video games. Reading skills, logi-
reading by acting out responses or by mak- cal thinking skills, observation skills, vocabulary
ing something. development, problem solving skills, and strategy
planning can all be improved through the use of
Males do report that they enjoy stories and some of the available video games. Most of the
information that they can relate to through their video games require reading. The problem occurs
own personal experiences (http://www.liberating- because the reading required in video games is
boys.com/books.html). Magazines, internet text, not the traditional form of literacy thought to
and even video games capture males’ attention develop reading skills. Video games are creating
as being reading that they can relate to. Elizabeth new forms of literacy. In today’s world, print

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 Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

media and literacy of print media is not enough is not recognized as being meaningful or useful
to be successful. Playing video games offers the in today’s educational system (Schmidt, 2006).
opportunity to learn a different type of literacy. Males enjoy reading the magazines and web sites
Computer games, the internet, instant messages, that give directions, tips, and clues on how to
and phone texts have shaped the way people, progress further in the level of the games. Students
especially males, interact with texts. Males use actively seek information on the new game systems
a sub-standard form of English to communicate and video games that will be available in stores.
with others quickly while playing games. The Males interact with one another with a different
language used is to help them reach the goals heightened sense of excitement when discussing
of the game. The literacy of the games is action the video game, its characters, and action scenes.
oriented. Paul Gee (2003) writes that visual The interaction about and excitement regarding
literacy is an important part of communication video games are the same behaviors that teach-
that is often ignored in typical classrooms. The ers seek in students required to read books and
viewing and understanding of symbols, graphs, stories. The video game has led males to become
charts, and visuals in necessary to obtain an ad- a different type of reader requiring him to develop
equate level of literacy in today’s world. “Visual a literacy of the world of computers and online
literacy is just as important an element as that resources. Gee (2003) states that “video games are
of reading the written word in gaining a more not replacing books, they are simply an art form
complete understanding of society and culture” that will interact with them, and change them and
(Madill and Sanford, 2006). Active learning can their role in society in various ways”.
occur and generate a greater understanding by Teachers do not recognize that video games are
interacting visually with something rather than a form of literacy or art. “It’s very sophisticated,
simply reading about it. but a lot of adults aren’t reading this kind of text, so
“Experiencing the world in new ways, form- we don’t recognize it as high functioning because
ing new affiliations, and preparation for future it doesn’t look like traditional literacy”, Leanna
learning” are the three (3) components of active Madill said at the Canadian Society for the Study
learning identified by Gee (2003). Video games of Education in Toronto (2006). The video game
offer the student a visual image that invites the players take for granted their knowledge of the
student to become completely involved in the video game terminology and computer literacy not
experience. As the students interpret and become recognizing the actual level of difficulty. Males
immersed in their imaginative play, the meaning are not becoming less literate; they are becoming
of the experience is more tangible (Robertson, more literate in a less traditional form of literacy.
2005). “They’re learning to take up different The new literacy is difficult for teachers to relate
pieces of information all at the same time. This is to and is one of the most pressing challenges for
not just about entertainment. The skills that they an educator in today’s world.
are learning will transfer to the world of work”
(Madill and Sanford, 2006). The skills obtained
from playing video games may be more intricate CHALLENGES OF USING VIDEO
than those required by simply reading a text. GAMES TO IMPROVE LITERACY
Researchers (Schmidt, 2006) at the Univer-
sity of Victoria found that males exhibited high One of the challenges facing educators is assess-
literacy levels in video game technology. The ment of the new literacy. In order to measure
study concluded that the “unique richness” of improvement of literacy, there must be some
the literacy of males in regards to video games form of assessment. Currently, the forms of avail-

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Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

able literacy assessment are the read the passage utilizes video games to improve literacy. In the
and answer questions type. This type of literacy report, “Learning in Immersive Worlds: A Review
assessment does not measure the new literacy of Game Based Learning”, Sara de Freitas (2006)
that males have acquired. The use of games in reported that “The main barrier to using games
instruction may promote different, more flexible in school…is a lack of access to equipment and
types of assessments. It becomes the teacher’s availability of up-to-date graphics/video cards-
responsibility to become technologically literate making it difficult for teachers to run games on
to be able to develop and incorporate the new their own PC’s – a problem also faced in higher
forms of assessment. Most teacher preparation and further education”. De Freitas (2006) listed
programs have basic integration of technology the seven (7) major barriers to the integration of
classes in their programs but do not have the video games in learning practice including:
advanced level technology courses required for
teachers to become adequately prepared to fully • “access to the correct hardware including
utilize and assess various forms of technology PC’s with high end graphics video cards;
and technological literacy. Basically, we have • effective technical support or access to
PK-12th grade students entering classrooms with suitable technical support;
better developed technological skills than the • familiarity with games-based software;
teachers. The rush of new technology into the • community of practice within which to
world has created a technological blockade in the seek guidance and support;
educational system. Students have the abilities and • enough time to prepare effective games-
skills to use technology and video games to learn, based learning;
but teachers do not have the computer skills and • learner groups who would like to learn us-
video game knowledge to integrate video games ing effective games-based approaches;
into their learning curriculum. • cost of educational games software or li-
Educators know that it is extremely important censes” (16)
to motivate student learning through the use of
the students’ interests. Teachers also know that Although barriers do exist for the integration of
males are extremely interested in video games. video games into the instructional process, there
To promote traditional literacy development, are ways to overcome the barriers.
teachers must match students’ interests with the
right book. The same pedagogy holds true for us-
ing video games for instruction. Not all students POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS
like to play video games. Not all students like the
same types of video games, and not all students Examining the barriers to the integration of video
are good at playing video games. Many students, games into classroom curriculums can result in
including males, find video games to be frustrating. a more flexible instructional curriculum and as-
Providing a wide range of types of video games sessment process. To ease the process of including
is important to match the interests and meet the video games to improve literacy of males in the
needs of all male students. regular school curriculum, the following initiatives
Providing a wide variety of video games for need to be explored:
instruction poses an additional problem. The ex-
pense of the hardware and software along with • Increase and improve video game training
the lack of funding for such endeavors poses in teacher preparation programs;
a threat to the development of a program that

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 Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

• Create and adopt video game guidelines practice, and assessment of the learning
for teachers; outcomes;
• Develop video game curriculum based on • Structure the game playing session with
skills used in novels; pre-play connections to the desired learn-
• Seek expanded funding for schools to pur- ing outcomes and post-play reflection on
chase hardware and software; the actual concepts and skills learned;
• Analyze data to determine that video • Assess the learning outcome of the video
games do improve literacy in males. game including computer literacy skills;
• Evaluate the effectiveness of the game for
Schools and colleges of education have begun reinforcing and teaching the desired skills
to include instructional technology classes for all and outcomes; and
future teachers. These courses need to include • Make changes as needed based on the as-
methods of including video games into the cur- sessment data and feedback from students
riculum as well as computer programming lan- (de Freitas, 2006).
guages so that they will be able to develop video
games that meet the curriculum requirements of With the aforementioned guidelines serving as
individual classrooms. New master degree pro- a framework and structure for teachers to follow,
grams in instructional technology have appeared development of curricula integrating video games
which may allow for more support in the schools into literacy instruction will utilize best practices
for the teachers implementing game technology. in teaching with video games.
Professional development classes in video game In promoting literacy, best practices have typi-
instruction for current teachers will also enhance cally revolved around the use of novels. Fiction
the initiative. Having the teachers play the video and non-fiction books were used to teach classic
games with the students will also serve as learning literature skills. In today’s educational arena, this
experiences for both the students and the teach- approach is not working for all students, especially
ers. The teachers can help instruct the concepts to males (Conlin, 2003; Greene and Winters,2006;
be learned through playing the games; while the Gurian, Henley, and Trueman, 2001). The skills
students teach the technology skills and literacy that are usually taught with novels can be taught
to be successful in the game. through the use of video games. These skills
For video games to be a successful tool in the would be the easiest connection to video games.
classroom, teachers will need to have guidelines The specific skills/learning outcomes to be taught
to follow and have video game learning outcomes by the novel should be identified and sequenced.
aligned with the content standards. Typical guide- Then a video game which teaches the same skills
lines for using video games to improve literacy should be identified/developed. The video game
of males include: can then be placed in the correct sequence of
instructional activities to insure that the proper
• Define and establish clear learning outcomes occur. Assessments would determine
outcomes; the mastery of the outcomes/skills as well as the
• Select the video game that supports the effectiveness of the game to teach and reinforce
learning outcomes and that can be appro- the desired outcomes and skills. Currently this
priately assessed; type of literature curricula is not commercially
• Sequence the learning activities so that the available and would have to be created by the
game fits and flows within the instruction, teachers. Curriculum development of this type is

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time consuming and may require additional fund- Male students can already list video games that
ing for teacher training and software development. match concepts being taught in history classes.
Funding for new initiatives in technology Civilization builder games are historically based
is essential to have the training, technical sup- and allow the player to better understand geog-
port, software support, and hardware to ensure raphy of different areas and the effect of choices
success. Software designers need to consider on the success or failure of the civilization. Video
the needs of teachers in developing new games. games create new paths and different outcomes
Teachers need to be proactive in demanding that encourage the student to consider how the
funding for development of curriculum that uses choices not made in real history could have
video games. Software designers and teachers changed historical events (Whelchel, 2007). By
need to come together to align literacy skills and changing the choices made, students can actu-
standards with the current available video games ally create better civilizations and determine the
to facilitate the development of the video game/ causes of civilization failures through trial and
literacy curriculum. error processes.
For learning with video games to be effec-
tive, connections need to be made between what
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR USING is learned in the game and how it is applied to
VIDEO GAMES TO IMPROVE practice in other literary genres. This follows most
LITERACY LEVELS OF MALES theories and best practices of teaching and learn-
ing. Follow-up reflection of the learning outcomes
To quicken the process of using video games to by the game player and connections to the literary
improve literacy levels in males, it is important applications in different genres are essential (de
to explore the current technology available. Freitas, 2006). Wilhelm (1997) found that males
Millions of video games are available in stores have to responsively interact with the reading
all over the country. Although their educational before critical analysis could take place. Games
qualities have not been their selling points, most promote the responsive interaction required to
video games can be used to teach certain literacy think critically. Bonk and Dennen (2005) con-
skills. For example, reading skills can be enhanced ducted empirical studies concerning skills sup-
for males through video games by requiring the ported by game-based learning approaches and
game player to read the directions for play first, found that “ …another way to build conceptual
then allowing the student to play the game, and knowledge is to engage in dialogue with peers or
finally having the student research the tips and experts about the game during game play” (29).
hints to reach higher levels of play. Through this The hands-on learning experiences offered by
structure, teachers are requiring males to read. video games promote the types of discussions
The more the males read, the better they get at it. between students that all teachers encourage.
Males do not resist reading about the video games Male game players are more likely to excitedly
that they love. Additional traditional literacy skills explain their moves in a step-by-step sequence
can be taught through video games including to another game player and analyze their moves
symbolism, genre, comprehension, literary merit, and decisions altering the outcomes of the game.
vocabulary development, logical thinking, critical In the new literacy studies conducted by Gee
thinking, and problem solving skills to list just (2006), results supported the concept that reading
a few. By using the current software available, and writing are not only mental achievements
traditional literacy connections can be made to but are also social and cultural practices. Video
the video games. games allow the players to simulate characters

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and to share the characters’ experiences and social Knowing how males learn literacy skills
relationships. Critical thinking skills are gained best and what motivates them to read and
through interacting with the game, taking on new learn is essential in closing the gap on lit-
identities, solving problems through trial and er- eracy achievement.
ror, and gaining expertise or literacy within the
game (Craft, 2004). The analyzing skills gained As the keynote speaker at the University of
through video game play are of the highest level of Newcastle’s 4th Biennial Working with Boys
reading comprehension. If appropriately assessed, Building Fine Men’s conference Dr. Martine F.
the literacy levels of the males would increase. Delfos, a Netherlands researcher said, “Boys
Through the vivid graphic images, character learning can be enhanced by taking into their ac-
analysis, and challenges that video games present, count evolutionary deeply embedded preference
students interact with the game acquiring mastery behavior. Teaching strategies should encompass
of skills that literacy teachers would recognize as boys’ preference for competitive behavior; a
essential for traditional literacy. Although students cognitive style orientated more towards discov-
do not recognize the learning aspects of the game, ery and rote memory; and a need for strong peer
they quickly become immersed in playing the connections. Boys have a tendency to action, and
game. In a presentation on “Teaching Generation need action in class” (http://www.newcastle.edu.
X”, Christopher Clark (2005) presented facts au/news/2005/04/teachingboys.html). In Michael
about learning including that video games and Pollock’s book entitled Real Boys: Rescuing Our
teachers have 30 seconds to “hook the player Sons from the Myths of Boyhood (1998) states
or the player is gone for good”. He challenged that boys have superior spatial abilities and see
educators to establish methods (including video things in three dimension easily. He advocates
games) to get students emotionally connected with using activities with intense movements and make
the content as quickly as possible (Clark, 2005). believe violence. He contends that by allowing
Video games can “hook” males into obtaining these types of activities, boys would learn how
high levels of literacy without even knowing that to harness the energy. Video games can create
they are learning. Males may be able to show the active learning environment that males need
their literacy skills better through video games through demonstration, demonstration, rehearsal,
than through the traditional literacy assessments. and reinforcement (Funk et al, 2006).
With males consistently scoring lower on
literacy assessments than females, teachers need
to know that: SUMMARY

• There is a real difference in literacy levels The researchers (Craft; Cummings; Dawson, de
of males and females; Freitas; Funk et al) studying the use of video games
• Text selection and curriculum develop- in promoting learning agree that video games of-
ment should be based on the knowledge of fer the hands-on types of experience that males
males and their interests; need to efficiently learn. Males learn differently
• Teacher assigned reading should be en- from females and require a more interactive,
hanced with self-selected reading; physical type of activity. Video games offer the
• Males should be guided in making connec- vivid images, flashy display of text, action, and
tions with texts through a wide variety of challenges that engage males in participating and
activities to support their reading compre- learning. The current generation of male students
hension and analysis skills (Bowen, 1997). enters classrooms with technology skills that far

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Using Video Games to Improve Literacy Levels of Males

exceed that of the teachers. Many teachers do study their choices/moves, analyze the outcomes
not recognize the technology skills as literacy of those choices/moves, reflect on the changes to
skills, although the literacy outcomes of a male be made to improve their level of play, and expe-
playing a video game may be very similar to the rience a wide variety of situations that simulate
outcomes expected in traditional literacy activities. real world issues and problems. The active nature
Research on the use of video games in classrooms of video games match the learning requirements
is expansive with more positive impacts noted of males and better engage them in the learning
that negative. Research on the use of video games activity. Video games have an addictive nature to
to improve literacy skills of males is limited, them resulting in video games being an excellent
however. James Gee is the leading researcher in tool for creating lifelong learners. The entertain-
the area of video games, learning, and literacy. ing aspect of the video game combined with the
He strongly promotes the use of video games educational components create an potentially
to improve literacy skills. He explains that the exciting and invigorating classroom learning tool
literacy skills of the males currently in school are which may improve the literacy levels of males.
not lower than they have been in the past. They are More research on the literacy level gains with the
just different. He contends that the literacy skills use of video games needs to be conducted to best
taught by the use of video games reflect the skills determine how to meet the twenty-first century
necessary to be successful in today’s world. In literacy needs of all students.
the Review of Game Based Learning, de Freitas
(2006) explains the possibilities that game based
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Traditional Literacy: The ability to read the
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Visual Literacy: The ability to look at charts,
graphs, pictures, and other visual images to grasp
Brain Differences: The variations found in an intended message.
the male and female brains.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on New Media Literacy at the K-12 Level: Issues and Chal-
lenges, edited by Leo Tan Wee Hin and R. Subramaniam, pp. 286-299, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an
imprint of IGI Global).

205
 Section II
Development and Design
Methodologies

This section provides exhaustive coverage of conceptual architecture frameworks to endow with the reader a broad
understanding of the promising technological developments within the field of instructional design. Research
fundamentals imperative to the understanding of developmental processes within instructional design are offered.
From broad surveys to specific discussions and case studies on electronic tools, the research found within this
section spans the discipline while offering detailed, specific discussions. From basic designs to abstract develop-
ment, these chapters serve to expand the reaches of development and design technologies within the instructional
design community.
 207

Chapter 2.1
Planning for Technology
Integration
Henryk R. Marcinkiewicz
Aramco Services Company, USA

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

Three models structure the planning for technol- The work of integrating technology into instruc-
ogy integration into instruction. Institutional needs tion at an institution may be daunting, particularly
are assessed for three dimensions suggested in in the absence of a plan. To support technology
Gilbert’s, “Model of Human Competence.” The integration, a plan is described with the goal of
areas needing addressing are typically within competence in the area of teaching. The plan calls
instruction; therefore, the process steps of a ge- for assessing the co-requisite conditions of an
neric instructional design model are used. Within institution and their influences on the goal. The
designing for instruction, Bransford’s, “variables underlying model is Thomas Gilbert’s model of
affecting learning,” are the focal points organi- human competence (Chevalier, 2003; Gilbert,
zational planners need to consider in planning 1978). The institutional needs assessment is com-
instruction. Instruction is framed as “faculty- bined with the general process of an instructional
as-learner centered instruction.” The variables design model. The latter is used because a typical
are also a significant aspect of the content of institutional condition needing intervention is the
instruction for faculty because faculty will use need for instruction among personnel. In practice,
them in planning their own instruction integrated the entire process is best organized as a series of
with technology. questions. The discussion is outlined according
to that logic. The process flow will be familiar
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch201 to instructional technologists and organizational

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Planning for Technology Integration

planners and it will appeal to their sense of a The kinds of technology most institutional
systemic approach to problem solution. planners deal with include communication systems
In the first part of the plan, technology is identi- such as e-mail or messaging, and software appli-
fied, and needs are assessed. The next two steps cations for administrative use including student
are instructional planning based on three reasons. auditing systems. They also include instructional
First, most work in technology integration has technologies that encompass software and hard-
a training need—personnel need to understand ware to facilitate learning. These include online
institutional information, or how, why, and when learning management systems, individual audio
to use the target technology. Second, instructional devices, and online virtual worlds.
planning models may be fairly wide-ranging and The purpose of identifying technology is to
are flexible enough to apply to organizational sys- focus your work and to select that with which
tems—they work well for that purpose. Third, it you will work. The result of this process is an
is useful to consider faculty as the benefactors of answer to the question of which technology you
learner-centered instruction, it may be considered want faculty to use in instruction. You know what
as, “faculty-as-learner centered instruction.” is needed in general. Specify what is needed and
There are several strategies for the integration set that as a standard expectation.
process that are based on research in the adoption
of instructional technology. They are meeting sub- Part A: Assess the Institution
jective norms, which is akin to peer pressure, and Conceptual Model
the management of institutional expectations. The
dimension for deciding the use of either strategy 1. Define Competence
is the relative novelty or newness of a technology
to an institution. A standard expectation has been established that
In summary, the process is workable, practical, faculty will use the given technology. (The work-
and effective; that is, if followed it does help one ing example in this chapter will be that faculty
to achieve technology integration at an institution. will use a learning management system (LMS)
This ought to offer a strong measure of reassur- in instruction.) Express the expectation into
ance to those professionals undertaking the task. operational terms—faculty will be competent in
The challenge, as often happens, is in the actual integrating an LMS in instruction. There may be
implementation. other expectations, but for whichever expecta-
tion is decided, the criterion for it is competence.
Identifying the expectation thus allows for using
THE PLAN Thomas Gilbert’s model of human competence
to structure this phase of the overall process
Which technology is needed? (Chevalier, 2003; Gilbert, 1978).
This is a wide-ranging question with conceptual The model suggests three co-requisite dimen-
as well as practical answers. For the purposes of sions addressed from two areas of the institution.
institutional planning, the latter are more impor- The dimensions are information, instrumentation,
tant; there are several notions of what technology and motivation. The two areas are the external and
is and which technology is wanted. Begin by the internal. The external refers to the institution.
considering the materials, tools, and processes Typically, it includes the administration and its
that are useful for instruction. The technology members who support and provide the conditions
used in instruction typically refers to computers for the success of an individual faculty member.
or the software applications for computers. Because it does not include faculty, it is external to

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Table 1. Gilbert’s model of human competence

  Environmental Supports (Institution) Information Instrumentation Incentives

  Repertory of Behavior (Faculty Member)
Knowledge Capacity Motives

the individual faculty member. The internal refers For the external area—Instrumentation:
to individual faculty members. The emphases for
the dimensions vary as appropriate for each area Instrumentation refers to the tools and re-
and are depicted in the matrix shown in Table 1. sources necessary to complete the competent
behavior. For LMS use it includes computers,
For the external area—Information: connection to a network, LMS software, support
software, etc. The responsibilities of the institu-
Information refers to the expectations of the tion are to ensure that the necessary resources are
institution expressed as vision, mission, and goal available and functioning at the expected level of
statements and includes institutional philosophy. quality, the availability is communicated, and use
It is the body of information about the institution of the resources is possible. The institution is also
that must be communicated to employees generally responsible for providing education and training
and specifically. It is likely that some parts will to learn how to use the technological resources.
differ by institutional organization. There may be
different expectations for faculty than there are for For the internal area—Capacity:
residential life staff, for example. The role of the
external area including all levels of administration Instrumentation for a faculty member refers to
and support is to communicate the expectations the ability or capacity, the interest or inclination
for competence towards the faculty. This means towards, the scheduling allowing, or the selection
that the provost as well as a librarian or a student of personnel for using LMS technology. Levels of
activities staff member know that faculty are individual instrumentation vary and the degrees
expected to use an LMS in instruction. of variation determine the quantity and quality
of instruction or other remediation. Faculty may
For the internal area—Knowledge: understand how to use LMS technology but do
not have a preference for it, or vice versa.
To achieve competence in using an LMS for
instruction, a faculty member must be aware of the For the external area—Motivation—Incentive:
information from the institution. A faculty member
must also know, understand, and especially, ac- The provision of incentives properly states the
cept the expectations for competence. The three contributing role that an institution has towards
dimensions are co-requisite meaning that all of a faculty member in regards to motivation. It is
them must be successful in order to achieve the the responsibility of the institution to provide
goal of competence for individuals. It is obvi- incentives for achieving competence by integrat-
ous how if a faculty member does not accept the ing LMS technology into instruction. There are a
expectation, meeting competence is thwarted. variety of incentives including salary, awards or
other recognition such as the recognition for the

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use of technology in instruction towards tenure individual faculty member. Following are samples
and promotion. Motivation does not occur if the of assessment questions germane to the target of
intended recipient does not accept the incentive. competence.
It is the responsibility of the institution to provide
the appropriate incentives for faculty. Message Communicated
◦◦ What is the institution’s vision?
For the internal area—Motivation—Motives: ◦◦ Does it refer to the integration of tech-
nology? To what level of specificity?
Faculty need to communicate their expecta- ◦◦ What is the institution’s philosophy?
tions for incentives. It is not accurately stated as ◦◦ Does it refer to the integration of tech-
a responsibility of faculty but rather as a natural nology? To what level of specificity?
consequence that if the appropriate incentives ◦◦ What are the goals of the institution?
are made available, faculty will be motivated to ◦◦ Do they refer to the integration
achieve competence. For the purposes of this pro- of technology? To what level of
cess, Gilbert’s model is a useful structure. It is not specificity?
entirely all-encompassing as an example, for much ◦◦ Assess the layers of administration
of faculty competence in using an LMS may be for the above questions beginning
prompted by internal incentives such as personal with the entire institution to the next
or professional satisfaction. A knowledgeable in- level which may be a college, school
stitution will be aware of that, understand it, and or department, etc.
foster it among faculty by making the conditions Communication Process
necessary for internal incentives to occur. ◦◦ How is the message communicated?
It could be in an annual presidential
2. Assess Whether all Conditions or other executive address. It could
are Met for Competence also be in the institutional catalogue
or other prominent publication.
Consider the three dimensions of the model of ◦◦ To whom is the message communi-
human competence. Use the model of competence cated? Is it for the general public? Is
to structure the assessment of an institution to de- there an expectation that the message
termine which parts of the institution are providing be received? How is that expectation
the conditions necessary for competence to occur. operationalized? Is there an executive
Recall that the premise is that the competence order directing all managers to an-
is being sought. Specifically, competence in the nounce the messages? Is it expected
integration of technology in instruction is being to be received by virtue of the fact
sought. The working example is the integration that it is part of the primary point of
of Learning Management Systems (LMS) in contact for the institution, such as a
instruction. Web site may be?
◦◦ Is there an expectation that the mes-
Here is what to do: External Information sages be accepted as well as being
received and understood? How is that
Assess the institution’s information. Recall expectation operationalized? Is there
that the external area refers to those parts of the an order from the executive or other
institution that contribute to the work conditions level of administration directing the
of the target employee, which is in this case an

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Planning for Technology Integration

faculty to acknowledge and accept ◦◦ Whether relevant communications

the messages? are being understood, and
◦◦ In summary, it needs to be established ◦◦ Whether relevant communications
▪▪ Whether relevant communica- are being accepted by faculty.
tions are being made External Instrumentation: Resources
▪▪ Whether relevant communica-
tions are being made via appro- Assess the institution’s resources. In the
priate channels discussion above about the conceptual model,
▪▪ Whether the institution expects an assumption was made that it was the respon-
faculty to receive, understand, sibility of the institution—the area external to
and accept the messages. the target of competent behavior, the faculty
Internal Information member—to provide the necessary resources
in all its connotations. These include hardware,
Assess faculty members’ responses to the insti- software, and spaces for the instrumentation to be
tution’s information about competent behavior in used such as laboratories, classrooms, or offices.
the integration of technology in instruction—the The connotations include reasonable availability
use of an LMS. to the instrumentation in its various locations.
Following are samples of assessment ques- Reasonable accessibility needs to be provided,
tions: also. Importantly, either instruction in the use
of the instrumentation needs to be provided or
• Do the faculty know that the institution at means for the instruction need to be provided.
some level of administration has a target of The institution may conduct faculty development
competence in the use of an LMS? programming or faculty may participate in such
• Do the faculty know that competence in instruction externally.
the use of an LMS is expected? Following are samples of assessment ques-
• Do the faculty understand the institutional tions:
target? Do they know what an LMS is? Do
they know which is being used by the insti- • Is the appropriate kind of hardware
tution? Do they know what the implemen- provided?
tation plans for such a system are? • Is the appropriate kind of software
• Do the faculty understand the institution’s provided?
intentions? • Is there enough instrumentation or are
• Do the faculty understand the institution’s there enough opportunities to use it?
expectations? • Is the instrumentation functional, current,
• Do the faculty accept the institution’s reliable, and in good working order?
intentions? • To what degree of accommodation must
• Do the faculty accept the institution’s faculty submit in order to use the instru-
expectations? mentation? Is it within proximity? Is the
• Will the faculty act on the institution’s in- schedule for the use of it reasonable?
tentions and expectations? • Is instruction for the competent behavior,
• In summary, it needs to be established using an LMS, provided?
◦◦ Whether relevant communications • Is the necessary instrumentation acces-
about the expectations of competence sible? (Can it be readily accessed?)
are being received

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 Planning for Technology Integration

• Is instruction relevant to the needs of the ◦◦ Whether the faculty know how to ac-
students, that is, the faculty? cess the resources
• Is instruction scheduled to meet the widely ◦◦ Whether the faculty can accommo-
heterogeneous schedules of faculty? date the expected use of the resources
• In summary, it needs to be established per their schedule
◦◦ Whether there is appropriate ◦◦ Whether the faculty know that train-
instrumentation ing is available
◦◦ Whether the instrumentation is avail- ◦◦ Whether the faculty make use of
able, there is enough of it available training
◦◦ Whether the instrumentation is ◦◦ Whether the faculty learn from the
operational training.
◦◦ Whether the instrumentation is ac- External Motivation: Incentives
cessible, the distance to it is reason-
able and the schedule for access is Assess the institution’s use of incentives for
reasonable faculty to reward competence in the use of an
◦◦ Whether there is appropriate training. LMS. Recall that the institution’s contribution
Internal Instrumentation: Capacity to motivation is in the provision of incentives.
Following are samples of assessment questions:
Assess faculty members’ responses to the
instrumentation. Following are samples of as- • Are there incentives for the use of an LMS?
sessment questions: • Which incentives are there for the use of
an LMS?
• Do the faculty know which resources are • Do the incentives match the needs and ex-
needed? pectations of faculty?
• Do the faculty know when the resources • Are the incentives material, such as salary
are available? or other compensation?
• Do the faculty know where the resources • Are the incentives symbolic, such as
are available? awards?
• Do the faculty know how to get access • Do the incentives acknowledge the profes-
to the resources, that is, locations, log in, sionalism of the faculty?
passwords, etc.? • Does competence in LMS use contribute to
• Do the faculty schedules allow for access- faculty promotion and tenure?
ing the resources? • Are conditions made available that pro-
• Do the faculty know how to use the mote faculty members’ internal motivation
resources? for the pursuit of competence?
• Do the faculty know how to access instruc- • In summary, it needs to be established
tion for the use of the resources? ◦◦ Whether incentives are available to
• Do the faculty learn from the instruction? faculty for LMS use
• In summary, it needs to be established ◦◦ Whether the incentives are
◦◦ Whether the faculty know what re- appropriate.
sources are needed Internal Motivation
◦◦ Whether the faculty know how the re-
sources are available

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Planning for Technology Integration

Assess the faculty members’ responses to Instrumentation Deficiency

incentives rewarding competence in the use an The institutional assessment may reveal that
LMS. Recall that it is characteristic of human there is an LMS license, but few of the faculty
nature that an appropriate incentive be given in have been exposed to it or have been instructed
order for a person to accept it. in its use. Deficiencies in this case are the lack
Following are samples of assessment ques- of familiarity with and knowledge and skill in
tions: the use of the LMS for instruction. The need to
be addressed would be the understanding and the
• Are the incentives appropriate, that is, do skill sets of the faculty.
they motivate the faculty to pursue compe-
tence in using the LMS? Motivation Deficiency
• Is internal motivation encouraged? The institutional assessment may reveal that there
are not any incentives provided to encourage and
In summary, it needs to be established maintain the use of the LMS. The faculty mem-
bers who have integrated it into instruction are
• Whether faculty respond to the incentives. largely early adopters who respond to their own
personal incentives who would attempt to use the
3. Repair the Areas of Deficiency LMS regardless of an institutional common plan.
The examples of deficits are generalized and
Communication Deficiency there will be nuanced versions of them in the or-
The model suggests the most important dimensions ganizational assessment. Predictable deficiencies
that contribute to competence. Once they have been are in the areas of faculty capacity and knowledge
defined and identified in an organization, the next step and in institutional incentives in respect of the
is to determine the status of whether the dimensions integration of technology. Because these two areas
are meeting the expectations for competence. If, for of deficiency are the most likely to occur, strate-
instance, the institution has formulated a statement gies for addressing them are suggested.
about the use of an LMS but demonstrates limited
communication of it as evidenced by the absence of Part B: Professional Development—
principal communication media for the campus such Provide Instruction
as its Web site, internal e-mail or print publication,
communication through the chain of command, When your organizational assessment reveals that
etc. and if a survey of employees, particularly the the area of deficiency is capacity, it may be that
faculty, reveals that there is a little awareness of the training for professional development is appropri-
institutional view, then there is a deficit of some sort. ate. Consider the technology that you are target-
From this deficit it can be inferred that there may ing, LMS in a matrix of two dimensions: degree
not be enough communication, or that the media of importance and level of skill among faculty.
are ineffective, or that the intended audience, the See Figure 1. The quadrant of interest is the
faculty, does not respond to the media. It is impos- intersection of high importance and low skills.
sible to expect that there would be action taken or This may be evidence for the need for instruction.
understanding of a communication if attention is If there were high importance and high related
not paid to it. The action of identifying deficits in skills, then it is unlikely that instruction would
expectations and then correcting them is the essential satisfy the deficit determined by the organizational
process for enabling the conditions necessary for assessment.
competence in the use of an LMS.

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 Planning for Technology Integration

Figure 1. A need for training indicated

The deficiency between the importance of the ficiencies such as the need for instruction among
skills needed and the actual skills available il- faculty. The assessment should also have revealed
lustrates a situation predicted by Rossett’s (1987) the level of instruction needed.
initiators of training needs assessments—the use
of an LMS may be a “new system or technology” Design Instruction
for those faculty with low skills in the integration
of the highly important use of LMS. When there What do the faculty need to learn? What are your
is a need for instruction, follow an instructional expected outcomes for the instruction?
design model even though the learners are fac- Understand your students and their needs
ulty members. In this case, you can develop and plan to meet them. Plan “faculty-as-learner
“faculty-as-learner centered instruction.” centered” instruction: What do you need to know
about your faculty-students?
An Instructional Design Model To guide your design process focus on the
factors affecting learning suggested by Bransford
Consider preparation for teaching faculty as (1979). These factors will be used twice in your
planning for instruction—follow an instructional planning; once for planning the instruction of your
design model to guide your instructional planning. students. The second time will be as the content
ADDIE is a model with most of the elements of the instruction your faculty-students will learn.
which are found in other instructional design The factors are the learners’ characteristics; the
models as well as in research and planning mod- media of instruction, the method of instruction,
els. The acronym stands for Assessment, Design, and assessment of learning.
Develop, Implement, and Evaluate (Molenda,
2003; Schrock, 1991) Learner Characteristics

Assessment Who are faculty?

What are their needs?
How do you know instruction is needed? How do they respond to technology?
The organizational assessment that was done Some characteristics of academic faculty in-
within the parameters of the model of human clude the love of and the pursuit of learning and
competence resulted in the identification of de- recognition for one’s intellect. Find other traits

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that would be relevant to your instruction of them. Are your faculty-students learning what you
Faculty response to the use of technology may and they expected? Is your instruction success-
not be the same as the general public because ful? A much used and useful assessment of your
faculty members are increasingly confronted with instruction is the Small Group Instructional Di-
technology in their work. As a result, they would agnosis (Clark & Redmond, 1982).
have more opportunities and direct experience to There are three questions:
form opinions about technology.
1. What did you like about the instruction?
Media 2. What should have been excluded from the
instruction?
Which media are appropriate? 3. What should have been included in the
Because one of the subjects being taught would instruction?
be the use of an LMS, the system itself ought to Content
be used directly in instruction. Faculty as highly What will they learn?
intelligent, adult learners ought to respond well to
the medium of instruction being the same as the The subject of the instruction for the faculty
subject of instruction. There is a double lesson in is the knowledge and skills necessary for using
this instruction in that if the media are used well the LMS. In order to achieve integration of the
to demonstrate how technology can facilitate LMS, the faculty-students also need to learn about
media, then the point needs to be made that that the factors affecting learning to help plan their
is the eventual goal. instruction. Just as the planner for technology
integration follows an instructional design model
Method and the factors affecting learning, faculty need to
know about the factors affecting learning for their
What will the learners need to do during instruc- students. They need to know the characteristics
tion? of their students, the ones that will cause them to
In the basis for Bransford’s original work, modify or target their instruction such as students’
the term used was orienting task. This refers to reading ability. There may be needs to keep in mind
the activity that the learner performed in order to such as the familiarity with the native language
learn the point of the instruction. This could be a of instruction.
method. Would the presentation and practice of The faculty-students need to know which me-
information be orchestrated for the learners’ dis- dia work well with the subjects they are teaching
covery or would it be provided by the instructor and with the needs of their students. They need
or other source of information? For this group of to know which methods work well with their
adult learners, experience has shown that non- students and with the media they use. They also
embarrassing actual or “hands on” practice in need to know which assessments are informative
very small groups is appreciated. and instructive.

Assessment Part C: Motivation: Select a Strategy

How will you and the students know they are It is necessary to create the conditions for which
learning? technology can be integrated. To select your strat-
egy, determine the relative novelty for technol-

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 Planning for Technology Integration

ogy use at the institution. The assessment of the believe that the constituent groups expect it of
institution using the competence model ought to them. It supports the need for excellent commu-
reveal the relative novelty of the technology being nication. They need to know that students expect
integrated. Is the use of an LMS something new LMS in instruction. Students can be surveyed to
and unfamiliar or is it common knowledge and know their minds on the matter. Faculty need to
there is much experience in the use of it? There are know that administration expects them to use LMS.
two principal organizational strategies to employ This coincides with the prediction of the model
based on the relative novelty. At an institution of human competence discussed above. Faculty
where the use of technology is novel, motivate need to know that their colleagues and learned
with the goal that there is much awareness, much societies expect them to use LMS. These groups
interest, much familiarity: use subjective norms, are the support system of faculty; they are the
create dependencies, and create infrastructure. peers and colleagues with whom faculty identify.
Where technology use is typical and not novel,
manage use per institutional needs. Identify ex- Create Dependencies
pectations, plan staffing and curricula accordingly. and Infrastructure
At such institutions, technology is integrated and
the strategic goal is to maintain the integration One knows that one is responding to a dependency
through management of it. for technology when a task cannot be accomplished
without it, or the completion of a task would
Technology Integration as Novel be done differently than typically expected. An
example of this is the cessation of departmental
For an institution where technology is new, the memos on paper; memos will only be posted online
goals are widespread awareness building and moti- via e-mail or perhaps via an LMS. New course
vation. The strategies are to use subjective norms, offerings will be availed if they are conducted as
create dependencies, and create infrastructure. hybrids with some percentage of them requiring
online LMS instruction; otherwise, the courses are
Subjective Norms not run. Many occurrences exist in professional
and personal life including the upgrading of tech-
A series of studies (Marcinkiewicz, 1996, nical services, price changes for needed services,
1995/1995, 1995, 1993/1994) revealed that the etc. The creation of dependencies is not a goal,
most predictive personological variable of teach- but rather a strategy that provides the incentive
ers’ use of instructional computing was subjective of completion of a necessary task. The tasks to be
norms. Subjective norms refers to the perception performed ought to be a part of the infrastructure
that teachers use technology because they believe of an institution. An example of the complete
that significant constituents expect them to use use of an LMS as a part of the infrastructure of
technology. They use technology because they an institution is an LMS for an online degree. In
believe that students, administrators, learned this instance, completion of the degree is made
societies, and their colleagues expect them to. It possible or required by the use of an LMS because
is similar to “peer pressure” in that the incentive it is a fundamental part of the infrastructure of
is meeting the perceived expectations of others. the institution offering the degree. Make the use
Subjective norms are operationalized by commu- of the technology necessary for the performance
nicating the expectations to faculty. The research of activities that are parts of the infrastructure.
has shown that faculty will use technology if they

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Planning for Technology Integration

Technology Integration as Mature REFERENCES

An institution that can post employment an- Bransford, J. D. (1979). Human cognition: Learn-
nouncements for faculty requiring knowledge ing, understanding and remembering (pp. 6-9).
and experience in the use of LMS demonstrates Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing.
maturity in the integration of technology for in- Chevalier, R. (2003, May/June). Updating the
struction. Under such conditions, an institution behavior engineering model. Performance Im-
has defined technology and its expectations for provement, 42(5). doi:10.1002/pfi.4930420504
its use; faculty, staff, students, and administra-
tion accept and expect the use of the technology. Clark, D., & Redmond, M. (1982). Small group
There is sufficient instrumentation available and instructional diagnosis: Final report. University
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Gilbert, T. F. (1978). Human competence: Engi-
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Marcinkiewicz, H. R. (1994/95). Differences
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SUMMARY
Education, 27(2), 184–197.
The purpose of this set of processes is to guide Marcinkiewicz, H. R., & Regstad, N. G. (1996).
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Marcinkiewicz, H. R., & Wittman, T. K. (1995).
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Shrock, S. (1991). A brief history of instructional Learning Management System (LMS): A

development. In G. Anglin (Ed.), Instructional set of online processes focused on instruction that
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Englewood, CO: Libraries Unlimited, Inc. Subjective Norms: The personal belief that
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in a certain way. The belief influences one to
behave that way.
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Technology: The materials, processes, or tools
Dependency: The need for using technology used to solve problems.
in order to complete one’s work.
Integration: The condition in which tech-
nology is used in instruction so that without it
instruction would not be possible as intended.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Technology Project Management, Planning, and Operations,
edited by Terry T. Kidd, pp. 385-396, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 219

Chapter 2.2
Bringing Reality into
the Classroom
Antonio Santos
Universidad de las Americas Puebla, Mexico

ABSTRACT in problem solving activities and then present

their solutions using a computer application as
Researchers and practitioners have been advo- a cognitive tool. The chapter discusses literature
cating that the nature of learning is contextually related with the development of situated learn-
situated, and that this should be reflected in the ing environments, proposes a methodology for
development of learning experiences designed facilitating context-dependent knowledge build-
to acquire knowledge. However, learning ex- ing, and describes a case where the methodology
periences are still being developed as mere was used and evaluated.
one-dimensional processes aimed to move, from
the teacher into the student, pure autonomous
pieces of content that are stripped from all their INTRODUCTION
contextual and cultural information. The purpose
of this manuscript is to propose a methodology For more than a decade, researchers and practi-
to allow instructional designers and teachers to tioners have been advocating that the nature of
encompass the complexities of reality so that they learning is contextually situated, and that this
can bring it pedagogically into their classrooms to should be reflected in the development of learn-
build meaningful authentic learning experiences. ing experiences designed to acquire knowledge.
This methodology permits students to first engage However, in spite of all the evidence gathered so far
about the importance of understanding the process
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch202
of human learning as intrinsically linked to context

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Bringing Reality into the Classroom

and culture (Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989) and possible future transfer of that knowledge to their
indistinct from acting (Maturana & Varela, 1998), “real life.” Nevertheless, in higher education, stu-
learning experiences are still being developed as dents that are finishing their degrees always worry
mere one-dimensional processes aimed to move, about not having cleared the relationship between
from the teacher into the student, pure autonomous what they learned and the practical nature of their
pieces of content that are stripped from all their upcoming jobs. In general, it can be said that stu-
contextual and cultural information. dents do not relate what they learn to the contexts
According to the constructivist perspective, and cultures where they are supposed to use that
this linear, cause-and-effect understanding of the knowledge because it is context-independent and
learning process is used because knowledge, the lacks the components that are necessary to link
product of learning, is wrongly conceptualized as it to real life situations (See Figure 1); they only
an object that can be transferred from some form relate what they are learning to the very school’s
of repository to a human mind. Thus, knowledge is traditional didactic culture (Brown et al., 1989). In
confounded with information and content. More- a few words, students receive, memorize, repeat,
over, information and content are also incorrectly move to the next grade, and forget.
understood as being independent of the contexts Some causes that could explain why educa-
and cultures in which they were developed and tional institutions remain in the didactic teaching
used. Consequently, human knowing and learning and learning paradigm are:
are equated with the basic acts of being exposed
to, and storing, independent entities of informa- 1. Accepting the constructivist notion that
tion and content. knowledge, learning, and content do not exist
The consequence of educating students this in a vacuum and that they are always context
way is that they end up with rather big amounts related entails profound changes to the school
of inert decontextualized knowledge, which they as a whole because, in essence, this posture
do not know what to do with, besides using it to represents a new paradigm. In consequence,
move forward in the school system that has given it “…requires more of a paradigm shift in
them this kind of knowledge. During their school educational practice than most institutions
years, basic education learners memorize content are ready to accommodate.” (Jonassen &
as if they did not have to do anything with it be- Carr, 2000, p. 166). It is not just a matter of
sides answering a test. They, more or less, accept using a new group of teaching strategies, it
as an act of faith their teachers’ promise about the means innovating in several of the schools’

Figure 1. Knowledge is built as context-independent

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Bringing Reality into the Classroom

basic educational processes such as cur- they can potentially apply those meanings. In other
riculum design, teachers training, learning words, I will try to describe a methodology to, on
assessment, relationships with parents, and the one hand, “bring reality into the classroom,”
most importantly, classroom environment. and, on the other, facilitate for students the process
The basic teaching and learning process has of transferring the newly constructed knowledge
to change profoundly because, as Miettinen back to “reality.”
(1999) states, to incorporate content context On this subject, some important questions that
into the classroom the didactic model of have been addressed by researchers are:
teaching needs to be broken.
2. Even when some schools are opened to this 1. How can we analyze and comprehend the
new view of learning, they do not take ac- complex real-life situations, where human
tion because they still do not know how to knowledge is created, together with their
manage the different educational processes contexts of activities and cultures? (See
that emerge under this new paradigm. That Leontev’s studies, for example Leontev,
is, under the traditional paradigm, adminis- 1978; Engeström, Miettinen, & Punamäki,
trators clearly understand the orderly cause 1999; Brown & Duguid, 2000; and the spe-
and effect model of pre-stating objectives, cial section of volume 45, number 2, 2005
identifying instructional strategies to teach of the Educational Technology Magazine,
them, and assessing if, what was stated in which was dedicated to cultural studies in
the objectives, was or not achieved. A linear instructional design).
model like this facilitates the control and 2. How can we bring those complex real-life
supervision of what is going on inside the situations into the classroom so that our
classroom and allows to account for its re- students can live meaningful authentic learn-
sults. We could say that, at the organizational ing experiences? (See the literature around
level, there is not a situated learning model the design of learning environments, for
for administering an educational institution. example: Cognition & Technology Group
3. There are few instructional design models at Vanderbilt, 1993; Campbell & Monson,
for creating learning activities under this 1994; Jonassen, 1999; Jonassen & Rohrer-
different paradigm, and the ones that have Murphy, 1999; Wilson, 1996).
been developed have not been sufficiently 3. How can this type of knowledge construc-
tried and researched to be proven practical. tion be evaluated, that is, how can we assess
how knowledge is being actually constructed
The purpose of this manuscript is to further ex- inside the students’ heads? About this par-
plore and add to the solution of the third identified ticular aspect, although most of the authors
cause. That is, based on several years of applying cited in the previous questions also address
constructivist theory on my teaching and research evaluation issues, assessing this type of
projects, I will propose a methodology to allow learning becomes complicated because it
instructional designers and teachers to encompass requires a qualitative orientation. In this
the complexities of reality so that they can bring line, as part of the proposed methodology,
it pedagogically into their classrooms to build this article will discuss an innovative way
meaningful authentic learning experiences. The to assess student’s learning.
aim is to describe how to contextualize content
so that students can actively build and negotiate The first two questions have been well ad-
meanings and link them to environments where dressed by Leontev’s activity theory and Jonas-

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sen’s model for constructive learning environ- BACKGROUND

ments design. However, to further explore how
we can bring complex real-life situations into the Situated Cognition
classroom and to address the evaluation issue, this
article will suggest a methodology, which can be The idea that knowledge, learning, and content
used by teachers and/or instructional designers are contextually situated can be traced to several
when they are developing a problem-based learn- theoretical endeavors, for example Bednar, Cun-
ing environment. This methodology permits stu- ningham, Duffy, and Perry, 1992; Brown et al.,
dents to first engage in problem solving activities 1989, 2000; Greeno, 1998; Lave and Wenger,
and then present their solutions using a computer 1991; and Wenger, 1998. In their seminal situated
application as a cognitive tool. The software used cognition model, Brown et al. (1989) stated that
during this study was developed by the local knowledge that is being built in the present mo-
software company Jacarandas Software (www. ment is in part a product of the interdependency
jacarandas.com), which specializes in educational of the actual activity, the information and tools
software. The software is commercially registered used, and their context and cultural underpinnings.
as HiperVideo Studio®, and it basically allows Thus, students not only learn about concepts and
students to display a produced video and stops it the use of tools, but also about the context and
at selected points where they believe that more cultures where those concepts and tools were de-
information should be given to further explain their veloped and used. Furthermore, the authors state
ideas (see Figure 2). The idea is that by indexing that “All knowledge is, we believe, like language.
the context depicted in a video, students bring out Its constituent parts index the world…” (Brown
their mental representations of the learned content. et al., 1989, p. 22). That is, the constituent parts
The rest of this article is organized in three of the knowledge that is built during a learning
sections. The first discusses literature related to experience are linked to both the context where it
the constructivism paradigm and its implications is learned and to the context where the informa-
for the development of situated learning environ- tion that is being learned was developed by other
ments. The second section takes into account the human beings.
ideas of section one and proposes a methodology Therefore, a learning experience designed to
for facilitating context-dependent knowledge facilitate the construction of context-dependent
building. Finally, the third section will present a knowledge by students must also include contex-
case where the methodology was used and tual elements from the context where the informa-
evaluated. tion was originally produced. This way, students

Figure 2. A film analogy to what students can do with the HiperVideo Studio® software

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establish explicit links or indexes between their to include context information. This perspective
constructed knowledge and the content’s con- understands teaching and learning systemically;
text; which, in turn, facilitates transferring back that is, not as a systematic linear cause-and-effect
knowledge to the students’ everyday problematic process. Thus, if one wants to include contextual
situations (see Figure 3). information in a learning environment, it is better to
These ideas are important for the purpose of have a holistic conception of the learning process to
this article because based on the notion that our encompass all relationships and interconnections
built knowledge, like language, indexes, or points (Carr, 1996) that naturally happen in a complex
to certain elements of our life situations, the pro- human learning activity. Once a teacher has se-
posed methodology will ask students to index a lected a subset of information as content (not all
video produced by them depicting a certain situ- information is content, but all content is informa-
ation by sticking pins, metaphorically speaking, tion), he or she needs to develop a contextual type
with their ideas attached to them. These ideas can of learning and to deeply understand the context
be presented in several formats (i.e., as text, as where that information was produced. Generally
images, or as audio using other software applica- speaking, information is produced by a group of
tions like a PowerPoint slide presentation, an people acting as a community with a common
Excel graph, or a Web page (see Figure 2)). These interest and purpose. These groups can interact
indexes are context-dependent because they are informally, like a stamp collecting club or very
directly related to a certain time and place as formally like a group of professionals interacting
shown in the video. Students decide at which point together to build the bodies of knowledge that
to stick a pin and how to further explain their define a certain discipline.
ideas, that is, they can show an image, a graph, Consequently, to include contextual informa-
or a piece of text. In this way, they are explaining tion related to the group of persons that developed
to the world their inner understanding of certain the content to be learned as part of the whole
content. learning experience, a teacher needs to analyze
that group’s complex real-life situations and set-
tings. Above all, the teacher must analyze their
USING ACTIVITY THEORY systems of activities because that is where their
AS A FRAMEWORK knowledge is created. To this end, although useful
methods for cultural and contextual analysis are
As discussed so far, situated learning theories pro- still a concern for research (Quek & Shah, 2004),
pose that knowledge is context-dependent and that several investigators are proposing, in tune with the
learning experiences must be multi-dimensional socio-constructivist epistemology, to use activity

Figure 3. Knowledge is context-dependent

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 Bringing Reality into the Classroom

theory as an appropriate socio-cultural frame- to perform their specific actions, which, in turn,
work for analyzing human community systems “shape the way people act and think.” (Jonassen
(Engeström et al., 1999; Jonassen, 1999; Jonassen et al., 1999).
et al., 1999; Johri, 2005; Quek et al., 2004; Wilson, To encompass community actions and to see
2005). The strength of activity theory lies in the the process more as a collective activity system,
fact that it offers a systemic perspective to analyze Engeström et al. (1999, 2002) depicts these tri-
complex human systems of activities. angular relationships graphically as shown in
Activity theory was developed by Russian Figure 5. The dynamics in this basic model states
psychologists Leontev, Luria, and Vygotsky. It is that through the recursive activity of a subject, or
based on the principles of dialectical and histori- a team of subjects, who belong to a community
cal materialism, which Vygotsky used to analyze whose activities are mediated through rules of
the historical development of social activity and relationship and division of labor, the object is
how it shapes and is shaped by changes in human transformed and projected into a broader final
consciousness (Vygotsky, 1982). Jonassen et al. outcome. In addition, the subjects’ activities are
(1999) state that activity theory “is a powerful organized hierarchically, according to Leontev
socio-cultural and socio-historical lens through (1978), in actions and operations.
which we can analyze most forms of human Thus, in order for teachers to apply activity
activity.” (p. 62). theory to understand the activities that character-
Traditionally, linear cause-and-effect proposi- ize the everyday actions of a particular group of
tions are established to understand actions, for professionals, they can apply several data collec-
example, if teachers teach then students learn. tion methods like observations, interviews, ques-
Alternatively, activity theory proposes triangular tionnaires, analysis of documents, etc. For ex-
relationships, a model that is more powerful to ample, to understand the context of social
encompass all the relational complexities of a researchers, a teacher can observe the everyday
human system. This structural model of an ac- actions of those professionals and interview them.
tivity system portrays the dynamic relationship Some of the tasks are identifying the profes-
between a subject, the object of his activity and sional goals that this group of professionals is
the mediating tools employed during the activity, traditionally pursuing, clarifying the inner motives
such as symbol systems, methods, and instruments that drive these individuals to perform as members
(see Figure 4). It is in this Vygotskyan idea of of that profession, and identifying the types of
mediation that the context information is included products that this group of professionals obtains
because different cultures choose different tools as the result of doing their activities.

Figure 4. Activity system Figure 5. Collective activity system

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Jonassen et al. (1999) present and discuss six mindtools as computer software applications
steps to use activity theory as a flexible framework that “…enable learners to think in ways that they
for analyzing a certain system of human activities. otherwise would not and could not” (p. 167) and
The data can then be used to design the components that “…scaffold different kinds of thinking and
that a constructive learning environment should knowledge representation” (p. 167).
have. The first step explains the purpose, motives, This concept of cognitive tool is relevant to
and goals of the activity system; the second clari- the methodology proposed in this article because
fies the components of the activity system; that is, students, going through the problem-solving pro-
the subject, object, community, rules, and division cess inside the learning environment developed
of labor; the third step analyzes the structure of all by the teacher, are asked to produce a program
the activities that are done by subjects; the fourth using the HiperVideo Studio software to argue
analyzes all the tools and mediators used by the in support of their selected problem solution by
activity system; the fifth analyzes the context explaining and justifying their selection.
within which activities take place; and the sixth The HyperVideo Studio software is considered
links the outcomes of the previous steps to clarify a cognitive tool because it enables learners to
the activity system dynamics. capture in video a piece of a real life situation and
relate it to their inner process of meaning construc-
tion. Learners engage in higher-order thinking by
THE CONCEPT OF COGNITIVE TOOL deciding in which parts of the video to put indexes
to further explain how they understand the learn-
The concept of tool is substantial in socio-con- ing environment content. When they present their
structivist notions. To further understand it, it is produced programs to the rest of the class, they
important to bring into consideration Vygotsky’s engage in metacognitive thinking by identifying
theory of mediated activity, an essential part of their own knowledge production process.
activity theory, which argues that “all purposeful The set of indexes placed in the video by the
human activity is accomplished through the use students are context-dependent because they are
of physical and/or psychological tools…by the related to the context shown in the video. The
subject in order to achieve the object” (Quek et set constitutes in itself a network or a map that
al., 2004). In this sense, tools are not just con- shows what is in the student’s head and explains
ceptualized as mere physical extensions of the how he or she sees the world in relation to his or
subject to increase his or her physical strength her (the knower’s) understanding of the content.
like a hammer or a screwdriver; they are under-
stood as cognitive tools that mediate the subjects’
activities by supporting, guiding, and extending THE PROPOSED METHODOLOGY
their thinking processes (Derry, 1990, discussed
by Jonassen et al., 2000). Jonassen (1996) calls Based on the ideas discussed in the previous sec-
this type of tools mindtools (i.e., knowledge con- tion, in this one, the instructional methodology for
struction tools that students learn with, not from bringing reality into the classroom is presented
or about). He defines them as “computer-based and discussed in more detail. For the purposes
tools and learning environments that have been of this article, a methodology is conceptualized
adapted or developed to function as intellectual as an organized body of pedagogical strategies.
partners with the learner in order to engage and According to the socio-constructivist base of this
facilitate critical thinking and higher-order learn- methodology, the pedagogical strategies discussed
ing” (p. 9). Also, Jonassen et al. (2000) refer to in this section are not only related to the teaching

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aspects of the process, but they also incorporate that characterize the everyday actions of a
collaborative actions, including thinking done by particular group of professionals.
instructional designers, teachers, and students.
The pedagogical strategies are categorized (see
Figure 6) into three different kinds of strategies: As stated earlier, information and content are
(1) Learning environment development strategies, intrinsically related to the contexts and cultures
where the instructional designer and/or teacher in which they were developed and used. For the
develops problem-based learning environments regular school classroom, this means that most
that replicate a system of activities done by a par- of the content domains to be learned are actu-
ticular group of professionals; (2) Problem solving ally linked to the different activities of a group
engagement strategies, where the teacher and the of professionals. For instance, Cobb, Perlwitz,
students collaborate in the knowledge construction and Underwood-Gregg (1998, p. 73) state that
process and engage in complex problem-based “students who engage in mathematical practices
learning; and (3) Knowledge representation strate- involving conventions, models, and symbolisms
gies, where learners engage in further reflection must necessarily be constructing the taken-as-
by constructing a product to represent what they shared concepts of the mathematics community.”
are learning and show it to the rest of the learning That is, in the learning of mathematics, students
teams. This product is also used by the teacher not only learn the subject matter but also live a
to assess how students understand the learning process of acculturation on what it means to be
environment content. a mathematician or any other profession, which
makes a wide use of the mathematical language
such as physicist or engineer. Also, if we consider
THREE PEDAGOGICAL STRATEGIES that most of what experts do in their professional
contexts is solving problems and not answering
1. Learning environment development strat- exams, as Jonassen (2004) states in the introduc-
egies: These strategies develop a learning tion of one of his books on problem solving, then
environment based on the system of activities a mathematics learning environment must include
conventions, models, and symbolisms used by
mathematicians, physicists or engineers, and al-
low students to engage in solving the traditional
Figure 6. Pedagogical strategies
problems that these professionals face every day.
Accordingly, to initiate the methodology pro-
posed in this section and use activity theory, the
instructional designer and/or the teacher (it is very
common in schools that the instructional designer
and the teacher are the same person) must develop
a constructivist learning environment based on the
system of activities that characterize the everyday
actions of a particular group of professionals. For
example, a learning environment can be based
on the traditional activities of the community of
historians that gather information about a certain
event and inductively analyze it to identify the

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possible causes that originated it. Another learn- teacher develops a learning environment based
ing environment could be built around the set on the data gathered from that group. The type
of activities that a social researcher performs to of learning environment suggested here has two
phenomenologically understand a certain social characteristics: (1) according to the traditional
context, such as the complex human dynamics of definition of a learning environment, students
a school classroom. Another example would be a should live meaningful, authentic learning activi-
learning environment based on the everyday ac- ties making use of tools and resources to develop
tions that an electronic engineer does when work- the skills to solve problems (Wilson, 1996); and (2)
ing at a steel producing company, like designing in order to facilitate the process of acculturation,
a device to control temperature. the environment should also simulate the type of
Once the activity system of a particular group problem solving activities that a community of
of professionals has been identified using activity professionals face everyday. Both characteristics
theory (See Table 1 as an example), the methodol- are suggested because knowledge construction
ogy recommended in this section suggests that the is both understood as “a person’s meanings con-

Table 1. Components of the community of social researchers’ activity system

Community: Educational researchers working in social sciences (scholars, academics, social workers)
Purpose of their activity: Develop research projects towards the building of theory frameworks to better understand
the social phenomena
Subjects: Educational researchers working under the qualitative paradigm
Purpose of their activity: apply qualitative research methodology to understand, from the participants’ perspective,
relationships among different people, meanings, events and contexts related to education
Tools: Theoretical models and concepts, research methodologies, terminology, communication systems,
computers, software, video, and audio equipment, etc.
Rules: Research is done according to the norms accepted by the international community of researchers.
Research must be done with scientific rigor.
Research is done based on postulates of a research paradigm.
Qualitative research is based on the postulates of the phenomenological posture.
Research questions should match the used methodology.
Research is done based in a theoretical frame of reference.
Always cite ideas taken from other researchers.
Division of labor: Directors of the whole research project
General advisors
Designers of research instruments like interview and observant guides.
Producers of research materials
Field workers
Object: Research projects
Outcome: New educational theory
The research project implemented, presented in a report, conference, and publication
Actions: Read cutting edge literature in their field of education
Identify problems and solutions in education and argument to convince others
Select research methodologies
Design and implement research studies to better understand the educational phenomena and to create theory
Writing academic papers to disseminate findings in scientific journals and conferences
Teach younger researchers
Operations: Filling out research proposals for funding
Design research instruments
Do field work, gather data
Analyze data to find patterns
Write research reports

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structed by interaction with one’s environment” vices using a computer. Phenomenaria is an area
and as “enculturation or adoption of a group’s that a learning environment should have where
ways of seeing and acting” (Wilson, 1996, p. 4). students can go to explore and test their hypoth-
Perkins (1992) proposes that a learning envi- eses. Examples include laboratory equipment,
ronment should have five facets: Information complex computational simulators, microworlds,
banks, symbol pads, construction kits, phenom- etc. Finally, task managers are components of a
enaria, and task managers. Information banks are learning environment that set the tasks that should
warehouses of information resources from which be accomplished by the students, and provide
both teacher and students select the learning en- feedback and guidance. The obvious example of
vironment’s content. These can be textbooks, a task manager is the teacher, and also textbooks
electronic encyclopedias, the Internet, etc. Sym- and different computational programs.
bol pads are tools that students use to register and As can be seen from the literature discussed so
manipulate symbols and language; examples far, the development of a constructivist learning
include notebooks (paper and electronic), video environment is a rather complex process; how-
cameras, software to create concept maps, draw- ever, the methodology described here represents
ing, and graphing software, etc. Construction kits an effort to simplify it, probably by sacrificing
allow students to build artifacts from prefabri- some of its pedagogical strengths. The intention
cated parts, a classic example is Legos; however, is to make things easier for teachers who do not
a more sophisticated example is the MIT Media have profound instructional design knowledge
Lab’s technology called The Tower (http://gig. (Figure 7 and 8).
media.mit.edu/projects/tower/), which is a an
inexpensive modular development system for 2. Problem solving engagement strategies:
designing and prototyping electronic devices. According to these kinds of strategies, stu-
Other examples of construction kits include dif- dents solve problems presented in the learn-
ferent types of software that allow students to ing environment. Once the teacher gathered
create computational programs to control de- information regarding a group of profes-

Figure 7. The HiperVideo Studio® software editor

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Figure 8. The HiperVideo Studio® software Presenter

sionals and used it to develop a learning ◦◦ Students then insert pins at certain
environment, he or she lets the students points in the video to stop it while
freely interact inside the learning environ- they are showing it so they can pres-
ment so that they can build their own mean- ent more information about particular
ings about the environment subject matter. ideas at those points. This is done by
3. Knowledge representation strategies: using the tools available on the right
Students here develop a program with side of the screen (see Figure 7).
Hyper Video Studio software to crystallize ◦◦ Finally, each team of students pres-
their knowledge construction. As part of the ents their products to the rest of the
activities suggested by the learning environ- class. To do this, learners use the pre-
ment, learners are asked to collaboratively senter part of the software (see Figure
or individually produce a program using 8). As can be seen, the left part of the
the Hyper Video Studio software. To do it screen shows the video running. Then
students: the video stops at certain points, dur-
◦◦ Shoot a video that they decide is re- ing which the right side presents the
lated with the solution they selected extra information that students devel-
to the learning environment’s central oped to further explain their ideas.
problem. Students decide what to
shoot and what not to; through this This part of the suggested methodology has
action, they are already showing part two objectives: (1) to evaluate how students built
of their inner understanding of the their inner conceptual map (to this end a rubric
content. can be used to assess students’ products, which
◦◦ The video is incorporated into the can then be compared to evaluate how different
software so that it can be indexed. To teams of learners understood the subject matter);
do it the students use the editor part of and (2) to allow students to engage in metacogni-
the software (see Figure 7). tive thinking processes (i.e., when they make a

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presentation for the rest of the class and justify Learning Environment Development
their solution by arguing (providing evidences
and explanations) in support of their ideas, they According to the three discussed pedagogical strat-
are also overtly reflecting about their learning egies and to the course objectives, the components
process, which increases their learning). of the system of activity were identified in the first
All the time that students are building their place. These components included typical actions
programs with the use of the HiperVideo software, and operations of the community of researchers
they are engaged in both cognitive and metacog- working in social sciences (see Table 1).
nitive thinking. In fact, when indexing they are With the data gathered about the system of
going through a deep process of reflective analysis, activities of the researchers’ community, a learning
and when they present their programs and explain environment was developed around one of their
them loudly to the rest of the group, they engage professional activities: doing fieldwork using
in another level of reflection. Thus, although this participant observation. The environment central
experience allows them to concretize what they problem and its context were created around an
learned interacting in the learning environment, imaginary school. Its main learning goal was
it should be considered as an integral part of the that students comprehended the philosophical
whole learning environment. In fact, this is a underpinnings of the qualitative data gathering
clear example where learning and evaluation are method called participant observation.
merged into the same practice, according to the The learning environment was built using as its
constructivist concept of evaluation. context problem an imaginary high school called
Escuela Benito Juárez. Students could relate to
the school downloading a couple of text files
TWO CASES DESCRIPTION from the course’s Web page, which thoroughly
described the school and the problem that students
The methodology described in this article is still a were supposed to solve; the problem stated that
prototype. Research projects to further examine it the school’s mathematical scores were among
are on their way. Here, two cases will be presented the lowest in the nation, according to a national
mostly to clarify more the methodology to the standardized test.
reader. The results discussed in this section rep-
resent part of the groundwork needed to develop Problem Solving Engagement
more complex research projects. and Knowledge Representation

Case 1 The learning experience consisted of three weekly

face-to-face periods of two and a half hours each
The methodology was applied in a group of 12 and of the tasks that students did as homework.
students that were participating in an undergradu- The first class began with an explanation of the
ate course about qualitative research methodology; learning goal. Then the school was described
the course belongs to an education program of- and the problem was explained. Students were
fered by a private university in the area of Puebla, divided in three teams. They were told that they
Mexico. Participants were all women with a rather should imagine that they were doing educational
high degree of technology literacy. practices in the school. The teacher told them that
one day, when they were at the school, the school’s
principal informed them about the problem related

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to the low mathematical scores and how he did Results

not know what to do about it. They were also told
that they had advised the principal about using Judging from the learners’ diaries and from the
qualitative methodology to better understand type of advice that they asked for during the first
what was going on inside the classrooms and that week, it was clear that the time was dedicated to
the principal had answered that he did not really solve the technical difficulties that they encoun-
believe in the qualitative paradigm, but that he tered learning to use the software, for example,
was willing to attend a presentation where they how to shoot and edit the video in digital format
could explain it to him. and how to insert it into the HiperVideo environ-
The objective for this first class period was ment. During this first week, it was not explicit
that students identified from the start of the learn- if the teams were also reading about participant
ing process that they were being asked to solve observation. For the second week, students had
the problem and produce a program using the solved most of the technicalities about the use of
HiperVideo to present their solutions. It was also the software; however, it was clear that the vid-
explained to them that to complete both tasks, eos they were producing were not clearly related
they could read about participant observation in with the subject matter. To correct this situation,
the materials selected for them by the teacher. the teacher explained to the group how to do a
Subsequently, a general and basic explanation video storyboard on paper. This helped students
of the HiperVideo Studio software was given to to pre-visualize their videos and to realize the
the students and each working team installed the need to make them more content related. Also, the
software in their laptops so that they could prac- teacher strongly emphasized the need to read the
tice and ask questions about how to use it. The observant participation materials. All the teams
first two and a half hour period was dedicated answered that they were already reading them.
to explaining the problems and letting students In the third week, the teams finally presented
become familiar with the software. their programs. The teacher and the assistant reg-
During all this process, a research assistant istered the process in the field diary. Later, using
was present taking notes in a field diary for fur- the constant comparison method of data analysis,
ther qualitative analysis, describing how each some interesting results were found.
team collaboratively learned to use the software. Most teams produced videos depicting real
Students were given a two-week period to finish classroom activities and one team made an enact-
the task and were told that they should make a ment of an actual classroom showing a teacher
presentation for the rest of the class and the teacher with his students. As expected, students showed
acting as the principal. classroom contexts with the video, but when they
Students were also told that they should send inserted an index to stop the video, most of the
an e-mail after each class period with a diary times they explained why they did it using text
explaining how they were learning. These dia- in the right part of the software screen. Even
ries were also analyzed as part of the evaluation when they used audio files at the pinpoints, they
strategy. To evaluate the student’s presentations, were their own recorded voices. The team that
the teacher and the research assistant took notes performed the classroom enactment used most
of the whole process. Originally, it was intended of its indexes in the video to show text balloons
to use a rubric, but it was not ready by the time explaining the characters’ thoughts.
of the study. It can be concluded that students participat-
ing in this small study accepted to use the video

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 Bringing Reality into the Classroom

images for analogical communication, but used the fact that this was the first time that the students
the indexes to explain their ideas using digital were using the HiperVideo software; it can be
communication. This is an interesting result hypothesized that after several experiences, they
because although they could explain their ideas will become experts in knowing where and why
analogically using images or even another video, to index a video at a certain point. Also, better
most of the times they preferred to explain their evaluation instruments are needed to relate the
ideas digitally. This, according to Watzlawick, indexes network to the subject matter.
Bavelas, and Jackson’s (1967) model of human
communication, could be explained because, in Case 2
general, we use analogical communication (non-
verbal) to explain relationships and digital (verbal) The methodology was again applied to a different
for the message’s content. group of the same university as Case 1 to further
A similar result was found in the few cases understand how it can increase the quality of learn-
where students used analogical communication ing of students of different educational levels. The
to explain their indexes. That is, in one case, one group consisted of 2 men and 10 women enrolled
of the teams decided to use a small video showing in an educational technology graduate course.
a child doing homework at an index, but it was In this case, all of the participants had a bigger
not self-explanatory; they had to explain orally level of technology literacy, as compared with the
in great detail what the video meant. In another group in Case 1, and had much more experience
case, a team showed another video at an index in developing educational projects because all of
showing one of them explaining orally something them had teaching experience.
regarding observant participation. In conclusion, In this second case, to obtain more feedback
students relied too much in their oral explanations from the participating students, right after they
and less in what was actually shown. finished the HiperVideo projects, each team
Regarding their comprehension level of the filled out a questionnaire where they were asked
content (i.e., observant participation), it can be to explain in detail how they had developed the
said that they were able to understand its main project. The main purpose of the questionnaire
purpose as a qualitative method. For example, one was to analyze the process that each team fol-
team said that by shooting a video in a classroom, lowed to produce the main video and to decide
they were actually doing participant observation. when and what type of information they would
Another expressed that participant observation insert in each pin.
allows us to be closer to a certain context. When
one of the teams was asked by a classmate after Learning Environment Development
their presentation why they shot that particular
video to explain observant participation, they For this Case 2, Table 2 shows the components
answered that they did it to explain how students of the system of activities of the community of
and their teacher in that classroom were behaving. instructional designers working at educational
However, it was not possible to identify any institutions.
type of pattern in the set of indexes used by each Based on the instructional designers’ activity
team (i.e., the places where teams actually inserted system, a learning environment was developed
their indexes did not give any relevant informa- for the graduate course on educational technol-
tion regarding the students’ understanding of the ogy and loaded to the Web page of the course.
subject matter). This result was probably due to Within the environment, students acting as in-

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Table 2. Components of the community of instructional designers’ activity system

Community: Instructional designers working at educational institutions

Purpose of their activity: Develop and apply instructional theories for instructional planning
Subjects: Instructional designers working as media experts in the public school system
Purpose of their activity: Apply instructional theories for instructional planning to develop
information and communication technology-supported learning environments
Tools: Theoretical models and concepts, research methodologies, project development methodologies, terminology,
communication systems, computers, software, video, and audio equipment, etc.
Rules: Instructional design is done according to the norms accepted by the community of instructional designers.
Instructional design is done applying accepted instructional design models.
Instructional design is done based on expert knowledge and creativity.
Media experts select information and communication technologies (ICT) considering: Learning objectives, char-
acteristics of the learners and the context
The main purpose of a learning environment is not to use ICT, but to increase learning.
Always pilot test the produced products
Division of labor: Instructional designers
Content experts
Media producers
Technicians.
Designers of evaluation instruments.
Object: Instructional plans.
Outcome: Instructional theory
Instructional design models
Learning environments
Actions: Read cutting edge literature in their field of education
Identify learning needs and problems
Manage the process to develop an information and communication technology-supported learning environment
Disseminate results in the institution and in the public school system
Writing academic papers to disseminate findings in scientific journals and conferences
Operations: Receive and discuss learning needs and problems
Apply needs assessment models
Select an instructional design model for planning instruction
Develop instruction
Evaluate results: Interview teachers and students, do participant observation, apply questionnaires, etc.
Design evaluation instruments
Tell every body in the design team what to do.

structional designers and media experts working Problem Solving Engagement

in a public school were asked to solve a problem and Knowledge Representation
presented to them by the school’s administrator.
He explained that the school had just received For Case 2, the learning experience was developed
federal funding to increase the quality of learning during a two and a half week period. During this
using computers in its classrooms. Students re- time, students and teacher interacted face-to-face
ceived reading materials explaining the educa- for a total of 15 hours. Moreover, students, learn-
tional concepts related to using media in schools ing in teams, worked on the project for at least
because the main objective of the learning envi- another 25 hours on their own.
ronment was that students learned to use media Again, as in Case 1, students were told that
as cognitive tools. they should solve the learning problem presented
to them and that they should base their solutions
in the reading materials. They were also told

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 Bringing Reality into the Classroom

that they should use the HiperVideo software to All students are or were working at educational
explain their solutions to the school’s administra- institutions, thus they either videotaped classrooms
tor. Next, the teacher explained the basics of the in the institution where they are students or at the
HiperVideo software and from then on, he acted institutions where they work. Their intention was
as a facilitator asking and answering questions, to shoot real examples of the use of media inside a
supervising, and giving feedback when needed. classroom and then use them at their presentations
To assess the student’s learning process and so that the audience could compare the traditional
presentations, the same methods were used as in uses of media as opposed to using them as cognitive
Case 1. However, in this second case, a question- tools. It is interesting to realize that because they
naire was added; it was designed and applied to could not find real examples of actual teachers
obtain more feedback from the students regard- using media as cognitive tools they decided to
ing their learning experience. We wanted to bet- enact their own, however, they decided to act as
ter understand the students’ thinking processes teachers using media as cognitive tools in a real
when they were developing their presentations classroom with authentic students. One of the
in HiperVideo. The questionnaire asked students teams decided to produce a piece of animation,
to (1) explain in great detail how and why they something that was unexpected and unwanted by
took all the decisions related with the production the researchers. However, it was considered that
of the video; (2) explain why they decided to this team also appealed to their familiar context
stop the video at a certain point and insert a pin; because the characters in the animation represented
and (3) explain, also in great detail, what type real people known by all. These results support
of information they decided to insert in each pin the methodology proposed in this manuscript
and why they chose to use video, text, graphics, because students, by shooting the video in real
audio, etc. to display it. contexts, linked the content to people’s activity
systems interacting in those contexts; in this case,
Results actual classrooms including their teaching and
learning situations.
As happened in Case 1, three of the four teams Inductively analyzing the explanations that the
dedicated their first week to understanding how students gave in the questionnaire regarding why
to use the HiperVideo software and the video they decided to place a pin at a certain place in
equipment. However, one team realized that us- the video, we can say that students first produced
ing the software and equipment was rather easy the main video and then decided where and with
and started right away to solve the instructional what purpose to stop the video. In general, students
technology problem that was posed to them. In reported that they did it to further explain, enrich,
general, the whole group showed higher technol- reinforce, complement, or to make a more careful
ogy literacy than the undergraduate students. This study of what was being shown in the images of
fact allowed them to dedicate much more time to the video. For example, one team was showing a
solve the instructional design problem and thus video of a classroom where a group of students was
were more able to reach the educational objective using a certain type of technology, they stopped
that we were looking for. it and presented in the right part of the interface
According to the data gathered in the ques- an Internet link to a page that explains in detail
tionnaire regarding the production of the video that particular technology.
that was going to be the core of their HiperVideo As expected, and similarly to what was found
presentations, it can be said that all of the teams in Case 1, in many occasions students used text to
went to their familiar contexts to do their shooting. present information, some students reported that

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they decided to use text because: (1) they wanted very satisfied.” Also, this high motivation was
to explain key concepts that were analogically shown by the fact that they stayed rather long
presented in the video portion of the interface. hours working collaboratively, even meeting dur-
As already discussed in Case 1, this further ing weekends to work in their projects.
supports the Watzlawick et al.’s (1967) model
of human communication, which states that we
use analogical communication (non-verbal) to CONCLUSION
explain relationships and digital (verbal) for the
message’s content. In this line, one team said that Most of the critiques made to the constructivist
“we used text because written information allows pedagogy state that it has not been able to modify
students to read it as many times as they need deeply the teaching and learning processes; in
to understand it; also, because when we want to spite of the fact that it has been recognized as a
understand a concept it is more significative to new paradigm in Education. It has been said that
read it than to hear it.”; (2) they wanted to ask the different educational changes move back and forth,
audience to perform a certain task; and (3) they while researchers and academia widely discuss
wanted to elicit reflection processes in the audience them in journals around the world without making
by presenting questions to them. This is a rather any important impact in the classroom. With this
interesting result, which can be explained by the in mind, the main purpose of this article was to
fact that the students were also teachers used to suggest a way to ground one of the most relevant
apply instructional strategies to explain content. ideas of the socio-constructivist paradigm, that is,
Audio was also used in the insertion pins; that human learning is contextually situated. To
however, it was almost always used redundantly this end, a methodology was proposed consisting
just to repeat what was written in text. Neverthe- in several pedagogical strategies including the use
less, in a couple of instances, one team presented of software as a cognitive tool. The methodology
a photograph with an audio clip explaining what proposed in this article can be considered design
it meant; and another presented a video with theory because it can be used as a guide to help
background music. Students reported that they students develop their higher order learning abili-
used audio because: (1) they felt that it is more ties (Reigeluth, 1999). Accordingly, it can become
attractive for students to hear the information and the subject for a larger, formative research project
read it; and (2) they wanted to underscore some as suggested by Reigeluth and Frick (1999).
key aspect of the video by linking a piece of music
to what they are seeing in the video.
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This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 177-197, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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238

Chapter 2.3
Model-Facilitated Learning
Environments:
The Pedagogy of the Design

Glenda Hostetter Shoop

Pennsylvania State University, USA

Patricia A. Nordstrom
Pennsylvania State University, USA

Roy B. Clariana
Pennsylvania State University, USA

ABSTRACT potential, considering the interrelationships be-

tween the learning experience, the technology,
The purpose of this chapter is to discuss how cognition, and other related issues of the learner.
instruction, technology, and models converge
to create online model-facilitated learning envi-
ronments. These instructional environments are CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
designed in such a manner that the interaction with
the model on the computer network is essential to The reader will be able to:
the learning experience. The idea is to use these
models to maximize the pedagogical power that • Discuss models
helps students construct conceptual mental repre- • Describe online model-facilitated learning
sentations that lead to a greater degree of retention • Find evidence that supports decisions to
and overall recall of information. How students design online model-facilitated learning
will act and learn in a particular environment experiences
depends on how the instructional designer creates • Define complex systems and their associa-
the environment that maximizes their learning tion with online model-facilitated learning
• Understand the role of collaboration in the
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch203 design of online model-facilitated learning

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Model-Facilitated Learning Environments

• Consider specific issues and challenges in and computer-based technology. Therefore, we

designing online model-facilitated learn- define online model-facilitated learning as an
ing experiences instructional experience whereby the instructional
materials and resources are managed and run on
a computer system. The system is connected by
INTRODUCTION a network of devices that are used and manipu-
lated by the students to support and enhance their
You are, once again, preparing your lesson plans participation in the learning experience. Students
for a fall semester online science class. For the are placed in experiences that allow them to learn
past two years, your students have expressed with and from other students in a system that uses
problems learning certain scientific principles, a model. The model is the artifact structurally de-
and their opinions have been substantiated in their signed and created to represent or to demonstrate
overall test scores. You are trying to decide how a theoretical construct of a system or some chosen
to revise your instruction to teach some of the phenomenon. The instruction is designed in such
more complex scientific concepts. To your credit, a manner that the interaction with the model on
you are aware of the challenge and are willing to the computer network is essential to the learning
consider alternative instructional methods. You experience. The instructors and students may or
become curious about model-facilitated learning may not be geographically separated.
after reading Hestenes (1987, 2006) describe a The intent of this chapter is to discuss how
decade of successes using modeling in physics, instruction, technology, and models converge to
chemistry, and physical science classrooms. In create online model-facilitated learning environ-
addition, today’s powerful computers allow you ments, and discuss the pedagogical structures
to go beyond traditional methods of instruction by within which they operate. More specific objec-
breaking down the limitations and constraints of tives for the chapter are:
conventional methods of teaching and assessment.
They give you the capability to use electronic ap- a. Define models and their function in online
plications and processes to deliver the content, and model-facilitated learning
situate learners in a domain of information and a b. Develop a theoretical platform and related
set of circumstances that maximize the cognitive principles as these apply to online model-
potential of learners. By creating these online facilitated learning
learning environments, you can give the students c. Apply pedagogical principles to teaching
the opportunity to use computer-based models and and assessment in online model-facilitated
simulations to explore, and better comprehend and learning
communicate complex ideas (Maier & Gröβler,
2000). In an extensive review of the literature
to examine computer-mediated communication MODELS
in educational applications, Luppicini (2006)
reported that learners in online courses did just as Models are instructional tools that teachers can use
well as face-to-face courses, therefore, it seemed to enhance the human cognitive power (Kozma,
a favorable alternative. 1987) and enhance higher order thinking as they
Online model-facilitated learning has its roots “function as intellectual partners with the learner”
in the learning sciences, an interdisciplinary field (Jonassen, 1996, p. 9). They are used to provide a
of study that focuses on building innovative learn- learning situation that is more contextually bound
ing environments that incorporate multimedia than most conventional instructional approaches

239
 Model-Facilitated Learning Environments

because they situate the students in an experi- level. For example, intuiting the effects of sup-
ence that gives them the chance to experience ply on demand or grasping the possible affects
and “play with” selected aspects in the domain of global warming on hurricane strength are case
of knowledge. As a representation, a model is the in point.
tangible depiction or portrayal of some original
object or phenomenon. For example, a globe is Building Models
a representative model of Earth that the learn-
ers can interact with to find different locations Students can be instructed to build models in
around the world; the interaction between the order to construct their own new understanding
learners and their interaction with the model are of a domain content area or of the dynamics of a
most important. As a demonstration, a model system. Students learning about the human car-
becomes the means to demonstrate or show the diovascular system can build a concept map (e.g.,
learner how to do something without having to a static model) of the content and then use their
actually build a model. For example, a scale model concept map to write an expository essay of the
of the solar system demonstrates the size of the content. Or they can build a dynamic model of
planets in relation to each other. Regardless if it the same system using Stella®1(a software model-
is a representation or a demonstration, a model ing program for creating dynamic systems) and
is primarily a tangible communication device for examine the structure and function of the heart.
conversing with self and others immediately and With both strategies, students build their own un-
through time (Pea, 1994). derstanding of the content. If decision making is
your instructional aim, there are software packages
How Are Models Used In Instruction? that students can use to build a model of a system
that needs to be managed (e.g., SIMPROCESS®
Instructors can employ models in different ways. is a product that can be used to build models that
They can create a model that the student can use support decision making2.).
or they can instruct the students to build their own Model building typically seeks to answer
model. Bliss (1994) refers to this as explorative questions of inquiry (Kolb, 1984). The knowledge
modeling and expressive modeling respectively. gained allows the student to understand causal
relationships and make predictions. The overarch-
Using Models ing learning objective is aimed at the students’
ability to gather information; to communicate
Students can be instructed to use instructor- knowledge; to transfer the knowledge; and to
created dynamic models (computer simulations apply complex cognitive skills to other novel
and games) or static models (illustrations and real-life encounters (van Merrienboer, Clark, &
concept maps) to learn about a domain of content. de Croock, 2002). Thus building models directs
These models are usually designed and created attention to higher-order, transferable cognitive
by instructors for learners to use within a specific skills and develops a domain-specific base of
sphere of interrelated knowledge. Löhner, van content knowledge.
Joolingen, Savelsbergh, and van Hout-Wolters
(2005) say, “Learners explore a given model Tasks Accomplished with Models
representing someone else’s ideas by trying it out
and perhaps modifying it” (p. 442). We propose that the tasks learners are asked to ac-
The primary learning objective of using models complish with models in online settings fall under
is to acquire domain content at the application one of two categories: peremptory and dialectic.

240
Model-Facilitated Learning Environments

Peremptory Online Task told to work individually to find the errors and
correct it, then it becomes less peremptory. If the
A peremptory online task invites either acceptance students complete this same concept map task in
or rejection, it is “a-dialectic” and it brings along a collaborative group with appropriate ground
an underlying worldview. Working alone on a rules, then this becomes a dialectic experience.
computer-based simulation or game is a peremp- In summary, the model is a contextual repre-
tory task. A learner who has become proficient sentation whose primary function is to provide
in Simcity has acquired important concepts and the basis of an experience where the students
principles regarding city planning that reflect the can experience and investigate the fundamental
theory that undergirds this simulation, including a attributes and properties of what is to be learned. If
positive bias (but perhaps misplaced trust) towards the instructional intent in online model-facilitated
public transportation. Said differently, the learner learning is to promote a conceptual change, ac-
‘wins’ when their intuitive planning actions and cording to Windschitl (1996), allowing students
interactions with the simulation most agree with to interact with the dynamics of a modeling
the hidden theory and the learner appropriates system can create unique ways to help students
the theory usually without reflection (rather like conceptualize the information. Common to both
brain washing). This assumption is derived from uses of models is simulating a situation, specifi-
the research on implicit learning. cally designed to situate learners in experiences
Reber (1967) refers to implicit learning as a that serve to stimulate their process of inquiry and
process by which knowledge is acquired inde- understanding (Kolb, 1984).
pendently of conscious and deliberate attempts to
do so. What is implicitly (unconsciously) learned
about the domain through simulations and games A THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE
can probably be evaluated only within the simu-
lation or game. This is an important issue that is Learning, as we know it, is an active cognitive
overlooked. Further, learners will internalize the process whereby knowledge is built on existing
“grammar” of the technology tool that they are knowledge as the learner seeks to understand
using; for example, thinking in terms of stocks and the information and experience as it is presented
flows when using Stella, or in terms of variable (Duffy & Cunningham, 1996; Winn & Snyder,
control when programming. At a minimum, given 1996). In online model-facilitated learning envi-
enough model-facilitated exposure, students will ronments, regardless whether the learner builds
begin to think about everything as a system, and or uses the model, he/she takes the information
this represents a substantial mental shift that may from the model and adopts mental representations
not be measured by traditional tests. of the system to help organize the information in
a personally coherent and meaningful way. The
Dialectic Online Task degree of learning rests in how well the learner
can connect the existing facts, concepts and prin-
In contrast to the peremptory online task, a dia- ciples with the new information that is given or
lectic online task invites argument or participa- discovered in the modeling experience.
tion. The learner must ‘fill-in-the-blanks.’ If the How this information is stored in memory
instructor posts a detailed concept map of a topic and how it is linked in this complex, abstract and
and requires students to study it for a test, this interconnected network of memory structures
approach is highly peremptory. However, if the is the schema (Bruning, Schraw, & Ronning,
students are given the same concept map and are 1999; Driscoll, 2000; Rumelhart, 1980; Schunk,

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2000; Winn & Snyder, 1996). If you think of sophical point of view called constructivism—a
the brain as a neural file cabinet, these schemas doctrine of beliefs that knowledge is constructed
are neural memory files that hold information by the learner through experiences and direct
about specific concepts. Over time, we make participation with the environment (Duffy & Cun-
associations between and among them, and this ningham, 1996). Based on what we know of online
intricate network of neural files become highly model-facilitated learning environments, Cobb’s
elaborate, interconnected, and cross-referenced. (1994) interpretation of the complementary nature
Online model-facilitated learning environments of the two perspectives of constructivism and so-
provide a powerful way for learners to develop cioculturism apply. According to Cobb (1994), the
these conceptual arrangements and manage the cognitive constructivist perspective explains the
interrelationships and integration of these com- unique configuration of knowledge constructed
plex systems. In online model-facilitated learn- by the learner and the quality of the individual
ing, Papert (1993) argues that constructing and interpretation of the experience in constructing that
manipulating “quasi-concrete” representations knowledge, while the sociocultural constructivist
of knowledge on computers leads to more robust perspective emphasizes the construction of knowl-
internal knowledge structures. edge when individuals engage in discussion and
Online model-facilitated learning is a gen- activity about shared problems and experiences
erative learning approach that uses strategies to in a community of learning. Accordingly, social
encourage learners to actively create and consider interaction is necessary for the construction of
the relationships among various elements of infor- knowledge, and meaning will differ among the
mation, between lesson information, and personal learners because meaningfulness is an individual
knowledge, and find personal meaning (Jonassen, interpretation based on past experiences. These
1988; Jonassen & Wang, 1993; Wittrock, 1992). interactions are uniquely understood by the
Following the theory of generative learning, it is learner through personal reflection and dialogue
the process of generating relationships between with others as they gain a shared understanding
and among the information and integrating that of the complexity of the concept being explored
with memory, whereby “meaningful understand- (Gasparini, 2004).
ing and comprehension are predicted outcomes” In the online model-facilitated learning en-
(Grabowski, 1996, p. 898). Generative strategies, vironment, the student is situated in the learning
such as asking the learner to formulate new ques- experience in a manner that directly confronts the
tions, form direct inferences, and demonstrate and intellectual, practical, personal and social aspects
represent how the concepts connect, typically the model brings to the experience. According to
require learners to consider multiple information Collins’s (1988) definition of situated learning,
elements at the same time, thus encouraging the knowledge, and skills are learned in contexts
development of the organizational and structural that reflect the way they will be used in real life
relationships between the information elements (p. 2), and he goes on to cite benefits of situated
(Grabowski, 1996; Ritchie & Volkl, 2000). The learning that we feel are applicable to the design
focus is to generate new conceptual understand- of online model-facilitated learning instruction:
ings, not just transform what is already known
(Grabowski, 1996). • Students are placed in the conditions for
The view that students actively participate to applying knowledge
construct their own knowledge through direct • Students are situated in conditions to apply
participation in the modeling experience (whether information and problem solve
using or building the model) is from the philo-

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• Students learn the implications of knowl- tively processed, and understanding the role of the
edge as they work through the problem social and collaborative aspects of learning about
• Students are supported in structuring complex systems are important considerations in
knowledge in ways appropriate to later use building a theoretical framework to support the
by gaining and working with that knowl- pedagogical decision to use online models. These
edge in context aspects are mutually connected and interrelated.

Brown, Collins and Duguid (1989) suggest that Complex Systems

embedding information in the situation provides
essential parts for its structure and meaning. The Wilensky and Resnick (1999) describe complex
knowledge gained in the learning experience systems as having multiple levels of simultaneous
becomes coded in such a way that it is connected hierarchical interactions; the system under study
to that situation; therefore, context and authentic- may in fact be a sub-system of a larger system. An
ity become important considerations. In online example of this would be the human body. When
model-facilitated instruction, the idea is to create you consider the body as a functioning “whole”
models that simulate authentic practice. the interrelated, interdependent, and simultaneous
We have continued to talk about the role of the interactions among the sub-systems, for example,
experience in online model-facilitated instruction. oxygen transport system, the renal system, the
We believe it is the hallmark and the distinguishing cardiovascular system, the nervous system, and
characteristic in your design. How you create the so forth, are essential for life. These complex
online modeling experience and then situate the systems are becoming increasingly important to
learner in that experience will greatly influence the understand in the 21st century as the relationships
success of achieving the learning outcomes. Carl among the systems becomes more integrated
Rogers (1969) paved the way for student-centered, (Lesh, 2006). But, learning about these systems
experiential education, and any instructional is difficult because of the amount and complexity
method that gives the student the opportunity to of subject matter within and across domains and
actively participate in the encounter with a goal disciplines (Hmelo-Silver & Azevedo, 2006).
of acquiring knowledge is considered experiential These systems tend to be defined by the dy-
learning. The students directly experience the namic interactions and interrelationships among
subject matter, either by using or building models. and between the multiple constituent parts and
frequently cannot be explained by a set of linear,
functional rules (Lesh, 2006). As stated by van
PEDAGOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS Merrienboer et al. (2002), “In complex learning,
AND ISSUES IN THE ONLINE the whole is clearly more than the sum of its parts
MODEL-FACILITATED because it also includes the ability to coordinate
LEARNING EXPERIENCE and integrate those parts” (p. 40). Therefore, ap-
proaching it from a traditional, behaviorist learn-
Among the pressing issues for instructors in ing point of view will not suffice. The theories
designing online model-facilitated learning ex- in behaviorism focus on forming associations
periences lie in understanding of the complex between a stimulus and a response, and they do
systems taught with models, and appreciating not account for the complicated and involved
the role of collaboration. Placing a student in the nature of systemic thinking in these complex
experience, knowing how information is cogni- online model-facilitated learning environments.

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 Model-Facilitated Learning Environments

The memorization of facts limits knowledge to unfolded the virus jumped from tag to tag infecting
the constituent parts rather than fully comprehend- the other learners. Colella created this model of
ing how these parts fit together into one cohesive the dynamic system of viral transmission so the
whole (Feltovich, Coulson, & Spiro, 2001). The students could experience the transmission of a vi-
instructor must break down the prevailing “silo” rus, understand the problem, develop hypotheses,
mentality so that the students can more easily find explore the underlying rules (cause and effect)
meaningful associations and see the patterns of re- of the system, and learn the consequences if the
lationships, and the control and influences among rules were broken. Colella could have taught the
the parts. These relationships are not necessarily students about viral transmission without giving
linear and the pattern of differentiation makes them the chance to experience it; however, the
them complex. Specifically, Milrad, Spector, and power of using a model to explore this helped the
Davidson (2002) suggest learners usually experi- students discover the knowledge of how a virus
ence difficulty in the following: is transmitted, understand the social relation-
ships in this community of learners, and feel the
• Comprehending nonlinear relationships accompanying emotion when infected with the
• Understanding and viewing the problem disease. According to Hmelo-Silver and Azevedo
within the context of the system (2006), learning about these systems confronts our
• Considering the full range of connections, cognitive, meta-cognitive, and social resources.
influences, and controls within a system Regardless if the students are instructed to use
• Transferring what is learned in one context a model or build a model, the microworld becomes
to find the solution to a problem in another the place for the group to learn. The instructor
creates these microworlds and models to simulate
Kukla (1992) claimed that using models de- the real world so the topic of instruction can be
signed to represent various situations and complex taught in the safety of an instructional environ-
systems will help develop cognitive systems that ment yet learned in a real-world context. Context
enable the learner to process information, solve and authenticity are important considerations in
problems by reasoning, infer consequences, form the design and creation of models because the
hypotheses about the world that’s external to the model represents domain-specific situations and
“microworld,” and make predictions about the systems constrained within “microworlds” that
future with reasonable accuracy. are meant to activate the cognitive system in ways
that traditional teaching by lectures often cannot
The Association with accomplish (Colella, 2000; Kukla, 1992). Accord-
Complex Systems ing to Colella (2000, p. 474-475), “the flexibility
of microworld environments opens up the range
When learners are plunged into a system, they of possible experiences that can be created.” Thus
become more aware of the system’s dynamics in a critical design issue in online model-facilitated
terms of the processes, relationships, and conse- instruction is determining the “level” of the mi-
quences of decisions. To illustrate this, we turn croworld and the “size” of the model.
to work done by Colella (2000), who designed
a microworld using miniature computers called Role of Collaboration
thinking tags to explore viral transmission. Each
learner in this “participatory simulation” wore Collaborative online projects are some of the most
a thinking tag3. To begin the session, only one exciting ways to motivate students. Getting stu-
thinking tag contained the virus. As the experience dents involved with posting projects on the web,

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emailing other students or experts, discussing detail, and then brings that portion or piece back
issues on a threaded discussion, or chatting online to the group. A properly designed collaborative
is a great way to motivate students. Stahl (2004, task engenders dialectic interactions as the group
p. 64) defines collaborative learning in terms of works together reaching consensus or compromise
building “the gradual construction and accumula- on every part of the project. Although the online
tion of increasingly refined and complex cognitive model-facilitated learning itself may vary among
and linguistic artifacts.” The students commit to different authors (Kanuka, Rourke, & Laflamme,
a shared goal and work together in a mutual and 2006; Roberts, Andersen, Deal, Grant & Shaffer,
joint effort to construct meaning, share learning 1983; van Merrienboer, 1997; van Merrienboer
tasks to build a knowledge base, clarify issues, et al., 2002; Wolstenholme, 1990), the process
explore a topic, and solve a problem (Hron & generally moves through the following phases
Friedrich, 2003; Nevgi, Virtanen & Niemi, 2006). as described below:
In online model-facilitated learning environments,
students gathered together in virtual groups not 1. Problem orientation: The problem is pre-
only learn from their own individual experiences sented and the learner is oriented to the mod-
as they solve a problem, but they learn from each eling task, which includes goal setting and
other. The nature of the task, the context of the engagement. These problems or scenarios
experience, the learner characteristics, and the are not only authentic and relevant but also
group relations all affect the collaboration (Dil- have the correct level of complexity for the
lenbourg & Self, 1995). learners.
Clark and Mayer (2003) make a distinction 2. Conceptualization: The learner puts the
between two alternative collaborations: product- problem into some context. Important
oriented and process-oriented. The product- components and causal relationships are
oriented collaboration results in some tangible recognized.
output. These types of assignments need suf- 3. Formulation: The learner develops hypoth-
ficient instructional guidance and resources that eses and a method of collecting the data he/
guide the experience, yet allow enough openness she needs to move forward with the problem.
for the student to explore, be creative and feel 4. Rules and Principles: The learner explores
challenged. The process-oriented collaboration the cause and effect relationships.
focuses on learning that is gained from structured 5. Testing: The learner verifies in that their
group exchange rather than the production of a evolving mental model does not contradict
tangible finished product. The learning is stimu- data from the real-world system.
lated by how the instructor designs interactions 6. Application: The learner transfers the
around the model. In either case, structuring the knowledge and applies the cognitive skills
online model-facilitated learning environment to to authentic situations to solve problems
promote collaboration and maximize the power (Perkins & Unger, 1999).
of the interactions is important and is critical for
a successful outcome as suggested by Clark and Collaboration in online learning, by its very
Mayer (2003). During collaboration, all members nature, requires attention to the social interactions
should contribute equally to the model and begin and communication strategies because this is very
to develop a sense of co-ownership of the model. different than face-to-face collaborative learning
In cooperative association, each member individu- experiences many students are familiar with.
ally completes a discrete portion of the task in

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PEDAGOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS cognitive development, opportunity to develop

meaningful collaborative interactions among
Instruction must be designed to teach students the learners, and concrete feedback to facilitate
how to apply skills in a coordinated and inte- the learners’ understanding. However, there are
grated fashion (van Merrienboer et al., 2002). The specific issues and challenges in designing these
instructor-created experience must be thoughtfully collaborative learning environments due to the
designed because it is paramount for learning. unique characteristics of online instruction and
Rogers (1969) has provided us with essential online learning groups, most specifically in the
guidelines to create an environment for learning. areas of social context, the nature of the com-
Although these guidelines were developed for munication, cognitive load, and the emotional
face-to-face instruction, we believe they are so state of the learner (Hron & Friedrich, 2003).
fundamental to learning that they are noteworthy Suitable instructional supports must be considered
considerations in creating online model-facilitated in each area.
learning environments: The social context of online model-facilitated
learning experiences cannot be ignored because
1. Setting the initial mood or climate of the it differs from face-to-face experiences. There
group or class experience are no facial expressions, body gestures, voice
2. Elicit and clarify the purpose of the individu- inflections, or head nods to help the instructor
als in the class as well as the more general or the students make judgments on interest, re-
purposes of the group sponse, or participation. In addition, the “whose
3. Make easily available the widest possible next” question can become an issue in deciding
range of resources for learning when and who takes the next turn to participate.
4. Take the initiative in sharing feelings with How the instructor communicates the idea and
the group in ways which do not demand nor how he/she draws all the participants into the
impose but represent a personal sharing model will determine the collaboration among
the participants. The instructor must take the
Just as important is the course design. Gold- lead to establish clear ground rules and set the
man, Williams, Sherwood, Hasselbring and the convention of etiquette for the communication at
Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt the onset of the experience so the students know
(1999) have provided us with these four principles what to expect and how to manage their role. It is
for course design: the challenge of the instructors to ensure that the
student interactions and discussions are engag-
1. Organize it around the solution of meaningful ing, productive, and meaningful in developing
problems knowledge and understanding (Littleton & Whi-
2. Provide scaffolds for achieving meaningful telock, 2005). In a study conducted by Navarro
learning and Shoemaker (2000), students enrolled in an
3. Provide opportunities for practice with online economics course were generally satisfied
feedback, revision, and reflection with the online student-to-instructor interactions,
4. Promote collaboration, sharing of expertise however, students were generally unsatisfied with
and independent learning their student-to-student interactions. Instructors,
by providing appropriate supporting materials and
Milrad (2002) concludes that the design of resources, activities that support the learning, and
these environments should include multiple per- feedback will enhance the quality of interaction
spectives of the problem, support for learning and between students and instructors.

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Communication in online collaboration is an in the design of the instruction so that problems

important consideration in terms of the technol- can be dealt with in a reasonable manner and
ogy and the quality of the message. Tolmie and without disruption to the learning. In designing
Boyes (2000) have found that asynchronous online model-facilitated learning environments
communication not just facilitates discussions when multimedia is used, instructors must create
between students but “any disagreements which experiences that maximize the opportunities for
occur will promote growth and understanding (p. the learner to mentally organize the information
121). The technology greatly expands the potential in meaningful and coherent cognitive structures
of the instruction, but it does not come without for meaningful learning to occur, while at the
problems. Navarro and Shoemaker (2000) found same time paying attention to the cognitive load
that technical problems are pervasive in online associated with multimedia learning (Mayer &
learning environments. The system can go down, Moreno, 2003). This becomes particularly impor-
the students may have problems accessing some tant when the model uses and presents visual and
instructional materials, the software may not be verbal representations of information. Mayer and
compatible, the video and audio system might Moreno (2003) highlight the potential for cognitive
malfunction; indeed, a whole host of problems overload in multimedia learning environments
could occur. Technical support to students and due to the substantial cognitive processing that
instructors must be available, and instructors must is necessary for meaningful learning to occur.
match the course design to the technology that is They report that in their research on multimedia
available to the students. How the information is learning, they are “repeatedly faced with the
delivered to the students is very important because challenge of cognitive load” (p. 43). In response,
messages are more enduring and permanent in they explored nine ways to reduce cognitive load
online collaboration (Hron & Friedrich, 2003). in processing information aimed at redistributing
They can be accessed or sent at any time, and the demands of cognitive processing (Mayer &
the sheer volume and the task of following them Moreno, 2003): off-load processing demands
can seem unmanageable. Instructors must be on the visual and verbal channels, segmenting,
concerned with the effect in how the message is pre-training, eliminate extraneous information,
interpreted, the value of the messages produced, provide signaling cues, minimize incidental cogni-
and the manner in which the messages motivate tive load, eliminate redundancy, synchronize the
the learners. In addition, it is the instructor’s presentation of material, build in ways for it to
responsibility to ensure that the students are not be individualized to the learner’s characteristics.
learning the “wrong” concepts that are transmit- In addition, other strategies to help manage this
ted in the messages. This is particularly important cognitive load might include breaking a larger
when the students are working and learning from problem into sub-problems, the inclusion of the
each other. The instructor should intervene to bring heuristic aids, or the integration of metacognitive
the students back on track if this occurs. self assessment tools (Malopinsky, Kirkley, Stein,
Cognitive load can overwhelm the student & Duffy, 2000). Instructional supports in online
(Hron & Friedrich, 2003). The complicated model-facilitated learning experiences would
computer network, the complex subject matter, include a plan to monitor the messages, coach
the sheer volume of information, and the differ- the students, build in scaffolding strategies, and
ent pattern of communication all contribute to provide reflection and feedback mechanisms.
this. It is important for the instructor to provide The emotional state of the learner cannot
help for students to cope with the complexity. be ignored in online model-facilitated learning
Technological support systems should be included experiences. Interest and motivation are im-

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portant learner attributes to the success of these sense. The evaluators(s) must assess the breadth
experiences whether you use or build models. and depth of information represented in the model
This is a concern, because low participation in as well as the students’ thinking and reasoning
discussions in online learning environments has strategies. A process assessment would be used
been reported across the board (Tolmie & Boyle, to measure the students’ contribution to the group
2000). Instructors must find ways to stimulate and structure, and participation in the discussion and
motivate the learners to participate. They should information gathering.
include mechanisms to involve all students and Educational assessment plans should include
not let a few dominate the discussions. Techniques two functional categories: formative or summa-
used by experienced instructors include personal tive. Formative assessment supports the progres-
electronic workbooks as well as records of their sion of learning by providing immediate, contex-
contributions to the group projects; participating tualized feedback and encourages self-reflection.
in instructor supported computer conferences; and Formative assessments should focus less on how
having the students use critical reflection on both closely student responses match a pre-determined
the content and the process. In a discussion on is- model and more on the competency of the per-
sues related to designing inquiry on the Web, Lim formance as a whole (Pellegrino, Chudowsky, &
(2004) suggests using questions, student planning, Glaser, 2001). In online model-facilitated learning,
careful sequencing of activities, and reflection to students work collaboratively to construct their
engage the students. own knowledge within the structure of the course
objectives. Instructors must be diligent to guide the
students “back on track” through either coaching or
ASSESSMENT CONSIDERATIONS scaffolding or other pedagogical techniques if the
students stray too far from the learning objectives.
Online model-facilitated instruction is aimed at Summative assessment is done at the conclusion
teaching complex, higher-order thinking skills; of a course or some larger instructional period to
therefore, online model-facilitated learning is determine individual student success or to what
defeated if the focus of the assessment is on de- extend the program/project/course has met its
clarative knowledge only, and using the traditional learning objectives. Because of the complex nature
methods, such as paper and pencil tests. These of online model-facilitated learning, we suggest
methods are unlikely to measure the full range that summative assessment must be designed to
of knowledge, skills, and attitudes accumulated measure higher order thinking skills to learn how
by the learner. they reason through situations, how they transfer
When developing an assessment plan in an knowledge, how they make decisions, and how
online model-facilitated learning environment, they critically think through problems. Reeves
the question is, “what should be assessed—the (2000) suggests three alternative assessment
process (contribution and interaction), the product methods to use in an online environment:
(the model), or both?” The assessment of process
and product are equally important; yet, assume dif- • Cognitive assessment is the assessment of
ferent types of assessment strategies and methods. a wide range of abilities, including atten-
In online model-facilitated instruction, the model tion, memory, problem-solving, language
represents the group’s understanding of a large skills and intellectual functioning. It is the
amount of information from multiple disciplines process of determining a student’s cogni-
due to the complexity of the modeling experience, tive strengths and weaknesses through ob-
and so assessing the model (the product) makes served behavior

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• Performance assessment requires that a overarching goal is to teach students a body of

student carry out an extended, complex knowledge that may draw from the integration of
process or produce a product, such as a many disciplines, and get this stored in long-term
model memory so it can be recalled and transferred to
• Portfolio assessment can be either forma- solve problems in different situations.
tive or summative. An example of a for- Perhaps the greatest value of online model-
mative assessment portfolio is a “growth facilitated learning environments is in developing a
and learning portfolio,” which contains student’s “thinking skills.” Reasoning and making
the student’s work that demonstrates their judgments is a multi-layered, complex process of
program toward a goal. A summative as- constructing evidence that is based on a social
sessment portfolio is a “best works portfo- interaction with others and gathering evidence
lio” which is representative of the student’s to support the claim. Learners must have the
work that provides evidence that they have ability to organize large amounts of information
a specific learning target (Nitko, 2004). through complex cognitive processes and mental
associations to critically analyze many facets of a
Assessment must not be an afterthought to problem, reach an informed conclusion, develop
be effective, but strategically integrated into the a plan to solve the problem, and systematically
instructional design plan from the very beginning, justify their response by making a reflective judg-
so it has the ability to assess the transfer and in- ment of their decision (Bruning et al., 1999; Winn
tegration the conceptually-complex ideas, which & Snyder, 1996).
are best measured through complex, authentic as- How students act and learn in a particular
sessment methods (Erickson, 2001; Nitko, 2001). environment depends on how the instructional
designer creates the environment that maximizes
their learning potential, considering the interrela-
CONCLUSION tionships between the learning experience, the use
of the technology, the cognitive conditions and
This chapter provides a framework for online other related issues of the learner. Pedagogical
model-facilitated learning environments that decisions depend on the interrelationships be-
offers pedagogical considerations not seen in tween the instructional goal, the instructor, the
traditional instruction. These models embedded in theory, and all the resources. The importance
carefully constructed “microworlds” are artifacts of considering these factors in the design of an
within a specific sphere or domain of information online model-facilitated learning environment
that instructors create for learners to interact with cannot be overstated. Surging ahead without this
and experience. The idea is to use these models understanding will result in a situation that does
to maximize the pedagogical power that helps not maximize the learning potential in online
students construct conceptual mental representa- model-facilitated experiences.
tions that lead to a greater degree of retention and
overall recall of information.
Based on what we learned in this chapter, learn- FUTURE TRENDS AND RESEARCH
ing and most importantly, the comprehension of
complex systems, are enhanced in online model- This area of online model-facilitated learning
facilitated learning instructional environments environments is relatively new and educators are
because students can interact with the content and at the fringe of gathering empirically valid and
each other to apply it to real-world scenarios. The reliable data to support the pedagogical decisions.

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As suggested by Hmelo-Silver and Pfeffer (2004) recognition of artifacts as “an embodiment of

in talking about the complexity of the systems we shared understanding,” only a few education sci-
are trying to teach, we are still at an early stage of entists have focused on how new users learn to use
understanding how this all fits together. For this them. To fully implement online model-facilitated
reason, much more needs to be learned. The deci- instruction, we must learn how to use models to
sion to choose model-facilitated instruction should expand the capacity and capability to help students
not be solely driven by the available advances process the information, and construct conceptual
in technology, but by the principles grounded in models that lead to greater retention, and recall
empirical research findings. The major elements and application of knowledge to new and com-
of model-facilitated instruction, learning and as- plex situations. Mayer, Dow, and Mayer (2003)
sessment, and the inherent relationships among focused on the pedagogic features of agent-based
them, provide important areas for investigation. microworlds to begin to address how to promote
A pressing issue in online model-facilitated deep learning in the next generation of highly
instruction lies in the complexity of the system interactive computer-based environments. How
being taught, and how the instructor integrates the best we can facilitate learning in these complex
breadth and depth of a vast amount of knowledge environments and how our cognition changes to
related to that system. These modeling systems do this is an area to be explored.
cross disciplines and cross themes within a unit
of study as they relate complex concepts and
generalizations, yet are all linked to the common REFERENCES
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ENDNOTES
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This work was previously published in Understanding Online Instructional Modeling: Theories and Practices, edited by Robert
Zheng and Sharmila Pixy Ferris, pp. 18-34, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 255

Chapter 2.4
Developing Learning
Communities:
Improving Interactivity of an Online Class

Pawan Jain
Fort Hays State University, Hays, USA

Smita Jain
University of Wyoming, Hays, USA

ABSTRACT from each college, were analyzed. The findings

of this study suggest that the interactivity in an
This study concerns the design and development of online class depends on group size, grade weight
online instruction and specifically targets interac- for discussion, use of web 2.0 technologies and
tion and communication between online learners. multimedia and the discipline it belongs to.
Facilitating appropriate and meaningful interac-
tions in designing instruction is a major goal for
anyone developing an online class. The guiding INTRODUCTION
question of the study was: how do the instructional
design elements and discipline area impact the For hundreds of thousands of years, people lived
quantity of learner-learner interactions? The data in hunting and gathering economy until humans
for this study came from the online courses offered made the transition to an agricultural economy.
at one of the major Rocky Mountain University. The agricultural society continued until about
The research subjects and courses were taken 200 years ago, when the Western world ushered
from the College of Education, College of Busi- in the Industrial Revolution. A few decades ago,
ness, College of Arts and Sciences and College of the industrial economy began to give way to the
Health Sciences. Forty graduate online classes, 10 present day information-based society (Dagget,
1998). The advent of the computer and the Internet
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch204 were instrumental in changing society to a global,

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Developing Learning Communities

knowledge-based economy or to what is known impacting the overall interaction among learners.
today as the information age (Crossman, 1997). Hence, the guiding question of the study is: do the
This shift in society has had an insurmountable instructional design elements and the discipline
impact on institutions of higher education. Today area impact the overall interaction among learn-
higher education is reaching beyond the walls of ers as defined by the number of learner-learner
the traditional classroom by providing alternative interactions?
methods of educational delivery through the use
of the Internet and the World Wide Web. This
type of distance education delivery is referred to BACKGROUND
as online learning.
Facilitating appropriate and meaningful inter- As access to the Internet and World Wide Web
actions in designing instruction is a major goal for has continued to grow, Web-based learning has
anyone developing a course, especially an online continued to expand. With approximately half of
course. Although not supported by a specific the households in the United States (or 150 million
research study, Kearsley (1998) claims that the people connected to the Internet), an estimated 2
“single most important element of successful on- million students are taking post-secondary courses
line education is interaction among participants.” that are fully delivered online (Galt Global Review,
He further states that it is “the instructor’s role as 2001). Millions of other students at all educational
a facilitator to ensure that a high-level of interac- levels (primary, secondary, post-secondary, con-
tion occurs in an online course” (p. 3). tinuing education) participate online in hybrid,
The concept of interaction has received consid- mixed mode, and Web-enhanced face-to-face
erable attention in the literature related to distance courses (Picciano, 2002).
Internet-based learning (Hill, Wiley, Nelson & Interaction has been recognized as one of the
Han, 2004). Daniel and Marquis’s (1988) chal- most important components of learning experi-
lenged the educators to “get the mixture right” ences both in conventional education and distance
between independence (student-content interac- education (Vygotsky, 1978; Holmberg, 1983;
tion) and interaction (mainly student-teacher Moore, 1993). Gunawardena and Zittle (1997)
interaction). In the 21st century we are still chal- revealed that social presence contributed more that
lenged to get the mixture right (Anderson, 2003). 60% of learner satisfaction with computer confer-
Appropriate mixtures will result in increased learn- encing courses. A common element for learning
ing and exciting new educational opportunities; in a typical classroom environment is the social
inappropriate mixes will be expensive, exclusive and communicative interactions between student
and exigent. Our responsibility as experienced and teacher, and student and student (Stubbs,
educators remain- to insure that the modes of 1976). The ability to ask a question, to share an
interaction that we practice and prescribe maxi- opinion with a fellow student, or to disagree with
mize the attainment of all legitimate educational the point of view in a reading assignment are all
objectives and support and increase motivation for fundamental learning activities (Picciano, 2002).
deep and meaningful learning (Anderson, 2003). In online education, it is particularly important
In this study the researcher assumes that the to provide an environment in which meaningful
opinion of Kearsley (1998), “single most important interaction can occur (Collins & Berge, 1996).
element of successful online education is interac- There is a scarcity of research on the importance
tion among learners” (p. 3) holds and wants to of interaction in education especially in online
understand the role the various instructional design education. There have been a few studies and
elements and differences in discipline plays in opinion papers on the relationship of interaction

256
Developing Learning Communities

to learning (Picciano, 2002). Many observers and who were engaged in learner-learner interaction
researchers have supported the concept interac- were more motivated than those who were not
tions among learners are important elements in engaged in learner-learner interaction. Karayan
the design of a Web-based course (Fulford & and Crowe (1997) used surveys to examine stu-
Zhang, 1993; Kearsley, 1995; Klesius, Homan & dents’ perceptions of electronic discussion groups.
Thompson, 1997; Kumari, 2001; Picciano, 1998; Their research was designed to discover whether
2001; Sherry, 1996; Smith, 1996; Zirkin & Sumler, or not student behaviors changed as a result of par-
1995). Both students and faculty typically report ticipation in an electronic discussion group. They
increased satisfaction in online courses depending believed that the convenience of interaction, the
on the quantity of interactions (Dziuban & Moskal, provision for different kinds of learners, and the
2001; Gunawardena & Zittle, 1997; Hartman & opportunity to “think through writing” would be
Truman-Davis, 2001; Kanuka & Anderson, 1998; evidenced in changes in student behaviors (p. 70).
Shea, Fredericksen, Pickett, Pelz, & Swan, 2001). According to Berge (1997), online class size
Previous research has indicated a strong, posi- is an area that is scarcely researched that may
tive relationship exists between student percep- have significant affect on students learning and
tions of their interaction in the course and their interaction. A research study by Jiang & Ting
perceptions of the quality and quantity of their (2000) found that grades for discussion and
learning (Dziuban & Moskal, 2001; Shea et al., requirements for discussion were significantly
2001). Interactions among learners and positive and positively correlated to students’ perceived
contributions to students’ learning are directly learning. Bouton and Garth (1983) stated that
related (Laurillard, 1993; Moore, 1993; Rams- learning is a group process: the learner actively
den, 1992). Michael Beaudoin (2001) examined constructs knowledge by formulating ideas into
the relationship between student interaction and words, and these ideas/concepts are built upon
learning. In the study, he divided an online class through reaction and responses of others (Harasim,
into three groups (high interaction, moderate 1990, p. 43). A unique feature of online education
interaction, and low interaction). He finds that is its capability to support this interactive group
the high interaction students achieved the highest process. As Internet-based education programs
performance. Adelskold et al. (1999) suggested expand, educators are being challenged to go
collaborative interaction among learners could beyond delivering information to remote learn-
have greater effects on learning in a problem ers to building community among them (Bruffee,
solving situation than other types of interaction. 1993; Dede, 1990, 1996; Harasim, Hiltz, Teles &
Rust (2006) in her study, found that there is Turoff, 1995; Kaye, 1995; Renniger & Shumar,
a significantly positive relationship between the 2000). Several researchers have found that the
number of postings per person and the student social aspects of the online learning environment
retention rate. She also concluded that a sig- are very important (Meyer, 2000).
nificantly positive relationship exists between
the students’ perceptions of the interaction and
their final grade. Picciano (2002) showed, using MAIN FOCUS OF THE CHAPTER
correlation analysis, that perceived interaction and
the actual interaction were significantly positively John Dewey (1916) noted that “Every expansive
correlated. era in the history of mankind has coincided with
Taiwei (2006) used structural equation model- operation of factors which have tended to eliminate
ing to show that learner-learner interaction plays distance between peoples and classes previously
an important role in student motivation. Students hemmed off from one another” (Dewey, 1916,

257
 Developing Learning Communities

p.100). Distance educators also follow this tra- College of Arts and Sciences and 9 classes from
dition of using the technologically “expansive” the College of Health Sciences, were analyzed.
of eras to remove the distances from distance Hence, the analysis was conducted on a total of
education. 39 online classes.
The field of distance education has a very long
history, however significant to this study, is the
brief history of online learning and the need to PROCEDURE
expand the research base that exists specific to
online pedagogy. The majority of research has Data were collected on the actual number of student
focused on the continuous debate of comparing postings to the formal instructional discussion
online course with traditional courses (Strachota, board. The site that provided the archived data for
2003). The majority of such research has arrived the study is recognized as being one that offered a
at the conclusion that both the environment of the large number of online courses each semester. The
face-to-face course as well as online course are research courses were taken from the College of
considered to be equally as effective (Johnson, Education, College of Business, College of Arts
Aragon, Shalik & Palma-Rivas, 2000; Phipps & and Sciences and College of Health Sciences. The
Merisotis, 1999; Saba, 2000). postings to be counted included all comments
Of concern to the practice of online learning or questions made to the formal instructional
is the scarcity of research studying the impact discussion board by the learner addressing other
of effective design of instruction on appropriate learner(s). These learner-learner postings were
and meaningful interactions. There is no single then sub-classified as Planning, Contributing,
“best way” to improvise these interactions. “Each Reflecting, Social Interaction and Parroting, based
institution, discipline, region, and user group will on the rules developed by the researcher (Table
develop unique cultural practices and expectations 1). Actual number of student postings made to
related to their need for and use of interaction. Too the formal instructional discussion board by the
much of our practice in distance education is not learner addressing other learner(s) was counted for
evidence based and our actions and instructional three different weeks during the semester- week
designs are often grounded on untested assump- 3; week 8 & week 14, for each of the 39 online
tions about the value of the modes of interaction classes included in the study. So, the total num-
(or lack thereof). Thus, research that focuses on ber of the observation for this study was 117. To
interaction in all its forms is critically important” control for the variability in class size, this count
(Anderson, 2003). The guiding question of the of the number of learner postings per week was
study is: do the instructional design elements and normalized by dividing by the class size and was
the discipline area impact the overall interaction the dependent variable for this study. By analyzing
among learners as defined by the number of the Course syllabus and structure, data on exact
learner-learner interactions? grade weight assigned to the discussion, use of
chat sessions, class size and group size statistics
were recorded.
SAMPLE
Rules for Sub-Categorizing the
The data for this study came from the graduate on- Learner-Learner Interaction
line courses offered at the University of Wyoming
during the fall of 2007. Ten classes each, from the On the basis components of collaborative behavior
College of Education, College of Business, and described by Johnson & Johnson (1996), Curtis

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Developing Learning Communities

Table 1. Rules for Sub-categorizing the Learner-Learner Interaction

ActivityLearner- Learn- DescriptionGroup skills: a generic code applied to ExampleI know that [names] have given you good
er Interactions expressions that encourage group activity and cohesive- advice, but I think it’s worth knowing that you
ness need patience.
Organizing work: Planning group work; setting shared I just want to set a time-line for myself. Is everyone
tasks and deadlines. OK with that?
Initiating activities: Setting up activities such as chat I would like to chat on the blackboard. What about
sessions to discuss the progress and organization of group this Friday at 7.30pm SA time?
work.
Monitoring group effort: Comments about the group’s I believe the overall contribution and collaboration of
processes and achievements. working as a group requires an increase within itself
as part of our learning.
Help seeking: Seeking assistance from others. Does anyone know how to read the chart on pg. 12
of the text..?
Feedback seeking: Seeking feedback to a position ad- What do you think about answering the question
vanced. that…has put forward?
Help giving: Responding to questions and requests from To read the chart, look at the Appendix A of the text..
others.
Feedback giving: Providing feedback on proposals from I agree with you and I believe… ........ Good point…
others.
Exchanging resources and information to assist other “With the implementation of an internet service …
group members. there has been a major shift in the communication
function in business.”
Sharing knowledge: Sharing existing knowledge and I think we also need to give thought to the following.
information with others. 1. The issues of quality/efficiency in teaching and
learning…
Challenging others: Challenging the contributions of other I agree but I wondered about the applicability of the
members and seeking to engage in debate. argument: “The individuals or other units in a system
…” (Rogers, p. 295). The example used in the book
to support is a valid argument but I am unconvinced
….
Explaining or elaborating: Supporting one’s own position Chery, you have a good point about generalizations
(possibly following a challenge). but I think the cell phone is a little harder to see why
the less fortunate may need it more than the wealthy.
I think it has a lot to do with the marketing of the
product……..
Learner – CMS interac- Help seeking: Seeking assistance from others about the use Does anyone know how to edit/add/append data on
tion of technology. the student pages?
Feedback seeking: Seeking feedback to a position ad- What do you think about tutorial on how to …..in an
vanced. online class?
Help giving: Responding to questions and requests from To access the chat room, click on virtual chat in
others about the use of technology. the blackboard; chat screen will come up; click on
enter…
Feedback giving: Providing feedback on proposals from I like your idea of a generic booklet and everyone
others about the use of technology. contributing aspects of interesting internet services…
Reflecting on medium: Comments about the effectiveness The email for the discussion group seems to work OK
of the medium in supporting group activities. for me. You know it has gone through because you
actually receive your email back almost straight away
if it has worked.
Social Interaction Social interaction: Conversation about social matters Regarding chat - my weekend is pretty hectic – I have
those are unrelated to the group task. This activity helps to my family flying in from Greece … so the
‘break the ice’. Greek festivities will be in full swing.
Parroting Repeat or mimic (another’s words, etc) unthinkingly, one I agree with you
line agreement/disagreement statements Me too…

Adapted from Curtis & Lawson (2001)

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 Developing Learning Communities

& Lawson (2001) developed a list to describe Yi=α+β1X1i+β2X2i+β3X3i+β4X4i+εi (1)

the various activities in an online course and
based on that list, the researcher developed the where,
following set of rules to categorize student post-
ings into four sub-categories- Learner-Learner Yi: Number of Learner-learner interactions per
interactions, Learner- Course management week normalized by class size.
system (CMS) interactions, Social Interactions X1: Use of chat session
and Parroting X2: Group size
X3: Grade weight for discussion
X4: Discipline
ANALYSIS α: Intercept
βj: Regression coefficients
Data were organized in SPSS 15.0 statistical εi: Residual
software for analysis. Descriptive statistics were
utilized to summarize, organize and simplify Overall Interaction and Learning
the data (Gravetter, & Wallnau, 1996). Means
and standard deviations of the sample were This study is based on the assumption that the
determined to tell us about the distribution of more the interaction, the greater is the learning.
the variables included. To test this assumption the researcher used aver-
To control for the variability in class size, age grade for classes included in the study as a
the dependent variables (overall interactions proxy for learning. This is not the best measure
per week) was normalized by dividing by the of learning, but it does serve as a beginning point
size of the class. Bivariate Correlation analysis and a concrete measure of learning application.
was used to find the relationship between the The result of the bivariate correlational analysis
dependent variable and the interval and ordinal showed that the average grade was significantly
independent variables- group size and grade positively correlated with the overall interactions
weight for discussion and a t-test was employed per student per week, rho = 0.32, p < 0.01(Figure
to understand the differences due to the use of 1). One of the reasons for a smaller correlation
chat sessions. One-way Analysis of Variance coefficient might be that the grade is not the only
was used to find the relationship between the or the best indicator of learning. The student’s final
dependent variable and the nominal indepen- grade is the undiscussed average (Biggs, 1999).
dent variable, discipline. Follow-up tests were The above analysis tested the assumptions of
conducted to analyze the pairwise differences this study. Hence, more interaction results in bet-
among the means and Scheffe’s post hoc com- ter learning, which also supports the opinions and
parison test was employed for this purpose researches by various authors in the literature
Multiple regression analyses were used to (Dziuban & Moskal, 2001; Gunawardena &
identify the individual contribution of each of Zittle, 1997; Hartman & Truman-Davis, 2001;
the independent variable included in the study. Kanuka & Anderson, 1998; Shea, Fredericksen,
A change in R2 test was employed to test if the Pickett, Pelz, & Swan, 2001).
independent variable made a unique contribution
in predicting the dependent variable. Equation
of the following form was estimated:

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Figure 1. Scatter plot showing the relationship between the average grade and overall interaction

RESULTS Regression Analysis

Correlational Analysis After testing the underlying assumptions, the

researcher conducted the multiple regression
Table 2 presents the Pearson’s product moment analysis. The linear combination of independent
correlation coefficients between the 4 variables variables was significantly related to overall in-
included in the study. The result of the correla- teractions among learners, F(4, 112) = 6.83, p <
tional analysis showed that 2 out of 3 independent 0.01. The coefficient of determination (R2) was
variables (Grade weight and Group size) were 0.27, indicating that approximately 27% of the
significantly correlated with the independent vari- variance of the overall interactions in the sample
able, interactions per student per week. can be accounted for by the linear combination of
The reader should be cautious while interpret- the independent variables included in the study.
ing the magnitude of the correlation coefficient The results of the regression analysis showed
as most of the variables had skewed distributions that discipline and group size were significant
due to the presence of outliers, which would reduce predictors of the dependent variable at 5% level
the magnitude of correlation coefficient (Lomax, of significance, while the use of chat session and
2007, p. 188). So, most of the coefficients shown grade weight were not significant in predicting the
in Table 2 are under-estimate of actual size of the overall interactions per student per week.
correlation. To further support the above results and to
find the individual contribution of each predictor
variable, the researcher used multivariate regres-

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Table 2. Correlation matrix showing the bivariate relationships among the variables included in the study

1 2 3 4
1 Intper Student 1.00
2 Grade Weight 0.19* 1.00
3 Group Size -0.35* 0.06 1.00
4 Chat session 0.10 0.23 0.04 1.00
* Significant at 0.05 level

sion analysis to conduct a change in R square test. found a weak positively significant correlation be-
The result of this analysis is presented in Table 3. tween the overall interaction and the grade weight
(table 1). But a more powerful regression analysis
Overall Interaction and Group Size failed to find any significant unique contribution
made by this variable in explaining the variation
The size of groups is an important element of the in the dependent variable (Table 3). Hence, the
success of the online learning process (Learning grade weight assigned to the discussions was not
Team Handbook, 2003). A unique feature of online a significant predictor of the overall interactions
education is its capability to support the interactive among students. This result contradicts the views
group process (Gusky, 1997). This study found of Jiang & Ting (2000) who found a significant
a significantly negative relationship between the positive correlation among discussion grade
overall interaction and group size (tables 1 & 2). weight and students’ perceived learning.
Hence, the overall interaction among students was
higher when the group size was small which sup- Overall Interaction and
ports the fact that smaller virtual learning groups Differences In Disciplines
build synergistic learning efforts among students
in online courses (Scarnati, 2001). In this study the researcher selected sample courses
from 4 different disciplines. Ten courses each
Overall Interaction and Grade from Colleges of Business, Arts & Sciences and
Weight For Discussion Education and 9 courses from College of Health
Sciences were included. The results showed that
Online courses included in this study incorporate a the Health Sciences courses had a higher overall
threaded discussion element in their courses with interaction per student per week then the other dis-
a varying grade weight assigned to it. This study ciplines but the differences in interaction between

Table 3. Summary of regression analysis for understanding the individual unique contributions of the
independent variables in predicting the overall interactions per student per week (N = 117)

Excluded variable Change in SE Change in R2 F-statistic Df (n,d) p-value VIF

Discipline 0.18 0.10 4.96 (3,110) 0.003 1.84
Group Size 0.10 0.05 6.77 (1,110) 0.011 1.28
Grade Weight 0.01 0.01 1.64 (1,110) 0.20 1.31
Chat Session 0.01 0.01 0.56 (1,110) 0.457 1.12

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Developing Learning Communities

Table 4. Summary statistics for overall interaction

CONCLUSION
per student per week for the different disciplines

College Mean SD This study began by asking “do the instructional

A&S 3.42 2.03
design elements and the discipline area impact the
Business 2.81 1.35
overall interaction among learners as defined by
Education 5.71 2.77
the number of learner-learner interactions?” The
following conclusions can be drawn on the basis
Health Science 7.36 6.16
of analysis done:

• Design Elements:
Education courses and Health sciences courses
1. There is a statistically significant nega-
was not significant (Table 4). The researcher did
tive relationship between group size
not find any literature that researched this vari-
and overall interaction. The smaller is
able in the past.
the group size, the higher is the overall
interaction.
Overall Interaction and Use of Chat
2. There is no statistically significant
Sessions
relationship between the grade weight
for threaded discussions and the overall
This study failed to find any significant relation-
interaction.
ship between use of chat sessions and overall
3. There is no statistically significant
interactions (tables 1 & 2), which is in direct con-
relationship between use of chat ses-
trast to the views of Rohfeld & Hiemstra (1995),
sions and overall interaction, i.e. the
who concluded that chat sessions are important
interactivity in an online class does not
to build a friendly and social environment which
depend on the use of chat sessions.
fosters learning.

Figure 2. Distribution of the overall interaction per student per week for the four disciplines

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 Developing Learning Communities

• Discipline: 6. A future study may be conducted on simi-

4. The differences in discipline made a lar lines using non-parametric estimation
unique contribution in predicting the techniques.
overall interactions, i.e. the interactiv-
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Limniou, M., Papadopoulos, N., & Whitehead,
C. (2008). Integration of simulation into pre- Distance Education: In this dissertation
laboratory chemical course: Computer cluster refers to “online delivery of education to remote
versus WebCT. Computers & Education, 52(1), locations, using either or both synchronous and
45–52. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2008.06.006 asynchronous delivery of course content” (Dis-
tance Education at Postsecondary Education
instructions: 1997-1998). In this research project,
Distance Education does not include correspon-
dence or broad-cast based education.

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Face-to-Face Learning: Refers to teaching between the learner and the instructor (Moore &
and learning that occurs when both teachers and Kearsley, 1996).
students are confined within a single room. Learner-Learner Interaction: Refers to the
Instructional Design Elements: Refer to the human interaction consisting of two-way com-
components of a course that facilitate learning. For munication between one learner and other learners
the purpose of this study 3 different instructional (Moore & Kearsley, 1996).
design elements will be considered: Group size, Traditional Courses: Refers to the courses
grade weight assigned to threaded discussions, essentially taught in a face-to-face classroom
and use of chat sessions. environment but may use some web-based tech-
Learner-Instructor Interaction: Refers to the nology to support the course content.
human interaction consisting of communication

This work was previously published in Strategic Pervasive Computing Applications: Emerging Trends, edited by Varuna Godara,
pp. 280-294, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

269
270

Chapter 2.5
Developing Prescriptive
Taxonomies for Distance
Learning Instructional Design
Vincent Elliott Lasnik
Independent Information Architect, USA

INTRODUCTION created a rich variety of effective, efficient, and

very current prescriptions for obtaining specific
There are simple answers to all complex prob- learning outcomes in specific situations (Anderson
lems… and they are uniformly wrong. -- H.L. & Elloumi, 2004; Marzano, 2000; Merrill, 2002a;
Mencken Nelson & Stolterman, 2003; Reigeluth, 1999a;
Shedroff, 1999; Wiley, 2002), to date, no single
One of the central problems and corresponding theory-grounded and research-verified unifying
challenges facing the multidisciplinary fields of taxonomic scheme has successfully emerged to
distance learning and instructional design has been address all existing and potential educational
in the construction of theory-grounded, research- problems across the phenomena of human learn-
based taxonomies for prescribing what particular ing and performance.
strategies and approaches should be employed
when, how, and in what combination to be most
effective and efficient for teaching specific knowl- BACKGROUND
edge domains and performance outcomes. While
numerous scholars and practioners across a wide Descriptive taxonomies developed in educational
range of associated instructional design fields have theory and practice have provided rich organi-
zational schema for classifying the structure of
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch205 conditions for learning describing the approaches,

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Developing Prescriptive Taxonomies for Distance Learning Instructional Design

types, events, methods, and goals of instruction clustered, and systemized. We group experiences,
(Gagne, 1977). While affective and psychomotor using some kind of framework, paradigm…sche-
capabilities have gained increasing importance ma, summary, matrix, model, unit, brief, diagram,
(Krathwohl, Bloom& Masia, 1964, Martin & category, concept, hierarchy, grid, or outline. We
Briggs, 1986), classic instructional design theory use hierarchies, superordination and subordina-
has tended to focus on the cognitive domain, as tion…All these terms indicate a linking, a relating
exemplified by the widely adopted hierarchical of experience on the basis of their differences and
taxonomies of Bloom (1956) and Gagne, Briggs, likenesses. Process and product, form and content
and Wager (1992). There have been serious efforts become fused, structured. (pp. 82-83)
to revise and update Bloom’s Taxonomy with the
applied focus towards more specific and pragmatic Human learning and the collateral forma-
“best practice” teaching strategies in instruction tion, representation, acquisition, generation, and
(Anderson, Krathwohl, Airasian, Cruikshank, creation of knowledge in the mind of the learner
Mayer, Pintrich, et al., 2000). However, few cor- are unquestionably immensely ill-structured and
respondingly robust prescriptive taxonomies have complex human problems (Reigeluth, 1999b).
emerged to encompass the optimal design solu- Philosophers and scholars have explored, for
tions for distance education and online e-learning ages, questions of ontology and epistemology,
professions. This article examines the critical is- and numerous competing schools of thought
sues involved with understanding the nature and (i.e., instructional design paradigms) have devel-
function of prescriptive educational taxonomies oped across a wide array of knowledge domains
for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of (Richey, 1986; Visscher-Voerman & Gustafson,
rigorous instructional design solutions adaptable 2004). The enactive, intentional, unifying higher-
and applicable to the burgeoning field of online order problem-solving endeavor is design itself,
learning, user-centered design, and technologi- and numerous universal principles, exemplars,
cally distributed distance learning environments. and epitomes of design have emerged (Lidwell,
Holden, & Butler, 2003). “Designing is, therefore,
more than ordering and arranging, more than con-
MAIN FOCUS: INSTRUCTIONAL structing. It is composing. It is using the codes and
TAXONOMIES - WHAT THEY pattern languages of a domain to create wholes
ARE AND WHY THEY MATTER with not only parts and relationships but also
ordering-underlying principles (Rowland, 2004,
In his hallmark narrative work on the complexities p. 40).” Critical in this human design process for
of successfully building a learning environment, instruction are systems thinking, creativity and
media pioneer Edgar Dale identified important evaluative judgment, metacognitive awareness,
considerations for the development of any pre- and the seemingly paradoxical nurturance for an
scriptive taxonomy for instruction, as well as this eclectic, broad-minded tolerance for ambiguity
encyclopedia broadly conceived: while simultaneously possessing a pragmatically
strong drive towards tangible closure (i.e., deliv-
Indeed product and process must not be sepa- erables) in the design activity (Lasnik, 2003b).
rated, any more than we would separate form To illustrate the relative complexity of this phe-
and content…A major issue in all learning deals nomenon, an easy-to-grasp architectural analogy
with the processes by which learning experiences is provided in Table 1.
become structured, organized, mapped, patterned,

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Table 1. Simple analogical model of e-learning environments

BUILDING ARCHITECTURE E-LEARNING ARCHITECTURE

Buildings, structures, bridges Courses, scope & sequence (curricula)
Macrodesign form, leitmotif, treatment Instructional design approaches/models
Purpose & function of building Information design
Properties of materials Media design
Patterns of interior/exterior space Interactivity design
Structure lifecycle (repair, modification) Iterative courseware design (improvement)
Settlements, zones, cities Lesson activities, modules, units
Power, water, air, transportation Courseware management infrastructure

First Principles of Prescriptive whether a verifiable unified theory of learning

Theory: The Taxonomic Function and instruction can be found, is even desirable,
and ultimately whether learning, instruction, and
The critical problem of taxonomic formulation is the active construction of knowledge are even
to provide a cogent, comprehensive, conceptual truly capable of a single, complete prescriptive
model of phenomena that is (a) dynamic (capable taxonomic classification. It is the premise of this
of change), and robust (representing all relevant article that such a comprehensive architecture
attributes) without being reductionist, and (b) will one day emerge.
parsimonious (graspable, usable) without be-
ing an oversimplification. Two broadly adopted Learning Taxonomies:
exemplars are the classification schemes of Carl Envisioning the Problem Space
Linnaeus (i.e., his 1735 System Naturae that
evolved into modern biology’s kingdom, phylum, Ideally, descriptive instructional schema can
class, order, family, genus, and species schema) support the diagnostic function, and prescriptive
and Dmitrii Mendeleev (i.e., his 1889 Periodic schema can support the remedial, corrective func-
Law of the Chemical Elements that evolved into tion in the teaching/learning enterprise. The under-
today’s Periodic Table). Mendeleev’s perspica- lying rationale for hybrid descriptive-prescriptive
cious insights into the nature of atomic structure taxonomies for instruction is (a) to demonstrate
arguably rank him with Albert Einstein as the that content and method are inextricably linked
paradigm-shifting geniuses of modern science. and are synergetic (i.e., mutually reinforcing
Moreover, the Periodic Table has provided a uni- entities that create a combined, holistic design
fied scaffolding between the detailed description alloy greater than either in isolation), and (b) to
of matter and the effective prediction about how provide a powerfully eclectic, flexible foundation
that matter will behave. In other words, a single, of a more effective and efficient design solution
well-organized, seemingly simple diagram in fact for particular e-learning requirements.
illustrates a highly sophisticated metageography Well-constructed taxonomic models should
literally encompassing the known universe and clearly and unambiguously represent all of
simultaneously explaining how all matter within the important concepts and principles (change
that universe will interact (Atkins, 1995). This is relationships) in a knowledge domain, in this
the fundamental character of prescriptive theory: case connecting instructional activities (inputs)
the power to explain and to predict. It is arguable to learning performance (outputs). An effective

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taxonomy can present a metatheory of the in- Each of the taxa may also be comprised of various
structional design problem space complete with levels of subcomponents: for example, rules are
a detailed map of the possible routes between logical control structures containing prepositions,
the origin and the destination. Moreover, Bertin concepts are logical schema containing critical
(1981) emphasized that: attributes and variable attributes, principles are
predictive change relationships containing static
In considering hypotheses and methods, it is and dynamic concepts, laws combine into theo-
necessary to envisage the whole problem. The ries, and theories become explanatory systems.
matrix analysis of a problem is a process which Viewed as layers of an onion, the organizational
enables us to see the whole…and to “foresee” the structure focuses on progressively smaller, less
possible choices and their repercussions. (p.17) abstract units from higher-order macrolevel down
to lower-order microscopic dimensions. More sub-
Therefore, the use of a taxonomic table or stantive taxonomic layers describe superordinate
diagram can serve as a representational schema and subordinate rules, superordinate and subor-
displaying both a heuristic method and an osten- dinate concepts, superordinate and subordinate
sible design strategy. Such a model could enhance principles, superordinate and subordinate laws,
the e-learning repertoire of distance teachers and and coherent, integrated, unifying theories that
contribute to their ability (a) to systematically subsume the descriptive taxa of rules, concepts,
define the educational problem (i.e., the content principles, and laws. These perspectives are con-
to be taught, the specific needs of the students, gruent with the salient dimensions of modularity,
and the intended performance outcomes), and (b) granularity, and combinatorial flexibility that have
to produce an appropriate instructional design emerged in the evolving definitions of learning
solution. Unfortunately, much of what constitutes objects (Merrill, 2002b; Wiley, 2002).
secondary and college-level instruction continues
to be predominantly receptive learning approaches The Emergence of the Postmodern
that separate content from method and disembody Knowledge-Based Curriculum
information into predigested, decontextualized,
abstract chunks that are easy to deliver but pro- Existing education and training curricula that rein-
vide little scaffolding for meaningful learning force the artificial division between information’s
(Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000; Lasnik, purpose, structure, and the student’s firsthand
1988, 2003a; Mayer, 1989, 1999; Perkins & Unger experiences within that information are vestiges
1999; Shuell, 1986). of an earlier learning paradigm that is no longer
relevant or effective in the postmodern e-learning
Levels of Complexity in environment. In fact, this is one of the principal
Taxonomic Design flaws in Benjamin Bloom’s (1956) widely adopted
cognitive taxonomy: the Industrial Age percept
Complexity levels are key to the development of of knowledge as the mere acquisition, storage,
any robust taxonomy, but levels of cognitive, affec- and retrieval of passive information is placed at
tive, or sensory-motor complexity may or may not the foundation level of the entire scheme! Ide-
directly translate to levels of difficulty and achieve- ally, perceiving knowledge itself as an integrated,
ment in the learning experience. In course design learner-centered design process can ameliorate this
architectures, simple taxonomies are often created disconnect and may serve to narrow the mind’s
to describe categories and subcategories of topics gap between inert information and applicable,
covered in the course (Posner & Rudnitsky, 2001). useful, and most critically transferable knowledge

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(diSessa, 1977). The bridge between static infor- fectively (i.e., successfully and robustly), and
mation and dynamic, transferable knowledge is efficiently (i.e., optimizing time, cost, and human
more soundly built on authentic competency and resources) taught.
performance ability across a range of analytical,
practical, and creative domains (Howard, McGee, Experiential Learning Models:
Shin, & Shia, 2001; Perkins & Unger, 2001). From the Student’s Perspective
Dale’s (1972) insightful systems view of how
people learn also conveys the underlying ratio- Edgar Dale’s widely known Cone of Experience
nale for designing instruction around practical, (Dale, 1954) is an exemplar of a simplified but
functional conceptual schema: parsimonious hybrid taxonomy that synthesizes
both descriptive and prescriptive domains. Con-
In mastering any subject, in learning to learn, ceptually modeling a progressive spiral curriculum
we must map the field, note its basic principles, of media and learning types, Dale’s Cone (author’s
its key ideas and vocabulary, and its conceptual interpretive update with significant modifica-
structure. For example, no sensible person stud- tions as shown in Figure 1) juxtaposed specific
ies the automobile by first trying to master the educational technologies with cognitive change,
names of all its parts. Instead, he thinks in terms effectively providing a descriptive hierarchy where
of systems—ignition, fuel, transmission, braking, the level of increasing engagement with the active
and so on. In each of these classes are meaning- learner predicts deeper learning and acquisition
fully related concepts…The crux of learning is to of transfer. From the perspective of granularity
develop a conceptual scheme. (p. 52) with learning objects, Dale’s learner-centered
system uses large, aggregate technologies/levels
Perkins (1992) has further elaborated on the across a spectrum from more inert, static, abstract,
prescriptive practices that can contribute to a more expository-declarative materials (e.g., texts,
effective and efficient instructional design across lectures, audio and video recordings) to more dy-
the curriculum from pedagogy to androgogy. Pre- namic, concrete, discovery-experiential activities
viously, Perkins (1986) had deftly proposed the (e.g., field trips, discussions, and participatory,
intriguing, powerful metaphor of knowledge as collaborative learning projects).
design in constructing first principles of empiri-
cal (i.e., discovery-driven) teaching and learning. An Experiential Learning Taxonomy
This is a reflective, recursive, parsimonious, and
practical taxonomy with both descriptive (of While variations on this theme have emerged
product and process) and prescriptive (the inquiry- across the literature (Anders, 1999; Reigeluth,
based learning activities) dimensions based upon 1983, 1999b; Richey, 1986; Shedroff, 1999;
four fundamental questions about the nature of Stolovich & Keeps, 2002; Wiley, 2002), the
a particular design: (a) what is its purpose?; (b) essential principles easily map into a cohesive
what is its structure?; (c) what are model cases of topography (See Table 2) like a broad continent
it?; and (d) what are arguments that explain and with two opposing coasts unified by the general
evaluate it? By carefully addressing each of these observation that all learning is experiential and
post-Socratic interrogatories, both descriptive and occurs across a wide multileveled continuum
predictive components of concepts, principles, proceeding from—to.
objects, and systems can be understood in the
broader educational context and conversely, ef-

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Figure 1. A 21st century update of Dale’s Cone of Experience Taxonomy (Lasnik, 2006)

Applying Prescriptive Taxonomies to with other perspectives about how people learn
Instruction (Allessi & Trollip, 1985; Bransford et al., 2000;
Mayer, 1983; Merrill & Tennyson, 1977; Perkins,
Prescriptive taxonomies attempt to address how 1986; Screven, 1999) leads logically to a pragmatic
specific learning types and capabilities can be prescriptive matrix constructed in Table 3:
enabled and achieved by which corresponding
experiences. In recently examining the affordances Integrating Cognitive and Affective
and medial qualities of interactive game-based Domains
learning, Prensky (2000) posited a basic set of
learning types (i.e., intended outcomes) and cor- Conventional didactic classroom instruction in
responding learning experiences (i.e., facilitating secondary and postsecondary institutions has
interventions). Extrapolating these observations been predominantly focused on the delivery of

Table 2. Selected summary of experiential learning dimensions

More passive learning to more active learning More expository/delivery to more discovery/inquiry
More abstract concepts to more concrete activities Less learner control to more learner control
From parts/components to wholes/systems Teachers on top to teachers on tap
Deductive rules to inductive processes Sage on the stage to guide on the side
Isolated part-tasks to situational whole-tasks Less interactivity to greater interactivity
Rule-learning practice to problem-oriented Surface learning to deeper learning
Independent facts to inter-dependent contexts Extrinsic rewards to intrinsic value
Convergent thinking to divergent thinking Lower order thinking to higher order thinking
Well-defined problems to ill-defined problems Telling/showing/listening to doing/making/acting
More algorithmic solutions to more heuristic design Less creativity to greater creativity
Less learning transfer to greater learning transfer Receptive learning to applied learning
More quantitative data analysis to more qualitative observation & Knowledge of results to constructive/remedial feedback
evaluation

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Table 3. Descriptive learning types & prescriptive experiences matrix

LEARNING TYPES LEARNER EXPERIENCES

(Learn this) (By doing this)
Facts, information, declarative knowledge Drill, repetition, memorization, viewing data
Skills, performance capabilities/competencies Practice part/whole tasks, receive coaching & training, continual
hands-on practice
Concepts, rules, associations, classifications Identify attributes, view multiple examples & non-examples, compare
& contrast
Principles, change relationships, correlations, critical paths, inheri- Critical thinking, analyze & synthesize data patterns across x/y dimen-
tances & comparison & contrast across time dimensions & functions sions; create concept maps, fault-trees and troubleshooting protocols
Procedures, processes, cause-effect reasoning Deconstruct problem or process into component parts, sub-systems,
beginning & goal states; analyze independent & dependent variables,
inputs & outputs; map IF-THEN logical control structures; identify
functionality & model cases; “work the problem” & “follow the data”
Systems, theorems, explanatory schema Reflective inquiry & observation; conduct experiments, formulate &
test hypotheses, understand tradeoffs & interdependencies; search for
patterns, create conceptual models
Creativity, innovation, novel & original ideas, resourcefulness, collab- Divergent thinking, team role-playing, problem-solving, simulation
orative decision-making, resolving complex, ill-structured problems games, group design tasks; “break set”, brainstorm, generate alterna-
tives, challenge assumptions, take calculated risks

“content” as abstract information and, at best, Identifying Critical Attributes of

employs critical thinking, reflective thinking, col- Taxonomic Philosophy
laborative learning, and creative problem solving
as ancillary scaffolding activities to ostensibly For any instructional taxonomy, it is essential to
engage learners to acquire this predominantly identify the core epistemological assumptions un-
declarative knowledge. Convergent thinking as- derlying the categorization scheme. The cognitive-
sessments generally designed for administrative constructivist pedagogical approaches all appear
convenience are then often employed to evaluate to recognize the following broad observations:
how well this specific content has been absorbed. (a) Real-world knowledge develops from active,
This instrumentalist paradigm tends to dilute the authentic (i.e., realistic, actual), and engaging
essential role of thinking, reflection, and both experiences within personally meaningful con-
creative and technical communication (e.g., writ- texts; (b) this knowledge is cross-disciplinary,
ing, composition, art) emphasized in exemplary multisensory, multidimensional, and problem-
constructivist course design, and has the additional oriented; and (c) the principle inner experience
onus of reinforcing a surface approach towards of learning is discovery-driven, meaning-seeking,
all instruction and learning (Nickerson, Perkins, sense-making, goal-based and intrinsically self-
& Smith, 1985; Perkins, 1992; Perkins & Unger motivating towards the actualization of achieve-
1999). ment and competency (Lasnik, 1999).
Stolovich (1978) and Stolovich and Keeps Rather than emphasizing abstract, iconic,
(2002) have engineered a variety of interesting conventional, static, and redundant expository
and helpful ways of addressing prescriptive ap- descriptions of various empirical phenomena on
proaches in education and training. A sample of an idiosyncratic case-by-case basis, the teaching
their integrated “learner-centered, performance- of concepts and principles are better founded on
based” strategies for instructional media is outlined a deeper level of human cognitive processing.
in Table 4. All robust learning is viewed as operational and

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Table 4. Modified Learning Element & Instructional Method Taxonomy (Significantly enhanced while
broadly adapted from Stolovich 1978, and Stolovich and Keeps 2002)

LEARNING ELEMENT INSTRUCTIONAL METHOD

Environmental The learner activity provides non-abstract, real-world contexts in which the skills are to be applied. Employ
actual case studies, local events, conditions, and current problems to engage learners, augment direct rel-
evance, and connect learning to application.
Enhancement In teaching a procedural task, the supporting media should clearly and unambiguously show each of the steps
during the demonstration of the skilled performance from start through goal. Learners should be provided
opportunities to replicate tasks and practice skills to enhance their performance mastery/competence.
Examples In teaching a concept or principle, the media provide a divergent set of examples and non-examples across
a range of complexity, difficulty, and thinking skill (lower to higher) dimensions. Opportunity to compare &
contrast independent and dependent attribute variables will support identification & generalization.
Instructions The training provides directions given in the procedure or process that ensure the learner will follow them,
including part tasks & whole tasks. Instructions and remedial help should be aligned and embedded (context-
sensitive) to task performances.
Summary The training provides summaries of the principles and procedures taught in the lesson and module. Sum-
marize and organize rules, concepts, unifying theory, and best practices to be used as job aids (performance
mnemonics) and cognitive strategy scaffolds.
Enrichment The media facilitate logical opportunities to go beyond the specific instructional objectives of the module
without interfering with its essential focus. Provide supplemental “value added” media resources and ad-
ditional opportunities for applying new knowledge through advanced projects, creativity, & collaboration.

experiential in nature: that is, by doing tasks, acterized by an impersonal disengagement and
hands-on activities, experiments, comparisons extrinsic motivation toward learning tasks, little
of examples and non-examples, individual and interest in integrating new knowledge with prior
group interactive role-playing simulations and knowledge, concern about the duration of learning
tasks-manipulating attributes, and rule parameters, tasks, and the reliance on memorization to learn
variables, and constants. These firsthand, inquiry- new material. Conversely, a student with a deep
driven, inductive reasoning, heuristic-based approach towards learning develops a personalized
approaches are particularly vital for compelling engagement and intrinsic enjoyment in learning
distance-learning educational experiences requir- tasks, interest in integrating new knowledge with
ing reproducible outcomes in improved thinking prior knowledge, and the search for hypotheses,
skills, longer retention and integration of content, explanations, and meaningfulness in new material
and a better transfer to on-the-job task performance (Biggs & Rihn, 1984). This observation is critically
(Dede, 2002; Lasnik, 1988; Schank, Berman, & important to the future design and development of
Macpherson, 1999). effective e-learning courseware because instruc-
tion emphasizing heavily expository delivery of
Deep vs. Surface Approaches information, content that students can acquire
Toward Learning perhaps more efficiently on their own via books,
Web sites, libraries, in the field on their own),
Insufficient serious attention to the problematic reduces the power of the online communication
effects of the dichotomy between deep learning and environment to a mere convergent thinking fun-
surface learning continues to plague educational nel. Meaningful deep learning can be facilitated
policy and practice worldwide. A student with a by appropriate levels of thoughtfully designed
surface approach towards learning maintains an interaction between students and teachers, students
instrumentalist view towards coursework char- and content, and student peer-to-peer communica-

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tion. Moreover, “the challenge for teachers and motivational, growth-fostering components of
course developers working in an online learning the learning intervention and learner’s transfor-
context is to construct a learning environment mation (Keller, 1983). Their inclusive model of
that is simultaneously learning centered, content media acts as an instructional catalyst, a dynamic
centered, community centered, and assessment scaffolding between passive and active realms
centered” (Anderson, 2004; p. 50). much like the muscles of the forearm provide the
medial function of motion between the (active)
A Learner-Centered Media Taxonomy brain and the (passive) bones of the ulna and
radius. These metacognitive media models are
Bruce and Levin (1997) proposed a four-part defined by their respective functions for inquiry,
user-centered instructional media taxonomy based communication, construction, and expression, and
broadly on the well-known learner-centric Pro- apply prescriptive activities and experiences for
gressive pedagogical philosophy of John Dewey. their attainment. An expanded synopsis of their
Like Dewey, their organizational schema places taxonomy is shown in Table 5:
the conventionally central roles of both technol-
ogy and traditional “content domain” disciplines Teaching Learners Heuristic
into the background, and elevates the individual’s Reasoning
intrinsic interests and social learning needs into
the focal plane of the educational experience. Heuristic principles and strategies are ostensibly
In particular, they emphasize the constructivist at the heart of all meaningful instructional design
notion of technology as media: reconceptual- treatments. The word origin is heuriskein, the
izing learning activities as well as hardware and Greek term for “to discover, find.” It is the source
software infrastructure as enabling, mediational, of Archimedes proverbial “Eureka!” (i.e., I have

Table 5. Media Taxonomy for Inquiry, Communication, Construction, & Expression (modified from
Bruce & Levin, 1997)

MEDIA LEARNING FUNCTION PRESCRIPTIVE LEARNER EXPERIENCES

INQUIRY 1. Theory-building; media for thinking: visualization, simulation, procedural & parametric
modeling, knowledge representation schemes
2. Data-mining: online libraries, hypertext tools, accessing digital media assets, databases of
audio, video, text, voice, music, graphics
3. Data-collection: active audio/video recording, remote real-time scientific data acquisition
tools, tablet PCs
4. Data-analysis: environments for inquiry, hypothesis testing, statistical search for patterns,
make tables, graphs, diagrams, matrixes to model problems, inter-relationships
COMMUNICATION 1. Design & produce communication artifacts: outlining ideas, arguments, writing clear & com-
pelling documents, creating presentation materials, persuasive use of text & visuals
2. Collaborative synchronous & asynchronous media: threaded discussions, computer conferenc-
ing, email, blogs, wikis, podcasts, listservs, online journaling, multiuser domains
3. Teaching & training multimedia: instructional simulations, telementoring, tutoring, coaching
CONSTRUCTION Student goals: build and make things; similar to Communication function but learner experienc-
es are designed to produce tangible, transportable multiple media artifacts for use in portfolios,
Web sites, software applications, tools and affordances to affect, influence, and impact physical,
intellectual, and cultural worlds
EXPRESSION The uniquely personal creative design function: original, self-expressive writing, scripting,
music composing, 2-D & 3-D drawing, painting, animation, video, digital photography, Web
design, interactive multimedia microworlds, and so forth.

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found it!) exclamation. Heuristic techniques and problems rather than a single problem, and
devices, far more than mere “rules of thumb” should engage students at the problem or
in the problem-solving vernacular, profoundly whole task level and not just the operation
assist discovery and guide further investigation. or action levels.
Insightful, deftly employed heuristic pedagogies 2. The courseware should attempt to activate
can designate “the educational method in which relevant prior knowledge or experience. This
the student is allowed or encouraged to learn is the precursor to a learner’s acquisition
independently through his own investigation.” of transfer skills, and recognizes the need
(Morris, 1976, p. 620). In other words, heuristic to scaffold learning activities between the
design principles are at the epicenter of every deep gap of prior knowledge and new knowledge.
learning-centered environment. For example, a Also, appropriate online help and coaching
cognitive-constructivist prescription for an e- should also be provided, but the need for
learning course might redesign, reformulate, and assistance should gradually be diminished
restructure content from the learner’s perspective, as the new skills/knowledge are successfully
or more precisely, based upon how people actu- acquired. The courseware activities should
ally learn (Bransford et al, 2000). There would direct learners to recall, relate, describe, or
be no arbitrary arrangement of course structure apply knowledge from relevant past experi-
or metacurriculum, but one carefully organized ence as a foundation for their new knowl-
around logical, intuitive, organic patterns and edge. For example, embed the use of ana-
models of knowledge acquisition within the par- logical and inductive reasoning from prior
ticular subject or discipline. Heuristic courseware examples/cases as scaffolds for improved
focuses the affordances of the online environment transfer to the newly encountered situations
on the learner as user, the learner as client, and or problems. These analogies should help
ultimately on the experiential transactions between learners recall or form appropriate structures
the dyads of learner-teacher, learner-learner, for organizing the new knowledge, thereby
and learner-content. An exemplary prescriptive augmenting new schema formation and
instructional-design scheme superbly adaptable to concept acquisition.
distance-learning courseware can be applied from 3. The courseware should show examples of
the five “First Principles for Effective Instruction” (demonstrate the new skill) what is to be
(Merrill, 2002) as summarized and elaborated in learned rather than merely tell information
the following five paragraphs: about what is to be learned. For active learn-
ers, showing is better than telling and doing is
1. The courseware should be presented in the better than showing (principle 4 following),
context of real-world problems. This is one and knowledge goal-state exemplars need
of the premises of problem-oriented learning. to be as explicit and as concrete as feasible
It is also helpful to clarify the importance (i.e., clearly show learners the task they
of integrating concepts within realistic con- will be able to do or the problem they will
texts and demonstrable learning outcomes. be able to solve as a result of completing a
Learner activities should utilize a range module or course), applying an appropri-
of problem difficulty and complexity that ate use of media to reinforce, supplement,
gradually reduces the need for scaffolding as complement, augment, enhance, clarify, and
competency increases across problem types. scaffold learning. The kind of showing is
The activities might involve a progression of important (i.e., examples and non-examples

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for concepts; demonstrations for procedures; vidual student practice of skills is suggested
visualizations for processes; and modeling in principle 4, this principle requires learners
for behavior). to reflect on, discuss, defend, and demon-
4. Learners should have an opportunity to strate their new knowledge in some public
practice and apply their newly acquired or semipublic capacity (e.g., online forums,
knowledge or skill, consistent with the learn- threaded discussions, wikis, blogs, etc.).
ing objectives. This learner demonstration Finally, the e-learning experience should
of transfer competency should be routinely also provide an opportunity for learners to
occurring throughout the instructional inter- create, invent, or explore new and personal
vention and not only at the end of instruction ways to use their new knowledge or skill (See
(summative finals). It is a core instructional parallel with Communication, Construction,
design practice to facilitate congruence and & Expression functions of Bruce & Levin,
alignment between learner practice activi- 1997).
ties and measured performance criteria used
to evaluate learning attainment. Also, the While it is true that the practice of instruc-
courseware should ideally require learn- tional design involves more than consideration
ers to solve a varied sequence and range for these “first principles,” per se, a judicious
of difficulty of problems while receiving application of these guidelines to the iterative
corrective (i.e., remedial) feedback on information-interactivity-media design process of
their performance. Moreover, the kind of learner-targeted products like immersive real-time
practice (i.e., doing) is very important in educational simulations, and both synchronous and
prescribing what specific activities are most asynchronous distributed courseware would osten-
beneficial for various learning objectives: sibly accommodate the needs of as many learners
(a) Information-about practice requires as possible and in effect, meet or exceed many
learners to recall or recognize information; of the collateral concerns about the economic,
(b) Parts-of practice requires the learners to engineering, cultural, and environmental impact
locate, name, or describe each component of the prescriptive design solution. Moreover,
part; (c) Kinds-of practice requires learners while these principles are not exhaustive in scope
to identify new examples of each kind; (d) or detail, they provide a helpful starting point for
How-to practice requires learners to perform a pragmatic heuristic evaluation of any online
the skill or procedure; (e) What-happens learning product’s learner experience portfolio.
practice requires learners to predict a con-
sequence of a process given conditions, or Future Trends and Conclusion
to troubleshoot faulted conditions given an
unexpected consequence. Experiential instruction designed for deep-learn-
5. The courseware should provide techniques ing heuristic skills, critical and reflective think-
that encourage learners to integrate (trans- ing, creative problem-solving, and project-based,
fer) the new knowledge or skill into their problem-oriented activities combines a superior
everyday life. This extends the prescrip- educational paradigm with far richer and compel-
tive curriculum from problem-oriented to ling utilization of new media accessible through
project-based activities that foster a deep the computer platform and Web infrastructure
approach towards learning, as described in (Firdyiwek, 1999; Fraser, 2001; Harvey & Lee,
this article. Also, while systematic, indi- 2001). The emergence of theory-grounded and

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research-validated prescriptive taxonomies for achieving this lofty albeit suspect goal. In a new
e-learning instructional design will offer an invalu- and fascinating exploration of the foundations
able contribution to the successful achievement and fundamentals of design competence, Nelson
of this new, comprehensive paradigm in learn- and Stolterman (2003) caution that perhaps the
ing. Anderson (2004) has cautiously observed, most common mistake in systems design “is to
however, that: assume that there are universally ideal systems.
That one size fits all, so to speak. In reality, this
There is no single, right medium of online learn- is never the case (p. 112).”
ing, nor a formulaic specification that dictates It might be just as self-delusional to seek an
the kind of interaction most conducive to learning absolute standard that conclusively and perfectly
in all domains with all learners. Rather, teach- integrates all of the descriptive phenomena and
ers must learn to develop their skills so that they prescriptive practice within a holistic design solu-
can respond to student and curriculum needs by tion paradigm for instruction. It has been a nearly
developing a set of online learning activities that intractable challenge to establish unequivocal
are adaptable to diverse student needs. (Anderson, technical standards across ANY industry, as cur-
2004, p. 54) rent competing specifications for DVD, HDTV,
widescreen format aspect ratios, Web-streaming
While much of “the message” is subsumed formats, SCORM compliance and transportability,
by “the medium,” it is an equally valid proposi- interoperability, reusability, and granularity con-
tion that much of the content is, in actuality, the troversies associated with learning object models
method. This is particularly relevant to incidental continue to rage on. While over time many com-
learning, collateral learning, creative and practi- peting technology systems find some reasonable
cal performance skills, heuristic and procedural accommodation to coexist on some level within
knowledge, and problem-solving transfer capabili- the same universe (e.g., AC and DC, AM and FM,
ties, long after the immediate content of the current Apple and Microsoft), idiosyncratic conceptual
lesson has been forgotten. To this end, pioneering paradigms like learning theories, educational
innovation in the field of distance learning will philosophies, and instructional design models
require a design synthesis towards the deliverable have ultimately “agreed to disagree” in addressing
goal of fully integrated courseware built within a the same, similar, or related issues and problems
research and theory-grounded, learner-centered, from different perspectives. And this is not only
problem-oriented focal architecture based on the intelligent and mature but probably wise, for as
active acquisition of real, transferable skills and the redoubtable learning psychologist and teacher
metastrategies, and authentically assessed perfor- Jerome Bruner posited in his collection of seminal
mance competencies. To the degree that the devel- essays In Search of Mind (1983):
opment and implementation of sound prescriptive
taxonomies for learning can contribute toward I think the best that we can do is get on with it,
this goal, the distance-learning enterprise shall but with a Wittgensteinian skepticism. Learning
lead the educational reform of the 21st century. about each use or facet…will itself be revealing.
Perhaps the most intriguing paradox of the We will delude ourselves if we think it will come
continuous search for a “unified field theory” of out singular and comprehensive. And we make the
instruction is the fallacious premise that it can pursuit less revealing and doubtless less enjoyable
actually be achieved. Despite emerging efforts to if we insist that any one approach…in the one to
create ubiquitous standards of learning achieve- which all others should be reduced. (p. 176)
ment across the curriculum, we are no closer to

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Publications. ity is multifaceted, and can refer to the size of
Stolovich, H. D., & Keeps, E. J. (2002). Telling learning units or scope (e.g., degree or certificate
ain’t training. Alexandria, VA: American Society curricula, courses, lessons, modules, activities);
for Training & Development. learning element prioritization or sequencing (e.g.,
logical order of lessons, concept formation and
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tecture (e.g., superordinate concepts, subordinate comes. While numerous scholars and practioners
concepts, rules, principles); teaching strategy (e.g., across a wide range of associated instructional
individual vs. group learning, passive learner/ design fields have created a rich variety of effective
expository vs. active leaner/discovery, inductive and efficient prescriptions for obtaining specific
vs. deductive, tutorial vs. simulation, abstract vs. learning outcomes in specific situations, to date
problem-oriented, synchronous online chat vs. no single theory-grounded and research-verified
asynchronous threaded discussions, etc.); media unifying taxonomic scheme has successfully
design and utilization (e.g., relative size and emerged to address all existing and potential
complexity of single components or combined educational problems across the phenomena of
components, type of media element including human learning.
text, graphics/visuals, audio, animation, degree of Taxonomy: From the Greek taxis (for ar-
user control, etc.); and learner assessment (e.g., rangement, order) and nomos (law): Every seri-
conventional declarative-convergent testing using ous taxonomy is an organizational scheme that
multiple-choice, matching, and short-answer ques- includes a system representing structure, order,
tions vs. holistic, constructivist-divergent portfo- and relationship. Some form of hierarchical
lios with demonstration work-product artifacts structure is generally defined, but this may be
from individual and group projects, internships, multidimensional and nonlinear in form. The
and service learning). purpose, domain, attributes and granularity of
Hybrid Learning Taxonomy: A comprehen- schema vary, but all taxonomies attempt to pro-
sive organizational scheme in applied learning and vide a robust (i.e., logical, coherent, cohesive,
instructional design theory and practice that inte- internally consistent) architecture. Prominent ex-
grates both descriptive and prescriptive taxonomic amples include the widely adopted schema of Carl
domains. While a number of conceptually useful Linnaeus (biology) and Dmitrii Mendeleev (The
hybrid learning taxonomies have been proposed, Periodic Table of Elements). Most taxonomies
there is, to date, no single, inclusive, unifying contain their own nomenclature for describing the
hybrid taxonomy that effectively synthesizes all taxons (singular) and taxa (plural) that correspond
of the design elements of instruction to sufficient to formal units in the classification scheme, such
practical levels of granularity and application. as kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus,
Instructional Design: An applied, cross- species (adapted from Linnaeus). Taxonomies
disciplinary professional (postgraduate) design may evolve over time. Neither systems of Lin-
discipline that integrates human learning theory naeus or Mendeleev are exactly in the original
and instructional practice to develop, produce, form when they were first presented, but they are
implement, and evaluate effective educational fundamentally and substantially the same in all
experiences and learning environments to improve relevant aspects and overall structure, changing
human performance outcomes, knowledge con- only as our knowledge of science changed over
struction, and the acquisition of robust transfer time to add additional granularity to the taxons
competencies. and taxa of their brilliantly original and enduring
Prescriptive Taxonomy: In educational theory descriptive taxonomies.
and practice, an organizational scheme for specify- User-Centered Design: User-centered (a
ing the optimal and appropriate approaches, types, cognitive/perceptual term) and usage-centered
events, methods, media, strategies, techniques, (a behavioral/functional term) are postmodern
activities, tasks, projects, scope and sequence design descriptors often arbitrarily or ambiguously
of instruction to achieve corresponding specific defined and interchangeably used and misused. In
learning objectives and desired performance out- the context of 21st century instructional product

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design theory and practice, user-centered design and learning outcomes (i.e., the highest level of the
focuses on constructing a user experience and prescriptive taxonomy). Usage-centered design
environment with physical and virtual affordances focuses primarily on the functional goal-based
that are manipulable, controllable, customizable, behavior of learners and structuring activities,
and adaptable from the essential perspective of procedures, processes, and corresponding affor-
the conceptual model of the learner. This means dances to optimize the effectiveness of the learner
both (a) the learner’s metamodel of their own to efficiently accomplish those intrinsic goals. In
learning processes and the learning activities and both of these approaches, however, the conven-
environment, and (b) the designer’s model of the tionally deterministic structure of the content and
learner and the corresponding educational activ- the underlying information architecture of the
ity and experience, with the former driving and knowledge domain are secondary considerations,
superseding the latter in the design solution. Thus, while the learner’s conceptual model and intrinsic
the conceptual model of the learner becomes the goal-driven behavior provide the guiding blueprint
superordinate principle guiding the design process for the instructional design solution.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 616-630, copyright 2009 by
Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.6
Drawing Circles in the Sand:
Integrating Content into Serious Games

Matt Seeney
TPLD Ltd., UK

Helen Routledge
Freelance Instructional Designer, UK

ABSTRACT three stakeholders (game designer, instructional

designer/learning psychologist and subject mat-
One of the most important differentiators be- ter expert), how to manage preconceptions and
tween Commercial Games and Serious Games balance their priorities. The case studies will also
is content; delivered in a way that is successfully show how different methodologies, techniques and
integrated with engaging game play and achieves technology have been applied to help solve this
the desired learning outcomes by delivering skills fundamental challenge of delivering a success-
and knowledge effectively to the end-user. This ful serious game. Advice is provided on how to
ability to integrate content effectively is the key facilitate this process, capture the correct require-
to producing “killer” Serious Games that deliver ments and create a design that meets and exceeds
demonstrable learning outcomes, business benefits the expectations of all the stakeholders involved,
and overall value. However, achieving this nirvana including the client/customer and the end user.
is not a trivial task. Utilising lessons learned and
case studies, this chapter provides an overview of
why this process can be so challenging, including INTRODUCTION
the differing experiences from the perspective of
Much interactive material and training has, in
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch206 the past, consisted of ‘click to turn the page’

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Drawing Circles in the Sand

applications, where the technology was merely studies, this chapter aims to translate practical
used as a delivery tool for the content. Recently experience into lessons learned for the industry
we are seeing more focus on other more inter- when designing and developing serious games
active applications for the technology, moving with diverse subject content.
from a delivery platform to products with actual So why is it so hard? There is also a miscon-
educational significance. The technology can be ception by many new to the industry that serious
used to engage learners and provide experiential games will be successful because they use games
opportunities which learners may not have had technology (Gee, 2005). Simply by forcing content
before. As Kurt Squire explains... “For educators into games technology will not produce an effec-
designing games, this shifts the question from tive learning environment. Commercial off the
one of delivering content to one of designing shelf (COTS) games may act as the motivational
experience” (Squire, 2006, p20). Serious games wrapper, but there is a lot more to achieving real,
are considered to be the new interpretation of tangible learning outcomes than that.
what e-learning can offer, but with the benefits Many claims have been made in the past two
of engaging story lines, player rewards and goals, decades that link real life behaviours to the influ-
and true interaction. ence of video games, and often in a negative light.
Serious games also offer instruction beyond A popular culture reference to the impact video
traditional means of skill and drill, multiple games can have, came from the movie ‘Snakes on a
choice questionnaires and text with fancy graph- Plane’ which depicted a character able to pilot and
ics; however, the skill sets required to develop land a plane safely due to his skills learned from
them are often out of reach of many instructional Microsoft’s Flight Simulator game. This is the
designers and subject matter experts. Therefore a ideal, but rather unrealistic goal of serious games.
partnership is required, forged by the passion of It could be asked, why a training course could
creating something exciting: a learning program not just be taken to create a simulation or a game
that people actually want to complete and come that uses all the learning outcomes? The answer
back to again and again in order to practice and is that most learning is seen in black and white
improve. and is extremely linear. This is the course, this is
Unfortunately it is not as easy as finding a the content, and this is what you will learn. Most
games designer, subject matter expert and an in- training material is created focusing on the ‘What’
structional designer and locking them in a room and not the ‘How’ and this is one of the contrib-
together, expecting a game design within the week. uting factors to high drop-out and low retention
Communicating with someone that speaks a dif- rates of traditional training and e-learning. In
ferent language can be very difficult and shouting most cases, learning outcomes are only achieved
or speaking slowly is not the answer! The serious through facilitation and one to one interaction
games industry is no different. Game designers and with a skilled teacher or trainer; however, this is
instructional designers often speak very different often an inefficient, costly and lengthy process,
languages and have very different requirements. particularly for large numbers of learners. Seri-
Now drawing circles in the sand is a slight ous games are more flexible in the way you can
exaggeration, but communication between each interact with them. You can choose whether to
of the parties involved in serious games design is follow the story line or explore the environment,
one of the major challenges faced by the industry sometimes you are able to choose which missions
going forward; however, it is one that can be you tackle and you can experiment with how you
solved. Using real examples in the form of case choose to play. The learner takes a far more ac-

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tive role with a game than in other, more passive • Stimulate recall of prior learning; where
forms of learning. Quinn (2005) concludes this the individual has to use prior knowledge
nicely: ‘We are not, cannot be, about designing to aid them in the current situation.
content. A fundamental perspective I want you to • Present the content.
take away is that we are designing experiences. • Provide guidance to help the individual;
If nothing else, start thinking not about creating this could take the form of step-by-step in-
content but about designing learner environments structions, for example.
and architecting experiences.’ • Elicit performance; this is achieved through
Serious games must also work in the domain of practice and completing tasks.
learning theory. ‘The use of instructional theories • Provide feedback; this allows the indi-
has been shown to enhance learning, increase vidual to understand areas that need im-
motivation and student achievement’ (Gunter, provement, and also gives them positive,
Kenny, Vick, 2006). Gunter, Kenny and Vick motivating feedback on areas where the
aimed to create a unique design rubric specifi- individual excel, or are improving.
cally conceived for serious games by analysing • Assess performance; which typically oc-
instructional methodologies and comparing them curs through a post-test evaluation, or de-
against current game design ‘best practices’. They briefing session.
conclude instructional strategies must be applied • Enhance retention and transfer; allow-
concurrently to the content development in game ing the learner to generalise the informa-
design, and therefore students would quickly adapt tion they have learnt and apply it to other
to the process of learning and actually enjoy the situations.
conditions under which they learned the concepts.
Piaget (1970), and Vygotsky (1978), both leading Keller (1987) developed the ARCS model of
names in learning psychology, shared the com- motivational design as an alternative to Gagne’s
monality of an interest in the active role a learner events of instruction. Keller proposed four steps,
must play in the learning process, and Vygotsky instead of nine, that could be put in place to pro-
(1978) placed an emphasis on the interpersonal mote and maintain learning; attention, relevance,
aspects of learning, including collaborative group confidence and satisfaction. For Keller attention
work, where he demonstrated students achieved involved both perceptual and inquiry arousal,
higher intellectual levels when working in a group, where inquiry arousal relates to providing ques-
compared to working on their own. tions and problems for the individual, as well as
Gagne (1977) highlighted nine “events of varying the content presented. Relevance referred
instruction” that contributed and facilitated an to achieving goals and matching motives (where
individual’s learning, each of which can easily the learning style of the user and the users inter-
be applied within a serious games environment. ests are matched as closely as possible), whereas
They were: confidence was associated with the learners’ per-
ceived self-control and opportunities for success.
• Gain attention; where the learner’s atten- Satisfaction looked more at the extrinsic rewards
tion is initially grasped by an exciting story (external rewards) and intrinsic reinforcements
line or animation, for example. (internal reinforcements) an individual could gain
• Set out clear learning outcomes; give the from the task. Attention, relevance and confidence
learner a set of instructions or goals that all have a dependence on the content.
they are aiming to achieve.

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UNDERSTANDING CONTENT this issue is. What is certain however is that in

order for more flexible, non-linear user-centred
To understand how to integrate content, one needs content to become the norm, LMS structures
to understand what the content is. Gee (2004) refers must be reconsidered to be relevant in the Web
to this as ‘a central paradox of all deep learning’. 2.0 world (Derryberry, 2007).
Gee analyses the two sides of the coin by arguing Cyclical content is the same action performed
that it will not work to throw the learner into the repeatedly, whilst the action or method is perfected.
deep-end due to a lack of knowledge to leverage Aldrich defines cyclical content as the ‘DNA of
the environment effectively and that the domain video games’ (p26). For example, a user spends
of knowledge needs to be built up over time and hours perfecting micro movements in order to
is a complex process that will be beyond a novice. shave a few seconds off the time left by taking a
This paradox is a concern to both instructors and corner more smoothly.
advocates of immersion. The key as Gee explains Open-ended content refers to content where
is to use “post-progressive” pedagogies that com- there is no right or wrong answer, and two expe-
bine immersion with well-designed instruction; riences are rarely the same. Second Life or The
and one area that is exceeding in this mix is the Sims are good examples of open-ended content
use of Video Games and Simulations. in games.
Just in Time content delivery is easily exploit- Each content category is valid in its own right,
able within games. Shaffer, Squire, Halverson, & and can be used independently; however Aldrich
Gee (2005) have created an emerging model of argues that for any educational game all 3 should
games and propose that they excel by providing be combined, liberally. The authors would argue
learners with situated experiences of activities, that there is a 4th category of content that is well
whereby they develop new ways of thinking, used in games and simulations, which is non-
knowing, and being in ‘Worlds’. linear, branching content that sits somewhere in
It is understood that content is central to a the middle between traditional linear content and
serious game, but what exactly counts as content? completely open-ended content. At the end of the
Aldrich (2004) describes 3 categories of content: day these categories sit on a continuum, rather
Linear, Cyclical and Open-ended content. Each than as discrete classifications.
category requires a different approach. Malone (1981) defines two alternative catego-
Linear content, that of movies, books or ries of content in games: Intrinsic and Extrinsic.
television is most familiar to us. It is a recipe The example mentioned above where the movie
that works for entertainment. Most training is character was able to land a plane from playing
also linear: lectures, PowerPoint presentations a simulation in his spare time, is an example of
and most e-learning. Linear content allows most intrinsic content, which is integral to the struc-
online courses to easily be stored in a Learning ture of the game. Achieving success in the game
Management System (LMS). LMS’s are very is equal to learning to fly the plane. Extrinsic
often used in large organisations; however they content, Malone’s second classification, is less
vary immensely from one another. The LMS is tightly linked to the game play, where there is a
the interface between the learning content and the structure which has flexible content, such as quiz
learner, and is the place where the learner’s records shows and question/answer-based role-playing
of achievement are kept. Serious games have no and adventure games. Again, these categories
standard methodology for LMS integration and are not an either/or but a continuum of possible
therefore it is a choice to be made by both the de- options that compliment different content styles.
veloper and customer or client on how important

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Training and e-learning generally use Lin- continuously adapt this balance throughout the
ear Extrinsic content, whereas games can use a game experience. For example, as the learner’s
mixture of all the categories defined above. The familiarity with the content increases, the pre-
challenge is combining each category effectively sentation can become more abstract and the level
with the existing subject matter to produce an ef- of fun or ‘affective experiences’ required can be
fective serious game. Early choices made in the reduced. This inverse relationship highlights the
development cycle will impact the effectiveness reason why simply integrating content into games
of the content and the effectiveness of the game technology will not work: too much instruction
as a learning tool. If the wrong game genre is will ‘suck the fun’ out of the game, but too much
chosen for the wrong content, it is likely that a fun, particularly in an abstract or context-less
poor learning tool will be produced. game environment, can make the learning harder
to contextualize without extensive reflection or a
skilled facilitator.
SYNERGISTIC ALIGNMENT
OF GAME AND CONTENT
METHODOLOGIES IN PRACTICE
We know what content is and we know that certain
types of game suit particular content types. So In their study to create a new instructional design
what are the rules? Prensky (2001) argues that paradigm, Kürşat and Kaplan (2006) concluded
there is no one way for developing applications that instructional design requires teamwork
and that serious games must be created on a case consisting of very diverse skills including, field
by case basis. In his description of game-based knowledge, proficiency in technology, strategic,
learning, he calls out principles of instructional holistic and especially creative thinking abilities,
design, domain or subject knowledge and game project management skills, leadership qualifi-
design. However, as mentioned previously the cations, communication skills, responsibility,
likelihood of success from locking these skill honesty, empathy, professionalism. High-level
sets in a room together, no matter how long for programming knowledge and advanced coding
is minimal. This is a view that is expressed by skills were also required, although these are
many serious games experts. One thing is true, highly specialised skills that are often sought
however, in that the content must be intertwined from experienced computer scientists and game
with the subject matter within the game and usu- developers. They also concluded that the quality
ally with some kind of emotive context. Separated and qualifications of the team members affect
game play from content is merely the carrot on the quality of the instructional system produced.
the stick; the reward completely independent of They emphasised flexibility and a holistic ap-
any learning and is not what the authors would proach to instructional design, where a modular
consider a serious game. approach would be ideal. At the centre of their
The balance of content with affective com- ideal instructional design methodology is pro-
ponents within serious games is a delicate one totyping and evaluation. They defined their own
and in order for the application to be effective, model for instructional design for game based
the right balance must be achieved. Appelman learning entitled the FIDGE Model which stands
& Goldsworthy (1999) argue that to create the for “Fuzzified Instructional Design Development
most effective learning environment, the designer of Game-like Environments” for learning. Within
must balance the content density against the level FIDGE there are is a dominant focus around
of understanding of the content by the user, and context, both in regards to the situation in which

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the instruction takes place, and the socio-cultural the necessary subject content required to
needs of the organisation. deliver these outcomes, often in the form
Most serious games companies, such as TPLD, of processes, decision trees, standard tem-
have no, or very limited, credible direct subject plates/exhibits as well as more traditional
knowledge in many domains. Although when text-based content or character dialogue,
moving into a new area we try to immersive depending on the game genre and content
ourselves in the subject matter and content, we delivery mechanism
do not try to learn everything or become experts
in a condensed timeframe for a particular project We also work hard to ensure that throughout
or product development; rather, we look to engage the process the whole development team assigned
with appropriate and credible subject matter ex- to a project is involved to some level with the
perts, who become integral to the project. design, whether in conceptual brainstorming or
Here are the key participants typically involved reviewing a final idea. This ensures that as the
in a successful Serious Game design process at application is developed, the team are aware of
TPLD: what they are creating and why, which helps give
them a sense of ownership. It also makes it easier
• Game designers: Responsible for recom- for them to know intrinsically what to build, as not
mending the most appropriate game genre everything can always be defined or effectively
and game rules/mechanics for achieving communicated up front.
the desired learning outcomes, creating In software terms we have moved to AGILE
any storylines and defining any characters development over the last year and this too en-
required, as well as designing levels and courages involving the whole team with continual
helping to define the artistic style (although reviews and refactoring through iteration. Taking
this is often done in collaboration with an this one step further, with much of our more re-
experienced artist). cent work we try to create opportunities for our
• Instructional designers/learning psy- developers to see the game actually being used
chologists: Responsible for validating by the target audience, as without this it is often
whether the learning outcomes will be difficult for them to step away from the ‘gamer’
achieved by the proposed game design perspective and move to that of, for example, a
during all stages of development, typically 45 year old executive or a 14 year old high school
including a number of evaluation studies student.
with target end users (ideally throughout
the entire development cycle, through the
use of iterative development methodolo- CASE STUDIES
gies, such as Agile), often working in col-
laboration with the game designer on the Using a number of case studies and examples,
pedagogical aspects of the design, as well the authors now aim to share their first-hand
as ensuring that good learning practices knowledge and experience to better inform those
are being adhered to. TPLD utilise a num- working on serious games, either at present or in
ber of serious games essentials to ensure the future. These case studies range from games
sound pedagogical design. (Routledge and where the content and the game play are com-
Seeney, 2003) pletely seamless, to more context-based simula-
• Subject matter experts: Responsible for tions where the content and game are less tightly
defining the desired learning outcomes and integrated. (Figure 1)

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Figure 1. Case study classification

eQA player’s choices. In reality this situation would

never occur, and the patient would most likely
eQA, which stands for Electronic Quality As- be quarantined in an isolated hospital ward many
surance, was created as a bespoke project for a miles away from the laboratory; however, this
molecular diagnostics company in the UK. The instant feedback mechanism provided some much-
client came to TPLD with a fairly well-defined needed emotional engagement for the player, who
design and script, and we were given the task of (we hoped) would become genuinely concerned
embedding this content within an immersive 3D about the well-being of the patient.
environment, primarily in the form of dialogue The scenario consisted of 4 NPCs for the
interaction between a player avatar and multiple player to interact with, not always present at any
non-player characters (NPCs). point in time. The script we were given for these
After an initial review of the design, we encour- characters was initially very dry and technical and
aged the client to consider adding some further didn’t enable the player to form any emotional or
elements to the game to provide more engagement memorable attachment to the characters. There-
for the target users, who were primarily University fore, another proposed change was to give each
students. These included a laboratory management character extreme personalities, occasionally
aspect, where users must purchase and install lab going as far as major personality disorders. For
equipment, after which required diagnostic tests example, a megalomaniac boss intent on taking
can be performed and some kind of feedback is over the world and a paranoid lab technician, who
given to indicate whether the dialogue, tests and was convinced that everyone was out to get him!
other decisions within the scenario are going This led to some humorous dialogue exchanges
down the correct or incorrect path. The proposed that we felt enhanced the game significantly and
feedback mechanism consisted of a sick patient provided the engagement that was previously
in an adjoining room, who was visible through lacking.
a large window. The patient would gradually Unfortunately these dialogue changes were a
become worse or get better depending on the step too far for the client and many of them were

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removed late in the project; however, some of the decided that because of the importance of getting
character quirks remained and this did enhance the language right (including the appropriate level
the learning experience. Overall we think it would of “Americanisation”), as well as being able to
be fair to say that this game does not represent successfully embed many of the messages from
our most successful attempt to integrate content the SME’s book, the majority of the content would
into the game play in a seamless way. However, be authored by the SME directly, using specific
because the game was primarily dialogue-based, tools and templates for the project.
with scripted NPC movement and basic interaction Due to the globally dispersed nature of the
with objects, it was relatively simple to create a team, this lead to a clearly defined separation be-
game editor to allow some of these aspects to be tween the game play development and the content
easily customised, and even author entirely new creation, with minimal levels of understanding
scenarios using the existing game’s art assets. about each other’s respective disciplines, despite
a number of face to face meetings to try to get
GY$T things back on track when they started going awry.
An experienced game developer was brought in
GY$T, which stands for Get Your Sales Together!, by the content authors to help mitigate this issue,
is another example of a primarily dialogue driven but due to differing ideas and priorities, this solu-
game targeted at sales training and development; tion caused as many problems as it solved from
particularly in a Business-to-Business context. a content perspective (although this individual
This game was a joint product development with made a significant contribution to the technical
an American-based creative learning company design of the game).
and a leading subject matter expert (SME) in the The game was created as a template or shell
field of sales training. for the subject matter content and some excellent
Although the subject matter expert had au- graphical authoring tools were created for the SME
thored a best-selling book and the creative learning to define scenarios and dialogue with NPC’s. A
company had run many sales training workshops, demo scenario with dialogue content designed
there was actually very little content present at the specifically to show off all aspects of the game’s
start of the design process. Therefore, we held a functionality was also created, which included a
series of workshops to step through a typical sales number of powerful concepts that moved it well
engagement process and to identify the desired beyond the typical multi-guess dialogue systems
learning outcomes from the game, as well as listing found in most e-learning simulations and dialogue-
a number of common “traps” that sales people fall based games. A number of guides and tutorials
into, which often lead to an unsuccessful conclu- were also created for the SME to learn how to
sion or lost opportunity. This led to a well-defined use the tools to create the content they desired.
process consisting of a number of steps to close a Unfortunately, the content that was created dur-
sale, including “doing your homework”, “getting ing the lifetime of the project was generally poor
in” and “closing the deal” as well as mapping and made very little use of the powerful features
out a decision making process within the target provided by the game framework. Although the
customer’s organisational structure. dialogue was professional and reasonably engag-
From a content perspective, this naturally led ing, many opportunities were missed due to the
us to the conclusion that a branching scenario, SME’s lack of experience with basic game design
which consisted of a combination of research principles, such as having an appropriate difficulty
and dialogue interaction with the target customer, curve and introducing new features and complex-
was the best way to go. Early in the project we ity slowly over time. A good example was in the

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up-front research phase that required the user to After two examples where the content has
do background research on the target customer in not been particularly well integrated with the
the game. This was supposed to consist of some game play we will now go through another four
basic information to get the user started in the examples where this integration is almost entirely
objective of understanding the customer’s needs seamless, with the content being delivered directly
in order to create an initial communication that through the game play as opposed to via dialogue
included a value proposition to get the company’s or direct simulation.
attention. What actually happened was that over
40 documents needed to be reviewed by the player Contamination!
before they could extract this basic information
and move forward in the scenario. Engaging and This project originated from the same molecular
captivating the audience, within the first 5 minutes, diagnostics company who commissioned the eQA
this certainly was not! Unfortunately the end result project. Due to their previous experience working
became yet another not entirely successful attempt with us on the eQA project, they had been ap-
to seamlessly integrate gameplay and content. proached by a government organisation to create
Our experience with this project and others an immersive 3D simulation for teaching quality
has led us to seriously question and doubt the control processes in laboratories in conjunction
approach of getting a subject matter expert with with a tutorial book. Traditionally this has been
no knowledge of game design principles and best a difficult area to teach, due to the high cost of
practice to directly author game content without getting access to laboratory equipment and the
any consultation and collaboration with a suitable consumables required to perform and practice
intermediary, such as an experienced designer of particular tests. Therefore, a 3D simulation that
serious games. However, over the last couple of accurately modeled the process and outcomes of
years we have seen an increasing trend towards this these tests was a logical solution.
model for content development, particularly with The initial content consisted of a fairly de-
the advent of web 2.0 and its user-generated content tailed walkthrough of the desired scenario and
model. From our perspective, the only place we a decision tree to show the different points in
believe this approach may work is with younger, the process where things could go wrong. Like
game-savvy SMEs (or even school pupils and any simulation, one of the initial questions was
University students) who can effectively balance whether the game would encourage or force the
the game play and content. With tools requiring player to correct a mistake or wait until later in
little of no technical expertise, we believe that the scenario to see the actual impact of the mis-
powerful and engaging learning experiences can take. We strongly encouraged the latter approach,
be created. Designing a serious game also requires along with some supporting information to show
a developer to become completely immersed in the player what they had done wrong in order to
the relevant subject matter, even when an SME is help them improve next time.
involved, which in itself is a very effective learn- Our initial reaction to the content was that
ing process (many of TPLD’s developers are now it provided a very useful starting point for the
experts in molecular diagnostics for example!). game design, but like the previous eQA project,
This is the reason why this type of high-level it was fairly dull, dry and technical, which was
authoring and customisation tool remains core to not appropriate for the intended student audience.
TPLD’s company strategy in relation to content Therefore, we suggested adding an engaging
development. back-story to provide some emotional context to

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the player. Given the nature of the content and • When working in partnership with an SME
desired learning outcomes we suggested setting for more than one project, always be sure
the game in a fictional town where there has been to take on board any lessons learned from
an outbreak of a disease and the player needs to previous projects to ensure a more success-
identify the source of contamination by going ful outcome next time.
through the actual process of testing the samples. • It is often a good strategy to split the seri-
This concept was met with approval and during ous game design phase up into a high level
a face to face meeting with the subject matter design to articulate the overall concept,
experts we were even able to suggest a further game play and walkthrough of the game
embellishment to the story by making the disease to non-technical subject matter experts and
turn everyone in the fictional town into zombies other key project stakeholders.
and using this as a direct feedback mechanism
in the game! Depending on whether the user is Once this has been agreed and signed off then
following the correct process (i.e. if mistakes move into a detailed design phase.
are being made), the zombies will start to attack Concept demonstrators will often be needed
the lab and more people within the town will be throughout the entire design process to help
killed. We also decided to give the player regular communicate concepts and ideas that will not be
updates about the current situation via a series of familiar to non-gamers.
news reports that break up the simulation-based Is important to define any assessment criteria
gameplay. Finally, we were able to integrate a or metrics within the design, as well as tying any
couple of engaging mini-games to provide an game mechanics and content directly back to the
effective metaphor for some of the diagnostic desired learning outcomes, using game genres
tests (these would normally be automated and and an appropriate graphical style for the target
conducted by a machine). The primary reason audience.
that these changes were accepted without ques-
tion was because the subject matter expert was KiddyKare
actually a gamer and one of her favourite games
happened to be House of the Dead! Another rea- KiddyKare was created just before the eQA project
son was because the SME had seen some of the and, unlike any of the previous examples; this was
engagement issues with the eQA project and did developed on a speculative basis rather than for
not want to fall into the same trap. a particular client. The concept was to provide
Overall, despite some quite dry and very an effective marketing tool for suppliers of child
technical content, due to the additional elements safety devices for the home, such as Mothercare.
that were added to the story and game play this The gameplay consists of a typical house on two
was a very effective example of how to integrate levels, with a baby walking and crawling around,
subject matter content with game play to create being drawn towards areas of danger. The user
a powerful learning tool. We have taken many of has an RTS-style view on to the world and can
the lessons learned from this project forward into scroll around without any constraints, trying to
more recent developments, such as: buy and deploy child safety devices before the
baby can injure itself.
• Try to ensure the SME is familiar with Examples include an iron that could fall, an
games and encourage them to play games electrical socket the baby could poke its fingers
and genres that may be relevant to the cur- into, a fire that could burn the baby, a set of stairs
rent project or product development. the baby could fall down and a dog that could get

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a bit over-zealous while playing with the baby. combinations are constantly monitored to assess
Given that the baby was not always in view, the whether certain actions are triggered while the
user had a baby monitor that would sound an game is in a particular state. If a combination is
alarm when the baby was getting close to a haz- fired, the player is given direct and instant feed-
ard, which would prompt rapid deployment of back on their actions by an intelligent coach, with
the correct safety device before the baby got hurt. results summarised at the end of each game in the
However, due to the humorous nature of some of form of a detailed assessment report, including
the injury animations, players often preferred to graphs to show metrics and improvement over
see the effects of not deploying the safety devices time. Combined with a personal learning plan
around the home! framework and an opportunity to debrief con-
Although the game never became a commercial tinually, with the assistance of the coach and a
success, we felt it was a perfect example of how comprehensive replay mode, the game includes
to successfully integrate content and gameplay, all the tools required to become one of the most
and took many of the concepts and lessons learned successful serious games so far.
forward into subsequent products and projects. At the time of writing, we are still finalising
the development of the game, so we cannot state
Winning definitively that it is a successful integration of
content and gameplay; however, all indications
The Winning Game was commissioned by the from pilot activities so far indicate that this is the
Scottish Institute of Sport Foundation and is based case. Perth High School, Scotland, has worked
on a concept and theory devised by a leading with the game’s designers to help modify its design
Israeli-based subject matter expert in Winning and and assist in determining how the game can be ap-
what it takes to become a Winner, called Yehuda plied within a high school environment. The initial
Shinar of Winning Enterprises. The concept and part of the pilot has evaluated the game’s impact
an original computer-based simulator, which on developing a culture of self-improvement and
encapsulated the Winning theory, had been suc- success within the school, both on a personal and
cessfully piloted in a number of market sectors an academic performance level. Feedback from
by Winning Enterprises, but TPLD was given the pupil’s has been very positive, with comments
the task of evaluating its effectiveness in Scot- such as “The in-game coach does help; it teaches
tish Education (primarily at high school level). you to be calm, take time and always give en-
Our initial findings concluded that the concept couragement” and “This is the first game I have
was extremely valuable and provided significant ever played that has actually taught me anything
benefits to school pupils for their general stud- useful”. (Boyle and Seeney, 2008)
ies, sport and music. However, the user interface
needed substantial development in order to create Eduteams/Infinteams
a deployable commercial product.
The Winning Game teaches the user to think Infiniteams, and its education-oriented cousin,
correctly under pressure and utilises continual Eduteams, are very good examples of how to ef-
debriefing to improve in all aspects of the game fectively integrate content with gameplay. These
and maximize personal potential. Unusually, the award-winning products developed by TPLD as
theory and content are very tightly integrated boxed products rather than commissioned projects,
with the gameplay. The Winning principles are are targeted at developing team building, com-
codified as a series of rules that are defined as munication and leadership skills through a range
“combinations” within the game engine. These of collaborative problem solving modules. The

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modules provide a safe environment to practice within the game to help stimulate discussion dur-
working as part of a team to solve a variety of ing the subsequent debrief.
problems commonly faced in outward bounds- This training and the player’s learning is further
style physical training activities, such as getting enhanced through the use of social networking and
across a river using limited resources and effective web 2.0 technologies such as blogging, forums
communication within the team. and wikis to share experiences and note down
These soft skills are becoming increasingly personal thoughts and opinions. The use of this
important in today’s society, particularly as more technology helps establish communities of best
organisations move towards having globally practice by allowing others to learn from how the
dispersed virtual teams. One could argue that game has been applied in different ways. This
the modules within Infiniteams and Eduteams type of surround and community-based support
are literally just collaborative multiplayer games is becoming increasingly important for successful
with no visible learning value or subject matter serious games, because it is unrealistic to assume
content; however, this would be missing the point they will operate in isolation in the vast majority
entirely. Simply watching a group of young high of cases.
school pupils or a senior executive management Both Winning and Eduteams/Infiniteams have
team playing the games, it is easy to see that real heavily utilised user-centric design approaches
learning is actually taking place. Anyone who has throughout the design and development cycle.
experienced the game would also agree that the Early prototypes were tested with large numbers
way a group of individuals approaches the prob- of target end users (these included both teachers/
lems and challenges they face, provides a strong facilitators and pupils/adult learners). This pro-
correlation with the thought processes involved cess has continued through subsequent product
and actions in the real world. updates, to ensure that functionality is only added
However, in order to bring this learning to or changed when repeated requests have come
the team’s attention, it is often necessary to have directly from end users. We believe that utilising
a skilled human facilitator on hand to provide a user-centric design methodology is essential
support and conduct debriefing exercises with the for any successful serious game development.
individuals as each of the modules are completed. This approach also fits very well with the AGILE
Failed attempts, communication breakdowns and development methodology.
underlying problems with the team dynamics can
be brought to the forefront of everyone’s mind,
with the consequences clear to see; along with the CONCLUSION
evidence of real improvement during subsequent
attempts, once the team has talked about and re- “What you want to do is create a game that’s
solved many of these issues, through reflection built on a set of consistently applied rules that
and debriefing, with the help of the facilitator. players can then exploit however they want.
In order for anyone to facilitate a session with Communicate those rules to the player in subtle
Eduteams and Infiniteams effectively, they need ways. Feedback the results of player choices
to be given training on how to use the software, so they can make intelligent decisions moving
how it can fit in with a blended learning approach forward based on earlier experience. Rather than
(particularly if they have existing team-based crafting single-solution puzzles, create rules that
course material) and how to accurately monitor describe how objects interact with one another
team and individual behaviour and performance and turn players loose – you want to simulate a
world rather than emulate specific experiences”.

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Warren Spector, creator of Thief, as quoted from Appelman, R., & Goldsworthy, R. (1999). The
Aldrich (2004, p. 97). Juncture of Game & Instructional Design: Can
The rules used within each game should also Fun be Learning? Paper presented at the As-
apply to the content used. The most important rule sociation for Educational Communications and
to communicate is to ensure the medium chosen Technology, Houston, TX.
is appropriate for the content that the developer
Boyle, L., & Seeney, M. (2008). Using Computer
and/or client wish to get across. Also, ensure that
Games to Promote Soft Skills in HighSchool – The
the content is linked to learning goals, which, in
Winning Game Pilot Study. Unpublished
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Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Game Based learning. <http://tpld.net/main.php?page=1175>
New York: McGraw-Hill
Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in society: The de-
velopment of higher psychological processes.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

This work was previously published in Games-Based Learning Advancements for Multi-Sensory Human Computer Interfaces:
Techniques and Effective Practices, edited by Thomas Connolly, Mark Stansfield and Liz Boyle, pp. 84-97, copyright 2009 by
Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.7
A Model for Knowledge and
Innovation in Online Education
Jennifer Ann Linder-VanBerschot
University of New Mexico, USA

Deborah K. LaPointe
University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, USA

ABSTRACT and critical reflection. It also represents a new

framework within which communities develop
The objective of this chapter is to introduce a and become more sustainable.
model that outlines the evolution of knowledge
and sustainable innovation of community through Introduction
the use of social software and knowledge manage-
ment in an online environment. Social software In this chapter, we suggest that the field of online
presents easy-to-use, participatory technologies, education adopts effective practices from knowl-
thus bringing increased interaction with others edge management, and the best social software
and a diversity of perspectives into the classroom. tools to create a knowledge community. As social
Knowledge management provides the opportunity software tools become more available for formal
to capture and store information so that content online learning environments, current conceptual-
and learning can be personalized according to izations of online communities must be modified.
learner preferences. This model describes a circuit Where are these social technologies leading us
of knowledge that includes instructional systems and what are the impacts?
design, individualization of learning, interaction This model proposes a more dynamic online
classroom where learners use cutting-edge social
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch207 software tools to capture and disseminate collec-

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
A Model for Knowledge and Innovation in Online Education

tive knowledge from the participants in the course, may be enhanced. Our vision of this dynamic
as well as the virtual and local community. This partnership of knowledge management, online
model facilitates the evolution of knowledge education, and social software is described in the
within the classroom, and encourages a sustain- following scenario (Table 1).
able knowledge community, wherein innovation

Table 1.

Futures of Technology and Knowledge in an Online Classroom

Fiona, Tim, and Vita are enrolled in Organizational Learning and Instructional Technologies (OLIT) 565, a graduate course designed to
function as an interactive online course using multimedia content, information literacy tools, tests, assignments, and small group projects.
The course requires intensive study of the content available in numerous formats for many devices, including desktop computers, iPods,
and smart phones. The content can be read online or offline. Interactions with classmates, instructor, mentors, and experts are a critical
component of the course and occur through discussion forums, chats, and Web conferencing in the learning management system (LMS),
as well as wikis, blogs, and virtual content outside the LMS.
Through a pre-assessment the students completed when registering for the course, the LMS captured their profiles, past performance,
and interests. With this information, the LMS organizes several approaches to present course content according to learner preferences. An
interactive concept map presents multiple ways of exploring and integrating the content with prior knowledge and outlines the suggested
path for each learner. Clicking on the nodes in the concept map brings up the content, supplemental materials, assessments, and group
discussions. The concept map also lists the times and places that experts who produced the examples will be available for discussion. The
learners explore the content, applying their own structure to it. Additionally, the social networking software inside the LMS connects the
three learners based on their shared interests.
During the orientation, the instructor provides an introduction to the synchronous and asynchronous communication technologies,
LMS and social software. The instructor, mentors, and learners negotiate ground rules, expectations, roles and responsibilities when
using asynchronous and synchronous communication and social software technologies. The ground rules and expectations support active
participation in achieving the development of a future sustainable community. The students come to realize that careful attention to one’s
online presence, reputation, and contributions to discussions is crucial, as they influence trust, cognitive presence and social interaction
for learning purposes.
On her way home from a movie, Fiona posts an audio message and a journal article she scanned using her mobile phone. She tags the
document with metadata enabling future searching and sharing for reuse and repurposing. The wiki notifies Tim’s iPhone and Vita’s
e-mail account. Tim responds to the message, agreeing with her ideas but providing minimal additional information. The LMS and Fiona
both note Tim’s brief response and prompt him to think more critically and elaborate on his message.
Essential components of the online environment are evaluation and reflection. For this reason, users provide feedback on the user-
created content, the contributions to the discussions, wikis, blogs, and podcasting, and the system. Learners are encouraged to rate each
posting using rating systems similar to e-Bay or Slashdot. The ratings are used to continuously improve the posted content and to identify
gaps in the material. With the abundant amount of choice in the ways information and knowledge are created and shared, Fiona looks for
the tagging, certification of fact-checkers and group rating systems before making a content selection.
Course designers specify multiple routes through a collection of learning objects. Just-in-time information is organized into small units
and presented to learners precisely when they need it. The LMS identifies Fiona’s preferences for learning, as well as recognizes that she
needs to develop other ways of learning in case she encounters online courses without such individualized features. The LMS monitors
and logs the student’s individual learning processes and creates a collaborative memory to offer aid when needed. The instructor and
group mentor review the logs before communicating with the individuals and group, and responding to the group’s requests for guidance.
The enrolled learners are not the only participants in the course. In previous courses in the OLIT program, instructors have encour-
aged emergent leadership from the group—meaning that learners with great interest in the content and technologies take a leadership
role in the course. Some of these learners were so stimulated by the content and interaction that they have organized a community in
which members meander in and out of courses, as they see fit. Additionally, the social software outside the course LMS is hosted, and
the content created, reviewed, and shared by community members. Previous course enrollees and program graduates bring their work
experiences to the community. The lessons they have learned through interacting in the world, reflecting on the experiences, and making
sense of them through collaboration with others in the community become powerful stories that create part of the community’s resources
and memory.
This community of learners and experts may choose to participate in the online OLIT courses; however, they may also decide to focus
on spreading the collective knowledge co-constructed in the community to local schools and organizations. This knowledge community
expands and contracts throughout its existence, but the common feature is that a passionate group of contributors collaborate to solve
problems within the community and share their learning and expertise with others outside of the community. The interaction within and
between the course and the community creates a space for reflection where learners, leaders and instructors constantly consider necessary
changes that need to be made so that the course continues to evolve, as does the learning. Belonging to such an innovative community
that provides valuable learning opportunities gives identity to the members and further motivates their participation. This evolutionary
process facilitates the innovation and sustainability of the learning community.

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Although the case scenario may seem like a with the ultimate purpose being to enhance or-
list of items for online instructors to buy, the real- ganizational creativity and innovation.
ity is that these tools are currently available for
learners and instructors alike to manipulate to Online Education
create meaningful and long-lasting online interac-
tion. Granted, adaptation is a constant challenge, Distance education supports the learning process
but it is our hope that through describing this when learners and instructor are physically sepa-
model, more practitioners will realize the poten- rated and hence rely upon technology to interact
tial for incorporating social software tools and (Moore and Kearsley, 2005). Distance education
knowledge management in online learning. This has made great advances since its inception in the
model breaks the previous boundaries presented 1800s, with the most recent innovation being on-
by virtual communities and suggests possibilities line education (OE), defined as distance education
for increased collaboration and participation. delivered through the Internet. Current trends in
OE include the incorporation of social software,
Definition and History of Key Terms which is a central feature in this chapter.
One of the major benefits of OE is that instruc-
Knowledge Management tors are forced to be as technologically savvy as the
students that they are teaching. Another advantage
Knowledge Management (KM) was a concept is that learners have access to the professor and to
initially established by Peter Drucker in the 1970s. a community of peers all hours of the day so that
However, it was not until the 1990s with Nonaka they can debate, problem-solve and discuss the
and Takeuchi’s introduction of a knowledge orga- concepts associated with their course. OE has been
nization, that it became a more integrated concept especially helpful in connecting remote students
in business practices. At that point, publications to each other to form an online learning commu-
and university courses expanded peoples’ un- nity. Most important to the progress of education,
derstanding of the benefits of KM (Wiig, 1997). the online platform encourages learner-centered
Within the past few years, a larger number of edu- activities, where the instructor guides learners to
cational institutions have begun implementing KM co-create knowledge, and share that knowledge
systems to enhance the community knowledge and with other members of the learning community.
encourage innovation (Hirschbuhl, Zachariah, &
Bishop, 2002; Kidwell, VanderLinde, & Johnson, Social Software
2000; Na Ubon & Kimble, 2002).
Traditional KM initiatives are often divided Social software (SS) is not a single type of soft-
into three processes: (a) design, (b) development ware, but instead a combination of two or more
and (c) technology (Conway & Sligar, 2002). Not modes of computer-mediated communication,
all KM plans follow a rigid process flow; some resulting in the formation of a community. A social
are flexible enough to incorporate, “how people network built from SS allows members to create
learn, how they implement what they learn, and and participate in a self-made community. With
how they share their knowledge” (Bassi, 1997, the rise of Web 2.0, SS applications seem to be
p. 426). By connecting the KM system to the introduced at such a rate that not even the most
users, the advantages become more apparent. technologically savvy can keep up. Yet these com-
The terminal goal of a KM plan is to create a munication and interaction tools influence how
sustainable system that enhances the growth of virtual communities form, and how they sustain
the organization’s knowledge (Salisbury, 2003) themselves even after the online course has ended.

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The affordances of SS include ubiquity, search- at the Business School at Britain’s Open Univer-
able content and referral to people with common sity. They focused on the tools and technologies
interests. These benefits then support multi-scale used to teach an online course on KM. Similarly,
social spaces and conversation discovery. Townley, Geng and Zhang (2002) collaborated
Some of the latest applications include 30 between New Mexico State and Beijing Univer-
Boxes, a social calendar; Lazybase, a site where sity to teach a class on KM. They explained that
individuals are given the tools to create and share global education was becoming a rapidly growing
a database; Zoho Show, a tool that helps create and field that addresses the need for the development
publish presentations; and voo2do, a task manage- of international relationships. Both collaborations
ment tool (Brown, 2007). In fact, this paper was were primarily interested in the course manage-
developed using PBwiki, a secure, open-source ment tools used, not on learning or community
wiki that allowed us to co-create this chapter at development.
a time and place that was convenient for each of Fry (2001) explained how many organizations
us. When one person edited the chapter, the other turn to OE as a strategy for transition and corporate
person received an email update, so she could development. The Ernst and Young Center for
see the progress being made. When we needed Business Knowledge, for example, has applied
to communicate synchronously, we used Yahoo! components of OE to assist in the organization’s
messenger. strategic development by using asynchronous
Although SS tools have not been typically discussion groups and online communities of
applied to educational settings, we side with practice, as well as personalization and profiling
Dalsgaard (2006) in that we believe SS tools can techniques. Different from the studies mentioned
and should be used to support learning. These above, Fry (2001) uses OE to enhance current
tools encourage the creation and contribution of KM practices.
user-created content and facilitation of learning Universities are working to close the gap
instead of management of learning—a paradigm between the change in technology and the learn-
shift that calls for a new model for OE. ing needs in an online environment. Hirschbuhl,
This model acts as a plea for the target audience Zacariah and Bishop (2002) suggest that this gap
including researchers, teaching practitioners, and can be minimized by using KM tools to deliver OE.
educational technologists to embrace a paradigm By fitting the instruction to the individual learning
shift that applies social systems in OE. SS can in- needs of the student, KM can provide increased
crease the diversity of perspectives in the content, success for all learners, regardless of their abil-
virtual presence of a community and establish and ity or familiarity with technology. Hirschbuhl,
enhance peer-to-peer social networks, as suggested Zacariah and Bishop (2002) encourage students
by the case illustration. The incorporation of this and instructors to shift their mental model of
emerging trend in this proposed model will facili- teaching methodologies and collaborative strate-
tate the dynamic evolution of knowledge beyond gies in order to develop successful online courses
the classroom and contribute to the innovative that can be customized to meet individual learner
and sustainable community outside of the formal needs. KM is the suggested remedy to smooth and
learning environment. prepare all participants in the paradigm shift from
traditional face-to-face classrooms to OE. Almost
Existing Literature opposite from the study above, in this case, KM
tools are supporting OE.
The first collaboration of OE and KM was envi- Saxena (2007) proposes that the integration
sioned by Albert and Thomas (2000) who taught of KM tools within OE will provide online dis-

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tance education administrators and instructors where they are working together towards an im-
with data that could result in improved decision proved system as envisioned in the case scenario.
making, reduced course development time, im- Since SS tools are such a recent introduction to the
proved academic and administrative services, field, there is even less literature on their role in
and reduced costs. He believes the integration this relationship. Saxena (2007) recommended that
of the two will reveal patterns and relationships KM be used to gather data on students so that uni-
that provide the knowledge necessary for improv- versities can then use that data to better understand
ing OE. Lytras, Naeve and Pouloudi (2005) also distance learners and their learning environments.
believe in the promise of KM in contributing He concludes his article by encouraging research-
to the evolution of online learning, and believe ers to more deeply explore the opportunities for
that, “The convergence of e-learning and knowl- KM in an online setting. This chapter provides a
edge management will be evident in worldwide model and an outline for a system where KM, OE
initiatives that will foster a constructive, open, and SS combine to create a more dynamic formal
dynamic, interconnected, distributed, adaptive, online learning environment, as described in the
user-friendly, socially concerned, and accessible case illustration.
wealth of knowledge” (p. 68). Only one article was
located that connected the fields of OE, KM and Description of Model
SS. Pettenati, Cigognini, Mangione, and Guerin
(2007) built a model in which SS was used to The model shown below represents a cyclical
track personal knowledge in an online learning process with five major components: (a) criti-
environment. However, they do not consider the cal reflection with leadership, (b) instructional
potential for knowledge development and in- design, (c) individualization, (d) collaboration
novation in a dynamic community environment. and interaction among course participants, and
(e) an innovative and sustainable community.
Gaps in the Literature This community development of graduates and
interested others is ongoing, and feeds experiences
KM and OE share several common elements, and resources back into the model.
including community, collaboration, trust, knowl- The interplay among the components that
edge sharing and SS tools (Na Ubon & Kimble, contribute to the evolution of knowledge occurs
2002; Saxena, 2007). Despite the availability of throughout the online course. There is not a par-
tools and technologies and increase in familiarity ticular order in which it happens—the boundaries
with these tools, universities seem reluctant to are blurred. For example, instructional design may
integrate OE and KM. This is demonstrated by be the first step for the instructor, followed by
the minimal capturing and sharing of knowledge implementation in which individualization of the
assets in the university environment. An additional learning experience is considered. Critical reflec-
gap in the KM literature is the lack of information tion may be a structured process at the end. And
related to the affective domain which is frequently it may not be until the course ends that learners
described as underlying cognition. Emotions and diverge from the cycle and engage in the com-
attitudes are critically important in order to inter- munity development process. On the other hand,
pret experiences positively and to learn effectively, the community development may be a carry-over
as well as support and trust others. from a former online course or provide authentic
Although there is literature on the combination learning opportunities during the course, thus al-
of KM and OE, there is not a true collaboration lowing the interaction to be a central component of

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Figure 1. Evolution of knowledge and community development model

the online course, with learners who already know voice conversations. Content will not magically
each other well. We will describe each component appear in the learning environment—learners and
of the model in the section below. instructors must collaborate to select, contribute,
and rate the knowledge that is pertinent to the
Instructional Design learning environment. Often times in KM sys-
tems, a Subject Matter Expert (SME) is selected
We will explain the innovative relationship among to maintain cohesion in the community and dis-
KM, OE, and SS beginning with instructional de- tinguish the most essential content to be shared
sign. Instructional design provides the template for with the group. In the corporate setting, the SME
determining learner needs, collecting appropriate is typically the most knowledgeable member of
content and designing interaction to enhance the the community, yet in an online course, it might
growth and development of future professionals. be more effective to have a rotating SME so that
A significant amount of the work of instructional a variety of perspectives can be a part of the
designers and instructors is not accomplished knowledge capturing process. An outside member
through declarative and procedural knowledge of the community, such as an expert in the field or
alone. Working with instructors and students a former class member, may also act as the SME,
involves affective aspects, such as responding to providing relevant content that is applicable to the
emotional or evaluative responses. We remind course objectives. All members of the learning
designers that affective and social content must community must work with the SME to continually
be a part of the implementation process. reflect upon and refine the content that is captured
and stored. New information should be frequently
Content reviewed and assessed, and older information
should be regularly revisited to determine if it is
The goal of a majority of KM systems is to cap- still valuable to the learning community.
ture the most essential knowledge assets for the In order for these captured knowledge assets
users (Conway & Sligar, 2002). This may include to be accessed frequently, the content must be
course projects, archived dialogue or recorded prepared in standardized formats that can be

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later customized in ways that are meaningful for tial. The technology helps learners organize and
individual users and support carrying the content find their way through the LMS, as well as make
forward. As LMS programs become more sophis- sense of the content presented in many formats
ticated, they allow online courses to offer more and through multiple perspectives.
individualized content that is adaptable to needs of The type of technology used should depend
each learner, as indicated through describing the on the participants. If learners do not understand
process of tagging in the case illustration above. the functionality of the interface where content is
Until that becomes common practice, passionate displayed, then the significance of the content may
content creators and fanatical reviewers are needed be lost. Content should also be available in the
to maintain a dynamic system so that learners platform preferred by learners, such as computer,
look forward to accessing and applying content cell phone, mp3 player, instant messenger, wiki
to different contexts (Conrad & LaPointe, 2007). posting, etc. Na Ubon and Kimble (2002) encour-
age the use of advanced technologies because they
Technology and Tools have the potential to increase the sense of trust,
identity and commitment of the community. Pre-
It does limited good to have extensive knowledge established standards help guarantee a useful and
sharing without the technological means to en- progressive product. Despite the recommendation
hance the information. Fortunately, advancements to use cutting-edge software and tools, we suggest
in technology afford users from around the world that the instructor establish a balance between
the ability to participate in the knowledge sharing user-friendly and innovative technologies.
process in real-time (Kilby, 2001; Lan, Xian, & Fu,
2000; Na Ubon & Kimble, 2002). All technology Individualization
and tools chosen to support the learning process
must facilitate the multiple phases of learning, Although content, technology and tools are es-
including exploration, reflection, collaboration, sential components of the instructional design
testing out new ideas, knowledge construction process, as illustrated in the model, they are
and feedback. These technologies do not neces- not the only factors to consider. Throughout the
sarily need to be complex. Instead, the critical design and development process, instructors and
characteristic is that the technologies allow easier course designers must think of the learners for
communication in the online course to facilitate whom they are developing the course because KM
in the process of interaction. and OE are more complex than technology and
RSS feeds notify learners whenever a new multimedia tools (Liebowitz, 2001; Na Ubon &
entry, podcast, email message or wiki posting has Kimble, 2002). The focus cannot simply be on the
been added. Instead of checking in frequently with use of technology, but also on the human issues
the constantly updated LMS, an RSS feed allows behind the success or failure of the technology
learners to create and distribute a list of Web links (Davenport, 2005).
to quickly review at a time and location that is All participants enter a course with different
convenient for them. This provides organization levels of familiarity and confidence in terms of
for the online participants to know what they have technology and content. Whereas some learners
already accessed in contrast to what they still need are willing to immediately engage in online com-
to review. Online participants depend on ease of munication and capturing knowledge, others are
use to get started and build confidence in using more hesitant to participate in this type of online
the tools. Thereafter, accessible support is essen- interaction. Other still may apply signaling to pres-

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ent themselves as different people to the online Interaction

class. It does not come as a surprise that a small
percentage of individuals usually create a major- Interaction is a central component to OE. Moore
ity of online content (Kamel Boulos & Wheeler (1989) outlines three types of interaction: learner-
2007). Instructional designers and instructors content, learner-instructor and learner-learner. A
must determine how to develop an individualized fourth type of interaction is especially important
system that encourages equal participation from in OE—learner-interface (Hillman, Willis &
all learners. Fisher and Baird (2005) encourage Gunawardena, 1994). Similarly, interaction is a
the use of peer mentoring to build students’ levels foundational component of KM and is facilitated
of confidence in using online tools. Similarly, by SS tools. It has even been found that groups of
Gunawardena, Linder-VanBerschot, LaPointe, individuals who regularly share knowledge tend to
Barrett, Mummert, Cardiff, et al. (2007) reported perform better than those who do not (Davenport,
that e-mentoring facilitated in cross-cultural 2005). Through interaction, individuals learn to
learning transformation. Community members analyze, question, interpret, and make sense of
may volunteer to be mentors for students, estab- phenomena. Members of the community facilitate
lishing their confidence in the learning platform their thinking and innovation through the ques-
at a pace that is appropriate for each individual. tions, problems, issues, solutions, resources, and
Once students become more familiar with tools tools that members bring to the community.
and determine how to best apply them for their Collaboration is not always a natural process
personal needs, a stronger sense of community for learners in an online environment. In fact, An-
begins to emerge. Due to these benefits, instructors nand (2007) expresses concern that online services
are increasingly utilizing community programs coupled with KM software may reduce the need
like Living Treasures to bring community mem- for human interaction. Therefore, instructors must
bers and community culture into the classroom minimize transactional distance and establish a
to localize course content. strong sense of social presence so that learners
Additionally, there must be space for users want to interact with each other. SS tools can be
to provide feedback on the system (Wiig, 1997) used to develop and enhance interaction and social
so that the effectiveness can continuously be presence in the course. Online learners often have
improved. When communication between knowl- different personal goals, and, thus, there is not
edge creators and SMEs is limited, the knowledge one tool that will fit the interaction needs of all
often becomes outdated and users stop accessing learners. An additional concern to consider in an
the system after losing interest (Ravitz & Hoadley, international online course is Internet accessibility
2005). LMSs such as WebCT Vista have a rating of all learners (Beldarrain, 2006). McLoughlin
option on discussion messages, so learners can and Oliver (2000) provide several suggestions
rate messages that they find useful, as described for online instructional designers, one of which
in the scenario. When a particular message has is to include communication tools that encourage
a high rating, learners are more likely to visit it social interaction so that all learners have the op-
because they want to be accessing the most per- portunity to co-construct knowledge.
tinent information in the course, as described in Conrad and LaPointe (2007) remind us that
the case illustration. This rating system allows all just because these tools are included, it is not
users to become SMEs in capturing data that is guaranteed that they will necessarily facilitate
most important to the collective whole. enhanced interaction, or even be used. Their
research revealed that collaboration depends on

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the design, nature, purpose and structure of the instructional designer should review the sense of
SS tool. In their course wiki learners were will- individualization of content that then encourages
ing to post content, but did not want to edit other collaboration both within and outside of the online
classmates’ content. Instead, the learners wanted course. Finally, we recommend that the instructor
additional opportunities to discuss the content on and instructional designers ensure critical reflec-
the wiki. This adds to our growing awareness that tion holds a central position within the learning
merely capturing and sharing information does not activities so that learners can also participate in
necessarily lead to deeper understanding. New the process.
information can only lead to shared knowledge
when it is integrated with prior data and tested Strategic Alignment
through dialogue with other learners. In the end,
it is the learners who will decide whether or not The goals and objectives of the online course must
they will accept and apply the tools to their think- drive the selection of SS and KM tools. What
ing and learning processes through interaction works for a problems-based biology course can-
within the course. not be plugged into a lecture-based math course
and expect comparable results. Similarly, cultural
Critical Reflection differences hinder the effectiveness of the drag
and drop method. For example, an instructional
In order to make sense of an experience, learners technology course taught at a university in south-
must interpret it. This interpretation then guides western United States must be culturally adapted
learning actions. Mezirow (1990) suggests that before implementing it at a Chinese university.
this process of reflection “enables us to correct This has become more apparent as open content
distortions in our beliefs and errors in problem and open educational resources are shared between
solving” (p. 1). It is a necessary strategy for all academic institutions, as described in Caswell,
online users, as it directs future professional Henson, Jensen and Wiley’s (2008) recent article
practice and improved performance through the on universal education.
discovery of personal meaning. Critical reflec- All SS tools and KM processes must be con-
tion takes the learning process a step further to nected to the institutional culture and overall
include “challenging our established and habitual course goals so that users feel like it is a valu-
patterns of expectation” (Mezirow, 1990, p. 12). able use of their time. In fact, Liebowitz (2001)
This process provides a potential transformative mentioned that one of the three reasons for a
learning or teaching experience. failed KM strategy is that it was not connected
Although reflection is embedded in every step to the central goals of the institution. If that is the
of the process, we believe it is important enough case, users will not see the functionality of the
to explicitly detail through the description of initiative and will most likely not engage. The
strategic alignment and leadership. Instructors and model proposed in this chapter provides a broad
instructional designers must reflect on every step structure within which instructors can adapt to fit
of process. For example, instructors must reas- their course objectives.
sess the applicability of the content in the online Alignment of the proposed initiative with the
class. As course objectives change, the content organizational strategic plan should be closely
must also be adapted to support learners’ needs. related to leadership characteristics, internal or-
Additionally, the instructional designer must ganizational structure and external characteristics
reflect on the applicability of the tools chosen to of the institution (Rogers, 1995). The degree of
meet course objectives. Both the instructor and centralization of power and control in an organiza-

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tion, the formalization of rules and policies, and Knowledge management uses the term Com-
the degree to which new ideas can flow among munity of Practice (CoP) to describe a place where
organizational units all impact organizational in- people unite for a common purpose so that they
novativeness and its implementation. Additionally, can work together to achieve a particular goal
strategic alignment supports the future sustain- (Conway & Sligar, 2002; Wenger, McDermott &
ability of the initiative. Snyder, 2002). A CoP may emerge from the com-
munity development process. However, we feel
Leadership that a knowledge community does not have to be
as structured as a CoP in order to be successful.
As mentioned above, leadership has the ability to Learners may come in and out of the community,
minimize or maximize the impact of this innova- as they feel necessary. Some learners may share
tive model. Leadership’s purposes, expectations, their knowledge from the online course with the
and goals for the model will vary, depending upon community, while others may distribute informa-
the lens through which it views the system. In a tion from the community with the online course.
formal educational setting, most people define the The community development moves beyond the
leader as the instructor or instructional designer classroom to peer networks before, during and
who may perceive the model as a way to encourage after the online course. It is this flexible inter-
learners to become involved in a community to play of expertise that creates an environment of
create, share, and use content to solve problems knowledge sharing and innovation.
and instigate change. Yet, if the leader is unwilling People choose to belong to social organiza-
to recognize, encourage and share the collective tions where value is gained through the exchange
knowledge, s/he is putting the entire online course of information and life experiences from highly
community at risk of losing vital information. credible sources. The value received reinforces
Openness to a variety of perspectives enables the connections between course members and
new understandings and encourages innovation. the community. The partnership of community
Sustainable improvement depends on successful with online course participants allows flexible
and sustainable leadership (Hargreaves & Fink, groupings of students and practitioners to work
2006). This may mean that the leadership is equally on projects. Students have increased opportunities
distributed across the course—members of the for authentic experiences and research that they
online course take turns in holding the leadership can bring back to the online classroom.
role. This not only provides different perspectives,
but also encourages emergent leadership within Innovation
and beyond the course.
Organizations cite innovation as one of the pri-
Community Development mary benefits of implementing KM practices into
organizational practices (Conway & Sligar, 2002;
When learners take responsibility for their learning Davenport, 2005). It is an educational institution’s
goals and take on a leadership role in their online responsibility to determine how to encourage in-
class, they develop confidence not only in their novation at all levels (Kidwell, VanderLinde &
knowledge of the content and technology, but also Johnson, 2000; Rogers, 1995). Brown (1998) sug-
in their ability to lead others. They further value gests that “innovation is everywhere; the problem
the interdependence and the responsibility of all is how to learn from it” (p. 156). Through having
members of the community to teach and to learn. the capability to search and navigate a diverse,

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extensive knowledge base, learners may build new occurring in their field. The leader must embrace
connections, and in turn, enhance the likelihood of the vibrant nature of the online community and
developing further innovative products (Merlyn work to sustain it. All participants can participate
& Välikangas, 1998). Innovation contributes to and contribute to knowledge building. Trust and
a greater institutional knowledge base, providing confidence must also be nurtured to support the
information of value that the community mem- sustainability. Again, it is recommended to ap-
bers want to continually access and contribute ply shared leadership so that the leader does not
to; thereby, creating a sense of community rather burn out and cause the captured knowledge to be
than a collection of content. outdated and minimally applied.  
Even the best innovations will get lost in the
shuffle if leadership does not know how to com- Future Trends
municate them with other members of the com-
munity (Brown, 1998; Rogers, 1995). Leaders With the rapid expansion of the fields of OE, KM
cannot pass a memo and expect the innovation to and especially SS, leaders in the field must step
be diffused in to everyday practice. Brown (1998) back and review broad trends in the field, as well
suggests that users need to have the opportunity as reflect what those trends mean for the field.
to experience it in a way that “evokes power and Social software presents easy-to-use, participatory
possibility” (p. 168). Sustainability of the innova- technologies, thus bringing increased interaction
tion is more likely to occur if learners participate with others and a diversity of perspectives into
and give input throughout the generation and the classroom. Knowledge management provides
diffusion process (Rogers, 1995). the opportunity to capture and store information
so that content and learning can be personalized
Sustainability according to learner preferences. Online educa-
tion offers instructional design and facilitation of
Organizations that use KM and SS to enhance OE presence and learning. The relationship of KM,
must plan for a dynamic system. Barron (2000) OE, and SS supports participation that encour-
mentions that online content can be considered ages innovation. This will bring opportunities
outdated in less than eight months. Additionally, and challenges.
learner experiences are consistently transform- Security of content and provision of a safe
ing and are always open to reinterpretation. For learning experience while inviting the community
these reasons, the dynamism of economic and into the online course will require a solution.
social change requires a flexible system that is Copyright and digital rights management will
created to adapt to future changes. Thus, the role impact the viability of the model and our case
of KM is to keep the knowledge base “alive and illustration. Websites such as Creative Commons
vibrant” (Wiig, 1997, p. 2) with knowledge gained has found a way to provide a space for users to
through everyday practice in the community as share content with one another with the goal of
well as with current research in order to secure creating something greater than what one person
the online course’s buy-in and later sustainability could develop working independently. Content and
of the learning community. interaction, as described in the current model, will
The learning and performance supported by this blend with virtual world technology. Extensive
model are based on the recognition and philosophy future evaluative and research opportunities exist
that learning is a way of being. It is an ongoing set to determine the pragmatic value of the model and
of attitudes and actions by a community of learners to build a body of knowledge related to the conver-
who try to keep abreast the myriad of events that are gence of technologies and communities to support

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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
worked Learning 2002, University of Sheffield,
UK, March 2002, 465-473. Community: A purposeful group of people
PBwiki. (2007). Retrieved September 7, 2007, centered around a knowledge concept who collab-
from http://pbwiki.com/ orate through the use of knowledge management
and social software tools to support a sustainable
Pettenati, M. C., Cigognini, E., Mangione, J., and innovative online course and to share learning
& Guerin, E. (2007). Using social software for experiences with person(s) outside of the group.
personal knowledge management in formal on- Individualization: A process in which dif-
line learning. Turkish Online Journal of Distance ferentiated instruction based on learners’ needs
Education, 8(3). Retrieved April 23, 2008, from and interests allows the learner to personalize the
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Ravitz, J., & Hoadley, C. (2005). Supporting Instructional Design: The systematic applica-
change and scholarship through review of online tion of instructional content, technology and tools
resource in professional development settings. used to design an individualized, interactive and
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957–974. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2005.00567.x

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Interaction: An exchange of knowledge and and instructor interact through the use of several
ideas between learners, instructor, content and of technologies for the purpose of intentional
learning interface(s) that encourages sustainable learning.
community development and innovation. Reflection: A process in which online partici-
Knowledge Management: The process of pants (learners and instructors) and community
capturing, storing and distributing information members (former learners and experts in the field)
across learning environments to improve the observe and interpret the learning experience so
application of knowledge to a variety of social that they can consistently adapt and improve the
contexts, thus increasing its availability to others high quality instructional systems design.
to increase innovation in the evolution of com- Social Software: A combination of two or
munity development and learning. more online tools encouraging learning, interac-
Online Education: A dynamic learning format tion and community development between two
taught by means of the Internet in which learners or more people.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Social Software and Developing Community Ontologies,
edited by Stylianos Hatzipanagos and Steven Warburton, pp. 254-268, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an
imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.8
A Large-Scale Model for
Working with Subject
Matter Experts
Judith A. Russo-Converso
CSC, USA

Ronald D. Offutt
Northrup-Grumman Information Technology, USA

INTRODUCTION This solution is based on a collaboration model

implemented and led by an integration team whose
The evolution of complex and distributed com- role and responsibility is to allow the SMEs to
merce requires the implementation of training achieve consensus, efficiency, and standard of
design and development models that capture quality in both products and processes.
and mold the expertise of subject matter experts The model is exemplified using a current
(SMEs). A SME is defined as “that individual large-scale military eight-year initiative to design
who exhibits the highest level of expertise in per- training support packages to prepare soldiers to use
forming a specialized job, task, or skill within the advanced technologies and employment concepts
organization”. SMEs possess in-depth knowledge in a blended delivery format of live, virtual, and
of the subject you are attempting to document constructive. The Live-Virtual-Constructive envi-
(http://www.isixsigma.com/dictionary/Subject_ ronment combines any of these three approaches
Matter_Expert_-_SME-396.htm). This chapter to create a common battlefield, on which live
describes a unique issue, and potential risk, along units can be represented along with virtual and
with a solution to work with a large number of constructive. These units can interact with one
geographically dispersed SMEs (separated from another and conduct a coordinated fight as though
one another due to their respective locations), they were physically together on the same ground
whose efforts are standardized and synchronized. (United States Army Combined Arms Center,
http://usacac.army.mil/CAC/functions/construc-
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch208
tive.asp). This initiative will be used throughout

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 A Large-Scale Model for Working with Subject Matter Experts

the chapter as our illustrative example as we job, and task analyses) in preparation for the next
describe the rising challenges and opportunities. phase, the design and development of training
Therefore, this chapter will provide a detailed support packages.
examination of the existing education and train- Typically when managing an educational or
ing development fundamentals that provided the training initiative, instructional designers (ID-
framework to meet the requirements of this training ers) depend on the SME for their expertise in
design and development challenge. The first step curriculum content. The IDers’ involvement is
in the process was to identify potential problems, critical during the analysis and design phases of
issues, and/or potential risks of this training a systematic instructional design approach.
initiative. Two obvious issues were identified: However, in our illustrative example, the
1) working with three different companies, each content SMEs were the lead component and
with their own internal structure and philosophy instrumental in actively participating in the plan-
on training and development thus, resulting in a ning phase (the design and development of the
need for standardization; and 2) having a large policies, procedures, and processes) and were
number of individuals geographically dispersed, primarily responsible for writing the analyses
responsible for contributing to or creating the ini- results/findings. The content of the results were
tiative’s policies, processes, and products resulting then reviewed by OTP IDers for writing conven-
in a need to find a means to work collaboratively tion format (e.g., use of acronyms, punctuation,
from a distance. spacing and numbering) and instructional design
Adding to the complexity of the initiative was format (e.g., sequencing of steps, alignment of
acknowledging the nature of the training design performance steps and sub-steps with performance
and development team; the fact that it consists measures). To meet this ID review requirement,
of forty (40) SMEs, analysts in the initiative, each OTP has a SME IDer whose responsibility
representing three leading defense contractor was to guide analysts (OTP SMEs) and to com-
companies, known as the One Team Partners ply with the standards and guidelines related to
(OTP). To resolve the issue of standardization, a instructional format and writing conventions.
three-member integration team (IT) was assigned In addition, there were vertical and horizontal
to facilitate the design and implementation of reviews conducted by other content SMEs (e.g.,
policies, procedures, and processes to accomplish internal and external to the OTP) for accuracy
the expected project goals and objectives of their and completeness in terms of breadth and depth
primary customers by synchronizing, integrating of content, in context.
and standardizing the SMEs’ work. The intent of the IT in designing this method-
The end-product (instructional/training prod- ology was to actively involve the SMEs from the
uct) was designed to support the instructional and onset, not only to capture their expertise, but also
training efforts for soldiers deployed, awaiting to gain and sustain their buy-in and commitment
deployment, or conducting combat operations. throughout the different phases of the initiative,
The authors of this chapter are two members of and to do so primarily from a distance. Therefore, to
the three-member IT, serving as the lead instruc- resolve the second issue of the OTPs collaborating
tional designer and lead content SME. During from a distance, the lead IT developed a process
the first three years of an eight-year initiative, using technology (e.g., Web-based application and
this joint effort, using the collaboration model, tools, relational database) to lessen the impact of
has completed or is nearly completed with the being geographically dispersed.
initial planning and analysis phases (i.e., mission,

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BACKGROUND system. A system, composed of the performance

of interrelated subsystems, forms a unified whole
The goal of this large-scale collaboration model which is more than the sum of its individual parts.
is to integrate the contributions submitted by The application of general systems theory devel-
multiple subcontractors (known in our illustra- ops performance and instructional strategies in a
tive example as the OTPs). To meet this goal, systematic manner and includes the following:
the prime contractor appointed a lead IT with the identifying specific requirements, designing an
responsibility to the customer, prime contractor, optimum solution, developing an intervention,
and the OTPs to synchronize (move along at same and comparing results to plans (Branson & Gil-
rate) and standardize (end-product has the same bert, 1997).
structure and language) processes and products. Keeping the system healthy and functioning at
Systems designers envision the entity to be a level in which its goals are being met by means
designed as a whole; as one that is designed from of actively contributing inputs, outputs, and con-
the synthesis of the interaction of its parts. Systems tinuous feedback is referred to as maintaining an
design requires both coordination and integration. open-system. A system in which all subsystems
We need to design all parts interactively, therefore share a common goal must be receptive to inputs
simultaneously. This requires coordination. The and outputs in making its goal a reality (Converso,
requirement of designing for interdependency 2001, p. 16). In order to create and sustain an
across all systems levels invites integration. In open-system, the IT from the onset actively en-
an age of continuous and intensified change, gaged the partners by formally requesting input
the understanding of the role of systems design and feedback as the initiative policies, procedures,
in creating our future and the development of and processes were being designed and developed.
competence in systems design are of the highest Instructional development systems or models
priority (Banathy, 2000). are then transformed through systematic design
Since the overarching component of such an functions within the system (e.g., planning,
initiative was the integration of work produced analysis, design, development, and delivery/
by the multiple OTPs, the lead IT adopted a implementation). Similarly, open-systems con-
systemic approach to achieve process and prod- tinuously receive feedback from stakeholders/
uct standardization. To understand instructional partners indicating how well these functions have
development, it is helpful to view from within been carried out. To survive, an open-system must
the context in which it functions. An educational gain advantages (e.g., return-on-investment) from
or training environment is, in effect, a system of its transactions with the environment (Rothwell
systems. By definition, a system (the whole) is & Kazanas, 1992, p. 10) (see Figure 1).
a structure that is dependent on the product of In our illustrative example, the instructional
the interrelationships of the parts rather than the development structure has multiple tiers of part-
attributes of any individual part (Ackoff, 1995). ners functioning in change roles. The change roles
Therefore, it is imperative to view an instructional are based on role assignments for change projects
development initiative within a systems approach as defined by Conner (1992). “Working relation-
context based on general systems theory. ships can be highly complex and convoluted, with
General systems theory (Gharajedaghi, 1999; people playing more than one role and frequent-
Rothwell & Kazanas, 1992) is based on the belief ly shifting roles once a change is under way”
that for significant and long-term change or oppor- (Conner, 1992; p. 105). The role assignments are
tunity to become institutionalized, it is imperative defined as (Conner, 1992; pp. 106-107):
to recognize and manage the organization as a

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 A Large-Scale Model for Working with Subject Matter Experts

Figure 1. Components of an open-system organization (adapted from Rothwell & Kazanas, 1992)

• Sponsor: an individual or group who has (e.g., prime contractor). Sustaining

the power to sanction or legitimize change. sponsors minimize logistic, eco-
A sponsor decides which changes will nomic, and political gaps that exist
happen, communicates the new priori- between layers of the organization
ties to the organization, and provides the and produce the appropriate structure
proper reinforcement to assure success. of rewards and punishments that pro-
Sponsorship takes far more than ideas and mote achievement.
rhetoric; it requires the ability and willing- • Advocate: an individual or group who
ness to apply and to enable the meaningful wants to achieve a change but lacks the
rewards and pressure that produce and en- power to sanction it. However, advocates
able desired results to be made on time and are influential and valued for their advice
within budget. and recommendations given to the spon-
◦◦ Initial Sponsor: an individual or group sor and others (e.g., dependent on the sit-
who has the power to break from the uation this role can be filled by the OTP
status quo and sanction a significant project managers, the lead IT, or the SMEs
change (e.g., primary customer - themselves).
military or government agency). An • Change Agent: an individual or group who
initial sponsor is usually higher in the is responsible for implementing the change
hierarchy than those who must per- (e.g., IT, project managers). Agent success
form the duties of sustaining spon- depends on the ability to diagnose potential
sors. The initiating sponsor must be problems, develop a plan to deal with these
able to enlist the support of sustaining issues, and execute the change effectively.
sponsors down in the organization, or • Change Target: an individual or group who
the change is certain to fail. must change (SMEs - analysts, designers,
◦◦ Sustaining Sponsor: one who sup- developers). To increase the likelihood of
ports and follows through with the success, they must be educated to under-
sponsor commitment and alloca- stand the changes they are expected to ac-
tion of resources for his/her area of commodate, and they must be involved ap-
influence. A sustaining sponsor has propriately in the implementation process.
enough proximity to local targets,
those individuals or groups who must In our illustrative example, the initial sponsor is
actually change, to maintain focus the military or government agency (a.k.a., primary
and motivation on the change goals customer) who has the ultimate/final authority and

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A Large-Scale Model for Working with Subject Matter Experts

responsibility to accept/reject the end-product. The structure, 2) as an advocate for individual analysts
sustaining sponsor is the government contractor within his respective team, and 3) as a change
(a.k.a., prime contractor) who has the authority agent who performs as approver of product that
and responsibility to accept/reject end-product). moves along the tiers of internal review/ap-
The change agents are the OTP project managers proval for submission to the external review team
(a.k.a., subcontractors) and the lead IT that has (i.e., the lead IT).
managerial roles and responsibilities to comply To oversee the instructional development (ID)
with standards and guidelines when submitting the initiative described herein, the lead IT adopted a
end-product for approval/acceptance. The change systematic model for working with SMEs. ID mod-
targets are the content SMEs, OTP instructional els provide communication tools for determining
designers, and training developers who follow the appropriate outcomes, collecting data, analyzing
policies, procedures, and processes for creating data, generating learning strategies, selecting or
the end-product (see Figure 2). constructing media, conducting assessment, and
As noted by Conner (1992, p. 105), as with implementing and revising results (Gustafson &
any change initiative, this large-scale model had Branch, 2002, p. 2). The core elements/phases
individuals with roles and responsibilities that are of any ID model are analyze, design, develop,
multi-disciplined (having more than one area of implement, and evaluate (ADDIE) – each element
expertise) and multi-functional (having to perform informs the other as development takes place
more than one role). For example, a project man- and revisions continue throughout the process
ager may have the following roles/responsibilities: via ongoing planning at the onset of each phase
1) as a change agent leads/supervises the work of and formative evaluations conducted during each
his respective team within the OTP organization/ phase. The ADDIE ID Model is well documented

Figure 2. Chain of responsibility and authority within in a change management role-based organization

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and widely used in military, business/industry, and delivered. This framework or model embraces a
academic training/education programs. However, systems approach and illustrates the interrelation-
the lead IT modified the ADDIE ID Model that ships among three major clusters 1) scoping, 2)
appeared in Gustafson and Branch (2002, p. 3) to planning, and 3) implementation and continuous
incorporate the upfront strategic planning phase improvement.
and technology components. The scoping cluster begins the guiding star or
For example, the ID Model adopted by the ideal vision, defined as the kind of world we would
lead IT includes the following modifications and want for tomorrow’s performer, and then selects
operational definitions: 1) upfront strategic plan- what the educational system commits to deliver.
ning (SP) – the phase where ADDIE is employed This delivery selection identifies the needs and
for the initiative or project as a whole, consisting mission objectives (e.g., what is and what should
of interrelated parts and 2) technology components be and how to close the gap between the two).
that are comprised of tools and applications (T) The planning cluster includes the strategic plan
to manage (e.g., relational database/repository, devised by examining the strengths, weaknesses,
report generator, search engine); to produce (e.g., opportunities, and threats of the implementation
standardized tools to create documents); and to and identifying the long and short-term milestones
communicate (e.g., availability and accessibility (e.g., measure of incremental successes).
of online collaborative meeting/classroom envi- The implementation and continuous improve-
ronment) aspects of development process/product, ment cluster includes tactical and operational
thus the new acronym SP/T-ADDIE (see Figure 3). planning (e.g., how to get from here to there),
A critical task of the lead IT was to establish securing resources, diffusing the initiative, and
business rules (i.e., guidelines for developing conducting formative evaluations for continuous
consensus-building). Kaufman, Herman, and improvement of the initiative policies, processes,
Watters (1996) present an educational strategic and procedures. For the purpose of continuous
planning framework with a focus on the primary improvement, criteria must be developed to
client and beneficiary of what gets planned and measure the effectiveness and efficiency of the

Figure 3. Core elements of instructional development: SP/T-ADDIE Model

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initiative. This was accomplished via the technical home and abroad, resulting in the saving of lives
and management plans adopted by the OTPs, IT, and property (see Figure 4).
and primary contractor. As stated previously, an important element to
Kaufman’s strategic planning and decision- working with SMEs is the ability to develop and
making model (1998) focuses on making soci- manage collaboration and decision-making.
etal contributions in addition to meeting it own Therefore, the lead IT developed two main com-
requirements for contribution and survival, thus ponents: Real time (collaborative online
the three levels of focus 1) micro (e.g., indi- learning/consensus-building environment) and
vidual), 2) macro (e.g., organizational), and 3) relational database/repository (capabilities to
mega (e.g., societal). In our illustrative example, manage document development; review with
the true outcome or mega contribution to society multi-tiered feedback; store documents in various
is the development of a well trained soldier that states of development; search document whole
has the skill, knowledge, and abilities to protect

Figure 4. Strategic Planning Model Source. © 2008 Roger K. Kaufman, PhD. Used with permission.

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or parts; and generate reports and automated Real-time Online Collaborative

notifications). Environment Issue

To meet the challenge of working at a distance,

LARGE-SCALE COLLABORATION the lead IT selected to work within a real-time
MODEL FOR SUBJECT online collaborative environment. This mode of
MATTER EXPERTS communication, fairly new to many of the partners,
resulted in a training solution designed by the
As with any implementation effort, there are in- instructional designers representing the OTPs and
evitably issues, controversies, and/or problems. IT. The real-time online collaboration minimized
The following paragraphs discuss specific issues the requirement for travel, while greatly reducing
or problems and the resolutions to manage, mini- associated costs (e.g., food and lodging, telephone
mize, or eliminate them. charges, time away from office/work settings).
However, the greatest value was in the ability to
Use of Technology Tools work at a moment’s notice in an environment that
and Applications Issue closely resembled a live face-to-face setting. The
key was having the facilitation skills and expertise
In order to provide a seamless environment to its to coordinate and conduct such meetings/training
end-users, the initiative required modifications sessions. The lead IT was fortunate to have key
of an existing relational database to meet the personnel with these knowledge and skill sets and
requirements of the implementation effort. Once years of experience working within collaborative
the technology was in place, there was the matter online environments, both in education and train-
of developing workable templates to capture the ing contexts. The greatest controversy was a secu-
required data to produce the end-product. rity issue when using such an environment when
This was accomplished via collaboration with contracted by a military or government agency.
the system technicians and analysts (i.e., those who There are license agreements and access issues;
would capture the data from multiple sources and however, in our illustrative example the military
entering data into the system). Then the issue of had access to a proprietary online environment
offline word processing for exchanging specific that had many of the same features as available
comments and edits on draft documents (e.g., commercial systems.
track change features using MS Word or features
within the relational database) became an issue to Nature of the Subject
those unfamiliar with the features and techniques Matter Experts Issue
to work through the reviewing procedures.
Resolution of the issue was accomplished by The areas of SME expertise are often focused on
the IT, OTP instructional designers, task leads, and specific function (e.g., knowledge and skill set,
analysts via formal training and direct one-one-one experience) and oftentimes overlap and were
help/guidance. This training was delivered in a interrelated with other SME expertise. To better
blended format, which constituted a combination understand the complex and multi-dimensional
of face-to-face live sessions and virtual online aspects of working with multiple SMEs, it is
sessions, based on time and location constraints. useful to first explore the very nature of SMEs
from an expert-performance perspective. The
relationship between nature and nurture has been
a long-standing debate (Tenenbaum, 1999) since

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it determines the quality of instruction and the collaboration and recommendation was then re-
amount of learning needed to acquire skills and viewed by the OTP project managers and the IT.
establish a knowledge base. However, most would The goal was to get beyond an arbitrary decision
agree that nurture plays a significant role in the or policy and adopt, based on active participation/
development of expertise and that in order to reach decision-making process and procedure. It was the
any significant level of expertise in a given domain, experience of the lead IT that this approach not
the performer must have the desire to excel and at only strengthens acceptance/adoption, but better
least some domain-specific knowledge and skills ensured sustained buy-in and commitment because
that are acquired through practice and feedback. of the active involvement of the partners in the
It is particularly interesting to consider the decision-making process. The key was to develop
role that SMEs are given within a project team. a continuous and open feedback loop, once again
Typically, ID projects are structured such that embracing a systemic and systematic approach to
the SMEs contribute to solutions, processes, and planning and decision-making.
product design by providing their content knowl-
edge to trained IDers. In our illustrative example, Standardization and
the SMEs were the driving force behind the effort Compliance Issue
and were therefore in key roles such as analysts,
managers, and supervisors, going above and be- To carry out a large-scale initiative it was important
yond their domain specific expertise. That is, the to understand the power of standardization for
SME s were serving as a project or team lead and outcomes/products and the compliance with stan-
had to make decisions and act from a perspective dards and guidelines for processes and products.
other than that of their domain knowledge. When Compliance was resolved by creating an internal
you have such a vast number of SMEs with vary- and external review process of product drafts and
ing areas of specialization working together, lines final versions. The business rules that governed the
of communication are of the utmost importance internal review process was determined by each
from the onset of the project for efficiency and of the OTPs, knowing that the external review
effectiveness. would be dependent on certain criteria being met
To deal with this issue of working with SMES it at the internal level. As it was the responsibility
was imperative to adopt a systemic approach where of the lead IT to approve the end-product that
the interrelationships are known, understood, and was then forwarded to the prime contractor, it
embraced as strengths for problem solving and was imperative that the end-product appear as if
decision-making and not viewed as obstacles it were written by one partner, not three separate
or challenges to the ID process. For example, in partners (OTP SMEs) – standardization enabled
the initiative there were seven task leads (TLs), that to be accomplished.
representing the OTPs. Their role was to follow Another important issue that emerged during
the lead of the project manager and to oversee implementation was the value of having a pressure-
the work of the analyst. They served at times as release - a means or process in which senior level
a change agent, a change target, and advocate, managers had the ability to influence process and
depending on the situation or context of the prob- product via business rule set. An analogy would
lem or issue. The lead IT had to establish business be a court of appeals. This capability provided the
rules that would guide the process for reaching analyst an avenue to gain support/advocacy from
consensus (e.g., accepting a common definition of senior management.
approved terms and illustrative examples). Their

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Collaborative Issues • Information overload condition. As with

any adult learner, the learning curve is
Jensen (2002, cited in Warner, Letsky, & Cowen, steep when experiencing new knowledge
2003) addressed collaborative challenges, issues and skills. The lead IT developed train-
that can hinder or prohibit successful implemen- ing for the OTPs based on the theoretical
tation if not address in a timely and organized/ framework of Ausubel’s meaningful recep-
planned manner. Jensen went on to cite the fol- tion learning and schema theory (Ausubel,
lowing major factors influencing military col- et al., 1978), where a learner transfers pre-
laborative teams: vious learning to new information. For ex-
ample, the lead IT designed the delivery of
• Increasing problem complexity– team ef- new information via illustrative examples
fort needed so that the learner could relate to the in-
• Integrated Technology/Communications formation based on their prior experience,
technology widening accessibility of or learning. In addition, situated cogni-
contributors tion theory, or situated learning, served
• Problems addressed at international level – as a theoretical framework. Situation
coalitions required learning is defined as occurring when de-
• Defense Transformation to agile and coali- clarative knowledge (“knowing that”) and
tion operations procedural knowledge (“knowing how”)
• Information overload condition are integrated within a single framework
(Driscoll, 2005, p. 154). Through constant
The lead IT revised this list of collaborative feedback and training within the context of
challenges based on its experience as noted below. the situation and the community of learn-
ers that the partners formed, the informa-
• Increasing problem and task complexity tion load was manageable and productive.
– team effort needed (e.g., resource reallo- • Content SMEs must be balanced with in-
cation: moving SMEs other roles/responsi- structional design analyst SMEs. It was
bility beyond the scope the original work understood that the content, or technical,
order) SME was not expected to have the knowl-
• Integrated Technology/Communications – edge and skill set to write instruction; how-
technology widening accessibility of con- ever, we found the greatest value when
tributors and archiving and collection of they worked in tandem with the instruc-
end-products tional SMEs – to integrate or combine the
• Problems addressed at a multiple tier level expertise of both to make the whole.
(e.g., IDers, TLs, IT, PMs) – where coali-
tions are required. For example, the PMs FUTURE TRENDS
agreed to conduct a specific task analysis
outside the scope of the contracted work, The use of online collaborative learning/training
formed a coalition to how they would at- environments is gaining greater popularity in
tack the problem and then presented a pro- academic and business/industry settings. Military
posed solution to the prime contractor for and government agencies are seeing the value
approval/acceptance. and benefit, in terms of cost and effectiveness in
training programs, as well. Hofmann (2004) states,

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“like every innovation, learning technologies are a time) – unless done virtually (any place, any time
mixed blessing. They allow us to present content or in a blended delivery format). A most significant
in many different formats and deliver that content opportunity for those implementing large-scale
to widely dispersed audiences at a relatively low ID initiatives is to use a collaborative model,
cost” (p.1). In the illustrative example, the lead IT such as the one described herein, thus breaking
took the online learning environment and used it through the barriers of geographical locating and
for that purpose, as well as to serve as a meeting capturing of a combined level of expertise only
and consensus building forum for its OTPs. As made possible by employing a variety of SMEs
more individuals learn the features of the online collaborating via virtual environments.
collaborative environment (its tools and applica-
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A Large-Scale Model for Working with Subject Matter Experts

selecting or constructing media, conducting as- products that appear to the customer or end-user
sessment, and implementing and revising results. as seamlessly created and produced.
Integration Team: Group of individuals Subject Matter Expert (SME): Defined as
whose role and responsibility is to standardize, that individual who exhibits the highest level of
synchronize, and incorporate the efforts of par- expertise in performing a specialized job, task, or
ticipating subject matter experts (SMEs). The skill within the organization. SMEs possess in-
integration team’s efforts allow the SMEs to depth knowledge of the subject you are attempting
achieve consensus, efficiency, and standard of to document (http://www.isixsigma.com/diction-
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Standardization of Processes and Products: Systems Approach: A methodology used to
Means provided to the subject matter experts create and sustain a system (e.g., educational,
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This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 1319-1329, copyright 2009
by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.9
Instructional Challenges in
Higher Education Online
Courses Delivered through a
Learning Management System
by Subject Matter Experts
George L. Joeckel III
Utah State University, USA

Tae Jeon
Utah State University, USA

Joel Gardner
Utah State University, USA

ABSTRACT unique to this context. They propose new in-

structional design models and a new instructional
The authors are Instructional Designers devel- system of design to address the instructional chal-
oping online courses in higher education. These lenges specific to their learning system context.
courses are facilitated by Subject Matter Experts
and delivered through a Learning Management
System. They propose that instructional alignment INTRODUCTION
with pedagogic beliefs is the best instructional
foundation for original course designs in this As Instructional Designers (IDs) in higher edu-
instructional context, and examine three factors cation, one of our main responsibilities involves
working with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to
design online courses for delivery in a Learning
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch209

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Management System (LMS). We have identified (ISD) we are developing to produce original course
three main factors specific to this instructional designs for our learning system context.
context. The first is the ongoing nature of the
relationship between SMEs and IDs as they
collaborate on the design and delivery of online TAXONOMY AND TERMS
courses. The second is the constraint that these
never-delivered courses must be designed without In order to communicate more effectively about
the benefit of learner-generated data to inform the our instructional context, we have developed the
process. The third is the foundational role which term “SME-F (Subject Matter Expert-facilitated)
the course facilitator’s pedagogical beliefs play online courses” to refer to online courses taught
throughout the course design process. by the same individual responsible for providing
In this chapter we propose a taxonomy for an a course’s content. We will refer to this person as
ID-designed Online Course and define the terms the “SME/F” (Subject Matter Expert/Facilitator).
used in our discussion. We then discuss the three We propose the following taxonomy in order to
factors associated with our instructional context. situate our terms within the larger context of online
We propose a model for achieving learner-driven courses designed by IDs (see Figure 1).
course designs through a phased approach. We We believe that there are critical distinctions
examine two elements which shape our learning between the instructional context for the type of
system context: the pedagogical effects of LMS course we have described and the instructional
adoption and success factors related to Online context for other types of online courses. For
Learning Environments (OLEs). We explore example, in an I-F online course the Instructor is
the role of context in ID. Finally, we present a facilitating a course with content provided by a
framework for an Instructional System of Design SME, and she or he may or may not be an expert
in the content. Also, the Instructor is not likely to

Figure 1. Taxonomy of online course designed by instructional designers

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

have played a significant role in the course design Designing without Learner-
process, so one would not expect to find course Generated Data
design choices aligned with his or her pedagogi-
cal strengths. By definition, never-delivered courses must be
For the purposes of this chapter we will use the designed without the benefit of learner-generated
term “course design” to represent the entire pro- data. According to Geber & Scott (2007), for de-
cess of Instructional Design as represented by the signers operating “from the theoretical orientation
phases described in the ADDIE model: analysis, of learning as interdependent with context and
design, development, implementation and evalu- experience, it is not possible to know learners’
ation (see, for example, Dick & Carey, 1996). We perspectives in advance of course development”
will use the terms Learning Management System (p. 464-465). The ID and SME/F are forced
(LMS) and Course Management System (CMS) look to second-hand sources of information to
interchangeably. We will use the term “learning construct assumptions about potential learners:
system context” as defined by Tessmer and Richey data gathered from learners in similar traditional
(1997): “those situational elements that affect both or online courses, research-based findings about
the acquisition and application of newly acquired online learners, learner characteristics implied by
knowledge, skills, or attitudes” (p. 87). We will the LMS, etc. In their examination of ID practices
use the term “pedagogical beliefs” to refer to using established instructional design methods,
“teacher’s educational beliefs about teaching and Sims and Stork (2007) state that IDs “...will often
learning” (Ertmer, 2005, p. 28). predict or assume certain characteristics of the
learners” (3) and incorporate these assumptions
into a course design.
THREE CONTEXTUAL FACTORS For original course designs, we propose that
IDs need to limit the assumptions made about the
We are part of a team of IDs providing ID (In- potential learners to one source: the SME/F. We
structional Design) services at a research-based posit that the SME/F’s assumptions about how
university. Designing original online courses the course’s future learners will achieve course
facilitated by SMEs is a major component of our objectives are inherently linked to their peda-
responsibilities. In the course of our practice, we gogical beliefs and practices. We stipulate that
have identified three factors that we believe are documenting and incorporating these assumptions
unique to this instructional context. into a new course design will create an instruc-
tional foundation that maintains alignment with
Ongoing Relationship the SME/F’s pedagogy, and consequently his or
her pedagogical practices throughout the course.
Each ID on our team is assigned to work with spe-
cific university departments on an ongoing basis. SME/F Pedagogical Beliefs
Our IDs and SME/Fs work together throughout
the entire pre- and post-semester cycle of course Working with the same individual throughout the
design. This arrangement creates an opportunity design and delivery process presents a unique op-
to make course design decisions driven by the portunity for instructional continuity. Our experi-
pedagogical beliefs of the individual providing ence has led us to conclude that the pedagogical
the course content and facilitating the delivery beliefs held by the SME/F are the best instruc-
of the course. tional foundation for original designs of courses

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

delivered online through a LMS. This conclusion structional process recognizes and embraces this
is supported by Ertmer’s (2005) examination of filter by systematically exploring, documenting,
the research conducted on teacher beliefs: “… and integrating the SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs
beliefs are far more influential than knowledge into the course design. We share the hope that a
in determining how individuals organize and de- greater understanding of the relationship between
fine tasks and problems” (p. 28). She also draws pedagogical beliefs and technology use:
a direct connection between pedagogical beliefs
and technology skills: …may enable us to facilitate a better alignment
between research, practice, and beliefs and to
Given that these [technology] skills are unlikely provide more effective ways of supporting and
to be used unless they fit with teachers’ existing documenting teacher change. Ultimately, the goal
pedagogical beliefs, it is imperative that educa- is to facilitate uses of technology that lead to in-
tors increase their understanding of and ability creased student learning (Ertmer, 2005, p. 27-28).
to address teacher beliefs, as part of their efforts
to increase teachers’ technology skills and uses We propose that creating and maintaining
(Ertmer, 2005, p. 37). instructional alignment with the core beliefs of
the individual responsible for the course’s content
Zhao & Cziko (2001) also emphasize the and for the facilitation of the course will lead to
importance of teacher beliefs when creating their the most significant learner outcomes. We suggest
Perceptual Control Theory (PCT) framework for that it is the responsibility of the ID to gather and
understanding teacher adoption of technology. interpret course data, and then present evidence
PCT defines three necessary conditions: of course outcomes which are aligned or mis-
aligned with the SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs.
1. The teacher must believe that technology If the evidence induces a shift in the SME/F’s
can more effectively meet a higher-level pedagogical beliefs, the ID should recommend
goal than what has been used. changes to the course design that will increase
2. The teacher must believe that using tech- instructional alignment, and then implement the
nology will not cause disturbances to other changes that are approved.
higher-level goals that he or she thinks
are more important than the one being
maintained. DATA-DRIVEN DESIGN EVOLUTION
3. The teacher must believe that he or she has
or will have sufficient ability and resources An ongoing relationship between an ID and a
to use technology. (Zhao & Cziko, 2001, p. SME/F may lead to an evolution of the course
6) design. Ideally this evolution would be the result
of evidence derived from course data that led
Ertmer (2005) demonstrates how pedagogi- to changes in the SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs.
cal beliefs have a global effect on a teacher’s We have created the term “data-driven design
perceptions about new instructional tools and evolution” to describe this process. We propose
practices when she states “Even new information a three-stage model in which the course design
(about technology, alternative teaching methods, shifts from “SME/F-driven” towards “learner-
etc.), if attended to at all, will be filtered through driven” (see Figure 2).
these existing belief systems” (p. 30). Our in-

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Figure 2. Data-driven Design Evolution in SME-F online courses

In Stage I, there is an insufficient quality of changes to the course. The ID assists the SME/F
course data to justify changes to the course design in interpreting the learner feedback from the latest
decisions/revisions based on learner feedback. cohort of learners by using the entire set of course
This occurs in courses which have yet to be de- data to control for anomalies. The ID recommends
livered, but it may also be the result of an insuf- changes and implements the approved changes.
ficient quantity of course data. The ID creates a
course design based on instructional alignment
between the SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs and TWO CONTEXTUAL ELEMENTS
assumptions about learners.
In Stage II, the quality of the course data is Researchers have explored the role of context in
high enough to identify learner characteristics ID for more than a decade. In 1994 Edmunds,
that can replace the SME/F’s assumptions. The ID Branch & Mukherjee stated:
provides the SME/F with evidence based on course Concepts, theories and models have an ecology,
data that demonstrates instructional alignment a context within which they function. Importing
or misalignment. When the evidence produces a a theory or model from a significantly different
shift in the SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs, the ID context, without attention to contextual differ-
recommends changes to the course design that will ences, violates this ecology, and subsequently
increase instructional alignment, and implements results in inefficient solutions to instructional
the approved changes. problems (p. 66-67).
In Stage III, the increase in the quality of Tessmer & Richey (1997) described the context
the course data has led to a fundamental shift in of a learning system as “those situational elements
the SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs. He or she has that affect both the acquisition and application
become willing to learner feedback drive design of newly acquired knowledge, skills, or attitudes

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

(p.87).” They identify the social, physical, and We have also seen shifts in pedagogical beliefs
political elements which combine to create “a among the faculty and instructors we work with
multilevel body of factors in which learning and that they attribute to their use of a LMS. Because
performance are embedded (p. 87).” We have our process is designed to establish “baseline”
identified two contextual elements that interact pedagogical beliefs, we will be in a position to
with the previously-discussed instructional con- document the changes to these beliefs. By follow-
text to create our learning system context: the ing a research-based model of success factors in
pedagogical effects of LMS adoption and the online learning, we can recommend changes to
success factors associated with Online Learning the course design that utilize these pedagogical
Environments (OLEs). shifts to generate increased learner outcomes.

Pedagogical Effects of Success Factors in OLEs

LMS Adoption
In order to identify success factors in OLEs,
The majority of the technological resources we Bekele (2008) reviewed 82 studies from educa-
use to deliver our courses are embedded in an tional technology journals. Based on his review,
LMS. In a comprehensive study of faculty and he developed a model that identifies seven success
instructional staff in a multi-campus university measures: learning outcomes, student satisfaction,
system, Morgan (2003) found that more than a higher learning, faculty satisfaction, sustainability,
third of respondents stated “to solve a pedagogical scalability, and rate of return. The model illustrates
problem or challenge” as their reason for CMS that “...success in the OLEs was a function of a
adoption (p. 3). Despite pedagogical problems or complicated interplay of human, technologic,
challenges being the number one reason stated course, pedagogic, and leadership factors” (p.
for CMS adoption, Morgan (2003) found that 237). We have adopted this model to guide our
“when probing below the surface, however, it ongoing development of an ISD specific to our
seems that most of these needs have less to do learning system context.
with pedagogy, per se, and more to do with class
management” (p. 2). Morgan (2003) reconciles
this apparent contradiction: THE AERO ISD

Faculty using course management systems find The AERO ISD is being developed to create
that they achieve a number of pedagogical gains. course designs for our learning system context.
This is something of a paradox given that faculty By focusing on a specific learning system con-
look to a CMS to provide them with organizational text, we believe our process will be practical,
tools. But in the process of using these tools, many detailed, dynamic and flexible. We also believe
faculty members begin to rethink and restructure that by maintaining a strict vision of solving the
their courses and ultimately their teaching. The instructional challenges presented in our environ-
end result is a sort of “accidental pedagogy”. ment (as opposed to taking on global instructional
Faculty teaching is improved through the use of challenges), we are creating a process that will
a CMS, but this is a side effect of the use of the evolve to be not only systematic, but systemic,
software rather than a direct result of its use (p. where “the outcomes of each component directly
4-5). or indirectly impact every other component of the
instructional design to some degree (Edmunds,

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 Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Branch & Mukherjee, 1994, p. 56).” The AERO communication among design stakeholders, c)
ISD utilizes two new context-specific ID models, remain inclusive by avoiding the use of jargon,
incorporates the ADDIE design phases (see, for and d) represent the basic order of operations in
example, Dick & Carey, 1996), encompasses the our ID process. The OAR model has proven ef-
instructional phases identified in Merrill’s First fective in meeting these criteria by organizing the
Principles of Instruction (Merrill 2002, 2006), components of SME-F online courses in higher
and is being guided by Bekele’s model of success education into three domains: Resources, Objec-
and success factors in Internet-supported learning tives and Activities.
environments (Bekele, 2008). The OAR model defines resources as the
physical, electronic and intellectual assets with
Assumptions which a course can be created. These resources
are determined by an analysis of the learners,
There are a number of assumptions that we have SME/F, ID, learning and performing environ-
made as IDs in developing the AERO ISD. We ments, available instructional technology, and
assume that our process will be applied to courses other relevant contextual factors associated with
for which: a) a needs analysis has been conducted, a course. IDs and SME/Fs use the results of this
b) a need for the course has been established, and analysis to identify real-world problems and tasks
c) there is an institutional commitment to develop to inform the design of objectives.
the course. We also assume that the SME/F has The objectives domain contains the learning
the necessary expertise in the subject area, and and performance goals that are designed to guide
that they have, and/or can obtain, the necessary the course. Objectives determine which resources
course content. We assume that IDs will be de- will be delivered to influence learner behavior
signing online courses to be delivered through a under specified conditions to meet defined crite-
Learning Management System (LMS) or Course ria. Opportunities for learners to accomplish the
Management System (CMS).We assume that the objectives are created through activities that are
extra effort expended in learning and utilizing our as closely aligned with real-world problems and
systematic process will be justified by increases in: tasks as the available resources will allow.
Activities are the actual events that learners
• Course usability for SME/Fs and learners engage in to acquire and develop new knowledge
• Instructional alignment with the SME/F’s and skills. At a minimum, these events involve
pedagogical beliefs an agent (most often the learner, but at times the
• Data-driven design choices facilitator) following an objective to engage with
• Learner outcomes a resource. Activities are primarily delivered by a
LMS and are facilitated and assessed by the SME/F.
The OAR Model
Merrill’s First Principles
The OAR model (Figure 3) is a visual tool which of Instruction
represents the components of SME-F online
courses in higher education, and their relationship The AERO ISD is being designed to generate activ-
to each other. The OAR model was developed to ity types which correlate strongly to a well-know
meet four criteria: a) maintain a strict focus on instructional theory: Merrill’s First Principles of
our particular learning system context, b) cre- Instruction (2002, 2006). In an effort to establish
ate a simple graphic-based aid which facilitates the most fundamental principles of instruction,

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Figure 3. The OAR model

Merrill reviewed and synthesized several instruc- wise to demonstration, followed by application,
tional theories and research reports. Merrill writes and ends with integration.
that learning is promoted when: Figure 5 illustrates how Merrill’s First Prin-
ciples of Instruction relate to the three domains
• Instruction takes place in the context of of the OAR model. The task/problem is a resource.
real-world problems or tasks that are pro- Objectives determine how this and other re-
gressively difficult sources will be delivered to create two types of
• Learners activate relative cognitive struc- activities: acquisition and application. Acquisition
tures by recalling or demonstrating prior activities are the opportunities provided for learn-
knowledge or experience ers to gain new knowledge and skills and encom-
• Learners observe a demonstration of new pass Merrill’s activation and demonstration
knowledge phases. Application activities are the opportunities
• Learners apply new knowledge, receiving provided for learners to use and develop the new
feedback and coaching that is gradually knowledge and skills they have acquired, and
withdrawn correlate to Merrill’s application and integration
• Learners integrate their new knowledge by phases.
reflecting on, discussing, defending, pre- The OAR communication model is adapted to
senting new knowledge and creating per- create an ISD-specific model by the addition of
sonal ways to use it an evaluation component. The AERO model
(Figure 6) represents the theoretical foundation
Figure 4 illustrates these phases and their rela- of a new ISD for creating and revising SME-fa-
tionships to each other. The task/problem plays a cilitated online courses developed by IDs in the
central role by defining the learning context. The higher education environment. The AERO ISD
instruction begins with activation, moves clock- incorporates the ADDIE phases of instructional

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Figure 4. Merrill’s first principles of instruction

Figure 5. Merrill’s first principles in the OAR domains

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Figure 6. The AERO model

design and Merrill’s First Principles of Instruction design level. The results of this analysis are used
to create a systematic, research-based process to design acquisition and application objectives.
targeted at this context. These objectives are used to select resources and
An AERO ISD “cycle” represents the steps of develop the vehicles for delivery to learners. The
the process when applied to one of three design cycle is implemented when the learner engages
levels: course, interunit or unit. The “course” in activities which are facilitated by the SME/F.
design level refers to acquisition and application The results of the activities are evaluated and the
activities that may incorporate elements from all results of the evaluation are used to make necessary
of the available objectives and resources, includ- revisions or additions to the relevant objectives,
ing introductory papers/discussions, assessments resources, and/or activities.
of prerequisite knowledge and skills, and com-
prehensive activities such as final exams, portfo-
lios, capstone projects, etc. The “interunit” design FUTURE TRENDS
level encompasses activities based on the objec-
tives and resources from more than one unit such In our practice as IDs, we have experienced
as midterm exams, projects, and learner presenta- positive outcomes and feedback from our use of
tions. The “unit” design level is the smallest the OAR communication model. We are in the
grouping of related objectives, resources and process of continuing to gather data from course
activities, and in our experience is labeled by stakeholders to design formal evaluations of this
SME/Fs with a term denoting a “chunk” of in- model. The results of these evaluations will al-
struction (ie, “Module 1”), or with a temporal unit low us to determine the validity of its theoretical
(ie, “Week 1”). foundations and make research-based revisions.
An AERO ISD cycle (Figure 7) begins with an The development of a systematic process based
analysis of the resources available at the selected on the AERO ISD is in its preliminary stages, and

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Instructional Challenges in Higher Education Online Courses Delivered through a Learning Management

Figure 7. The AERO ISD cycle

continues to be challenged and revised based on SME/F’s pedagogical beliefs and encourages a
the feedback we receive from our clients. We data-driven evolution from SME/F-driven designs
encourage other IDs operating in higher education to learner-driven designs.
to utilize any of its components that they might
find helpful in developing a process for their own
practices. REFERENCES

Bekele, T. A. (2008). Impact of technology sup-

CONCLUSION ported learning environments in higher education:
Issues in and for research. Unpublished doctoral
Three factors unique to new online higher educa- dissertation, University of Oslo, Norway.
tion courses facilitated by Subject Matter Experts Dick, W., & Carey, L. (1996). The systematic
and designed by Instructional Designers create an design of instruction (4th ed.). New York: Harper
instructional and learning systems contexts with Collins.
unique challenges. We created the two context-
specific ID models (OAR and AERO) and are Edmonds, G. S., Branch, R. C., & Mukherjee, P.
continuing to develop the AERO ISD to address (1994). A Conceptual Framework for Compar-
these challenges. Original designs in this context ing Instructional Design Models. Educational
are most effective when aligned with the SME/F’s Technology Research and Development, 42(4),
pedagogical beliefs. As learner-generated data 55–72. doi:10.1007/BF02298055
is gathered, our process documents shifts in the

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Ertmer, P. A. (2005). Teacher Pedagogical Beliefs: Morgan, G. (2003). Faculty use of course man-
The Final Frontier in Our Quest for Technology agement systems. Boulder, CO: EDUCAUSE
Integration? Educational Technology Research Center for Applied Research. Retrieved Dec. 23,
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461–478. doi:10.1007/s11423-006-9005-6 (Eds.), Proceedings of AusWeb07, Thirteenth Aus-
tralasian World Wide Web Conference. Lismore,
Merrill, M. D. (2002). First principles of instruc-
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au/aw07/papers/refereed/sims/index.html
Merrill, M. D. (2006). First principles of instruc-
Tesser, M., & Richey, R. C. (1997). The role of
tion: a synthesis. Trends and Issues in Instructional
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Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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342

Chapter 2.10
Functional Relevance and
Online Instructional Design
Glenn E. Snelbecker
Temple Universtiy, USA

Susan M. Miller
Kent State Universtiy, USA

Robert Z. Zheng
University of Utah, USA

ABSTRACT a conceptual framework to identify and to drive

decision-making processes that occur during the
Online instruction will more likely be effective if design and development of instruction.
it fits with, and is perceived by, students as being
functionally relevant for their education, work,
or other personal contexts. Existing practice may CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
emphasize an ad hoc approach to online design
by being pragmatic and somewhat unsystematic. The reader will be able to:
It is proposed that using a functional relevance
perspective, as described in this chapter, is more 1. Understand the meaning of—and conceptual
likely to have designers and online learners at- foundation for—functional relevance
tain a greater advantage in using the capacity 2. Apply functional relevance as a conceptual
of the Internet to support teaching and learning. framework to clarify and drive decision-
This chapter introduces the concept of functional making processes during the design and
relevance and identifies some of the underly- development of online instruction
ing theories. Discussions are made on how the 3. Recognize how general guidelines from
concept of functional relevance can be used as this chapter may be applied to the design
of online instruction
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch210

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Functional Relevance and Online Instructional Design

4. Understand how a functional relevance Several important issues in online instructional

perspective can aid designers to: design involve pedagogy and theoretical orienta-
◦◦ Decide whether particular theories tion. These issues include deciding whether: (a)
or research findings might improve an existing or a new pedagogical or instructional
some aspects of their instruction approach would be appropriate for learning; (b)
◦◦ Identify those situations where so- someone’s research findings are likely to “fit”
cial presence might constitute an area with teaching and learning; and (c) using a new
that merits careful study and possible pedagogical approach or new research findings
important modifications in the online might cause a change in the design of teaching.
instruction, and Some instructors respond to these issues by using
◦◦ Consider which learner attributes an ad hoc approach to online design. This is to
may be most relevant for the instruc- say that often they take a pragmatic but unsystem-
tion being designed and to discern atic approach, which usually, in the end, fails to
how those particular attributes may take advantage of the capacity of the Internet for
warrant additional instructions of teaching and learning. An alternative position is
modification of the online instruction taken by some who propose that online practice
should be grounded in theory through a systematic
application of evidence-based strategies (Wilson,
INTRODUCTION 1999). With this position, what is important is the
congruence between practice and theory, rather
The proliferation of Internet use in general than selection of a correct theory (Bednar, Cun-
and online learning in particular has dramati- ningham, Duffy, & Perry, 1992; Wilson, 1999).
cally changed the landscape in K-16 education An example of congruence is the inclusion of
(DuCharme-Hansen & Dupin-Bryant, 2005; scaffolding strategies in constructivist-based
Salpeter, 2003). Fernback (2003) pointed out instruction, or the use of prescriptive strategies
that Web-based instructional delivery has al- associated with cognitive theory that aid encod-
lowed educators to experiment with flexible, ing and retrieval of information (Wilson, 1999).
innovative, and progressive learning techniques All this reflection still leaves the designer
that “permit students to contribute the learning uninformed on how to proceed. Wilson (1999)
process in new and active way” (p. 28). Although suggested a problem or practitioner-centered
the idea of delivering instruction online has been approach in which theory plays a supporting but
heralded by teachers, administrators, parents, and non-limiting role. Jonassen (1999) suggested that
students, doing so effectively takes more than a a designer possess the skills to include multiple
mere shift in modalities (DuCharme-Hansen & perspectives, such as the inclusion of objectivist
Dupin-Bryant, 2005). Recently, there has been and constructivist views. Miller and Miller (2000)
a concerted effort among educators to create a suggested five variables that need to be considered
successful online learning environment through by a designer of online instruction: (a) theoretical
design (Lim, Plucker, & Nowak, 2001). For ex- orientation of the instructor and of the students;
ample, DuCharme-Hansen and Dupin-Bryant’s (b) learning goals, either explicit or implicit; (c)
model of distance education planning and Jones, nature of the content, such as well or ill-structured
Harmon and Lowther’s (2002) framework for subject matter; (d) learner characteristics including
online instructional implementation reflect the cognitive and motivational characteristics; and
efforts in that direction. (e) technological capabilities including available

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infrastructure to support various types of online tions, including online learning environments, are
communication exchanges. actually supportive of learner activities and are
Snelbecker (1984, 1989, 1993) proposed that perceived as such by learners as being relevant for
a designer should keep in mind the concept of how they function in a particular context (Snel-
functional relevance requirements regarding both becker, 1989, 1991, 1993). The assumption is that
the subject matter and delivery of that material to it is only the degree to which technology is seen
the learner. This idea suggests a perspective that as potentially helpful that it will actually foster
addresses and integrates theoretical, technical, and and support educational achievement and its use.
practical context concerns. Functional relevance The importance of functional relevance for
is congruent with the design considerations men- technology applications became apparent dur-
tioned in the previous paragraph. In fact, functional ing the first author’s (GES) work with various
relevance can be used as a conceptual framework technology projects starting in the 1970s (e.g.,
to identify and to drive decision-making processes Aiken & Snelbecker, 1991; Ball & Snelbecker
that occur during the design and development of 1982a, 1982b, 1983; Ball, Snelbecker, & Schechte,
instruction. 1985; Roszkowski, Devlin, Snelbecker, Aiken, &
This chapter discusses (a) the concept of Jacobsohn, 1988; Snelbecker, 1986; Snelbecker,
functional relevance from a design perspective, Bhote-Edjulee, Aiken & Wilson, 1992; Snelbeck-
particularly how it can be applied to online instruc- er, Bhote, Wilson, & Aiken, 1995). Participants in
tion design and other Web-based learning, and (b) these technology training projects initially con-
the relationship between functional relevance and sisted of nurses and physicians, but later mainly
design issues involved with pedagogical theory, involved K-12 teachers. Many were computer
social presence, and learner characteristics. The novices who expressed some level of anxiety
chapter focuses on these topics: about using computers. Researchers involved in
those projects also observed that teachers’ anxiety
• Meaning of, and conceptual foundation was a barrier or restriction in their effective use
for, functional relevance as a perspective of computers and related technology resources.
that can yield fruitful implications for the The solution of choice that emerged from
success of online instruction those projects and related research was to focus
• Problems, learner needs, and online issues on how computers can be relevant and useful
that are met by the inclusion of functional for what teachers need to do in their work with
relevance students. Stated another way, once teachers were
• Exploration of functional relevance as it shown how computers could help them to function
relates to three aspects of online design: more effectively as teachers, indications of so-
theoretical orientation, social presence, called computer anxiety and fear were no longer
and learner characteristics. a major concern. Functional relevance involved
providing concrete examples demonstrating how
the participants could help their students gain
CONCEPTS, PROBLEMS, technology mediated content. One method was
AND SOLUTIONS the use of sample scripts—used first by teachers
and then modified for their students. Teachers who
Functional Relevance previously had only limited computer and Internet
experiences were hesitant about using computers.
The concept of functional relevance can be de- However, once they recognized how they could
picted as the extent to which technology applica- get useful ideas and activities for their students,

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they were much more willing to take cognitive they function in personal, work, or other contexts.
risks and explore technology resources and the Concurrently, Heider’s pioneering work regard-
Internet by themselves. Quite commonly with the ing common sense psychology and interpersonal
different groups it was found that, even early in relationships (Fredenborg, 1995; Harvey, 1989;
the training sessions, teachers and other trainees Heider, 1958; Snelbecker, 1988) provided insights
began to have more confidence, rejecting offers and research methods to discern how people
of help even though they initially had regularly develop beliefs as to what can be functionally
sought help. relevant for them.
The initial experiences of these teachers reflect Other theorists’ ideas were helpful in devel-
the experiences of many end-users. When comput- oping procedures for selecting and improving
ers and other technology resources became more interventions related to functional relevance.
readily available, available instructions and manu- Many people are familiar with Selye’s (1956,
als almost exclusively focused on how computers 1980) concept of distress, which is stress from
functioned. In contrast, end-users need instructions highly undesirable or even potentially painful
and examples clearly describing how they could experiences. But, comparatively, few seem aware
benefit from using computers in their respective of Selye’s concept of eustress, which is stress in
learning or work contexts. Unfortunately, the trend conjunction with highly desirable but challenging
to focus on how technology works rather than on experiences, such as getting a job or promotion,
its functional relevance continues today. All too getting married, or having other challenging re-
often, many user manuals emphasize key-strokes sponsibilities. This raised questions about how to
(i.e., push X key followed by Y key) rather than cope with challenging experiences during online
guidelines about how the hardware or software and other learning activities.
can enhance how people function relevant to their Certain researchers’ ideas were helpful in ad-
respective learning or work contexts. One key dressing cognitive operations that are regularly
idea derived from functional relevance is that fear used by experts and that could be valuable for
of computers is less likely to occur when users novices to learn. Herbert A. Simon and Alan New-
recognize clearly how the computer resources can ell’s key work on administrators’ and other profes-
support and enhance their functioning. sionals’ approaches to problem solving showed
During the previously mentioned school- that, quite often, those experts were not aware of
related technology projects, the first author (GES) the many steps or sequences of actions they use
used his background and experiences as a clinical in formulating or solving problems (Simon, 1981;
psychologist and as an educational psychologist to Simon & Newell, 1971). Lev Landa (Landa, 1987;
create and develop the concept of functional rel- Landa & Kopstein, 1974, 1976; Main, 1987) cre-
evance. A number of theorists’ ideas were helpful ated procedures (a) to uncover actual procedures
in developing facets and use of this concept. Carl used by experts—including logical steps that
Rogers (1969) is widely known for his concept experts have described and also other cognitive
of personally relevant learning, that is, students operations that they could not describe, and (b) for
may be apathetic about teachers’ comments but teaching novices, effectively and efficiently, how
will become engaged in learning when students to emulate experts in complex real world problem
perceive learning to be personally relevant for solving contexts. Those procedures and other ideas
themselves. This idea stimulated Snelbecker to from Landa, Newell, and Simon proved to be
explore ways that teaching-learning activities helpful in designing functional relevance guide-
might have greater impact if and when students lines for teachers and students. Other aspects of
perceive those activities can be relevant for how functional relevance were influenced by the work

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of educational technology leaders and various there be a machine that adapts to my business, not
psychology learning theorists, including the views the other way around?” More recently some IT
of scholars about the creation, modification, and industry publications have been proposing that
use of theories and research findings (Azar, 1999; an “IT attitude” (or, “IT” emphasis) should be
Oswald, 2002; Snelbecker, 1974, 1985). Thus, discarded in favor of focusing on ways in which
functional relevance draws from and is based on IT resources can enhance business, professional,
a synthesis of observations and ideas from formal or personal productivity. Each of these comments
theories and research findings, as well as common reflects a condition in which technology is not
sense psychology and other so-called real world functioning in a manner that is recognized by users
learning, ideas, and perspectives. as being relevant for them. All too often, it seems
intended end-users tend to judge that technology
When Design Lacks resources or ideas offered are so markedly different
Functional Relevance from their perspective that any benefit from such
ideas would be too costly in time, frustration, or
Our premise is that potentially helpful technology effort that they are judged as being simply not
applications will foster or support meaningful worth the effort needed to learn and use them.
educational achievement successfully only in the Unfortunately, one source of frustration stems
degree to which they are clearly relevant for how partly from inherent attributes of modern-day
students and teachers function. This requires hav- technologies, which constitutes strengths as well
ing such helpful resources perceived, respectively, as frustration-laden weaknesses. These inherent
by students and teachers, as being functionally aspects of technology resources include, but may
relevant for them in their particular context. Func- not be limited to, the following: (a) complex soft-
tional relevance overcomes frustration and anxiety, ware that can deal with complicated processes, and
two human emotions that frequently accompany (b) general purpose software that can be modified
use of technology. We now need to recognize for a variety of purposes. These attributes make
briefly some inherent, potentially problematic, it difficult for developers to know how and when
attributes of technology before addressing ways software may malfunction. For example, once we
to maximize learning benefits from technology. know that a board can support 210 pounds we also
It is a mistake to assume that the frustrations know that the board can support objects weighing
encountered by users in the aforementioned tech- less than 210 pounds. Unfortunately, the same may
nology projects are a thing of the past. There are not be true for many technology resources. Even
unending streams of examples about the frustra- if we know that software can handle complicated
tions people endure when trying to use technology tasks, we cannot safely say that this software
resources. A June 16, 2004 PC Magazine article, can separately handle all simpler tasks. That gap
entitled Help Us Define PC Ease of Use, depicted could exist even when those same simple tasks
a PC as behaving like a stubborn child, including are being addressed successfully in the process
being obstinate and hard to figure out, much too of handling more complicated tasks. An example
often taking even simple tasks consume too much would be to create a universal design compatible
time. Also criticized were too frequent occurrences website. It is believed that by adding technical
of poor design, inherent incompatibilities, and features such as ALT tags for web graphics and
having things not working the way they should. enclosed captions for streaming videos, we are
Advertisements and articles in major IT industry able to create a website that would address the
publications (e.g., the June 28, 2004 issue of needs for all people. Such an assumption may not
ComputerWorld) contain requests such as, “Can’t be warranted. Even though the website is designed

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based on the principles of universal design, it still Some technology designers, developers, and
lacks the capability to address the specific needs vendors seem to misunderstand why technology
for all people who use the website. resources are not readily usable. That reaction is
A second source of frustration is the appar- evident each time designers assert that the solu-
ent tendency of designers to forget or ignore the tion to end-user problems is to make the software
fact that the main goal of online instruction is simpler (less capable) or watered down (i.e.,
to facilitate learning that will be beneficial for providing less information rather than providing
learners. Instead, too often, designers apparently the valuable information more clearly). Instead,
see a project from their own perspective, perhaps the designers should be trying to find out how
focusing on the technological “bells and whistles” their technology resources, whether intended for
and not through the eyes of the users who want to experts or novices, can be relevant to the ways that
achieve or complete successfully a particular task. their target group functions. This means that the
Some designers seem to think that their real goal added value of the online learning for the user’s
is to convince others that only the best technology productivity or other aspects of work is effectively
and technical details have been incorporated in and explicitly provided. Adding value or getting
their online instruction. It is very easy for online a return on one’s investment (ROI)—time as well
designers to get excited about some new gadget, as monetary, personal, or business investment—is
device, or technology with many new features. routinely expected by end-users, (but not necessar-
Designers and developers of online instruction ily recognized by designers) much of the time in
must be extremely cautious and sensitive about business and professional contexts. Recognizing
the selection and deployment of appropriate online the perspectives of targeted end-users—during
instruction resources and become aware of the needs assessment and identification of purposes
design related issues in online learning. Studies for the instruction and throughout the development
have shown that educators and designers tend process and follow-up evaluations—rather than
to focus more on the technical aspects than the depending so much on how designers perceive
relevant functions in online learning (Baer, 2000; things is very important. Involvement of potential
Carr, 2000; Tu & McIsaac, 2002). For example, end-users can benefit the ultimate end—and also
many online instructional designers are fascinated can help improve the productivity and positive
by the nonlinear, associative nature of the Web impact of applications designers and developers
and assume that learning will occur when such in online learning.
features are built into instructional Websites. What is needed is to have designers of online
However, physical connection between concepts in learning focus more on the learning benefits that
online courses does not necessarily guarantee the can be derived from online learning, rather than
types of cognitive connections that occur during only or mainly on the subject matter and technical
learning. According to Perkins (1990), “… ‘Con- aspects of the technology resources. Of course,
nections’ is an effort to try to confront the need all three of these plus practical and other matters
for conceptual understanding of subject matter on must be considered. Online resources should be
one hand and the need for general thinking skills designed so that they provide students with learn-
on the other” (p. 53). Oftentimes, designers are ing experiences of relevance to the ways that they
overly concerned with the physical aspects of a function in their educational program, personal
connection, that is, how many links are needed lives, and/or work.
and where to insert them, and so forth, leaving In the next sections we will offer some exam-
little room for examining the cognitive connec- ples of how a functional relevance perspective can
tions that are needed to support learning. be useful in addressing online learning instruction

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issues and problems. We’ll offer some suggestions possible, have representatives of potential
from a functional relevance standpoint regarding students somehow involved in providing
three online learning matters: theoretical orienta- relevant ideas prior to, during, and after the
tion, social presence, and learner characteristics. actual design and development of the online
instruction. Be especially attentive to their
Functional Relevance and Design views and expectations, concerns they may
have, and any special accommodations or
Functional relevance is proposed here as an ap- other issues that might impact on their ac-
proach that can help improve and enhance the cess to and active participation in the online
quality of online instruction. Although functional instruction.
relevance can not be expected to solve all online 5. As you should do regarding your reactions to
instructional design problems, it can help the ideas from theories, professionals, and other
designer make decisions about students’ likely resources, consider the ideas you gain from
reactions to online instruction and thus possibly potential students in the context of all other
avoid some problems. Here are some general ideas you’re using to design and develop the
guidelines to consider: online instruction.

1. Before starting any design or development Theoretical Orientation

activities, get as much information as is
feasible about the nature and attributes of One rather common question occurs when design-
learning that is desired and likely to be ing online instruction: Should a particular theory
successful. guide design and implementation? Many different
2. In addition to discerning what instructors, views have been expressed, ranging from those
subject matter experts, and administrators who think that theories are quite useful to those
consider to be important attributes and learn- who think that theories are not helpful because
ing outcomes of the online instruction, also they do not take into account practical realities of
get the views and expectations of people online learning contexts. Based on our functional
who are presumed to be potential students. relevance standpoint, we offer ideas for you to
Where feasible, also be attentive to ideas consider, but we will not pretend that there is one
from students who completed previous correct position about the use of theories. In brief,
relevant instruction. we will propose that it could be appropriate to use
3. Online instruction quite commonly involves theories in some contexts more than other contexts
potential students who are not in the same or with some facets of instruction without relying
geographical area. However, to the fullest on theories for other facets. Theories, research
extent that is feasible, seek information from findings, practical information, and so-called
those potential students. Identify similarities wisdom of the profession (e.g., knowing previous
as well as differences among those students customary ways of doing things) all can be very
and note patterns that may have design helpful in organizing online instructional design
implications. Use technology resources to plans. For example, theories can stimulate or
communicate with geographically remote facilitate insights and variations in ways to think
potential students. about online learning.
4. Do not wait until you have set the final At the core of instructional theories are their
design of the instruction before getting po- respective epistemologies (or, philosophies about
tential students’ views. Instead, as much as the nature of knowledge). Various frameworks

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have been used to describe how respective theo- vironments which promote positive and active
ries compare regarding epistemology, with some student learning. Head, Lockee, and Oliver (2002)
people suggesting that they might be both comple- described the facilitating functions of the nonlin-
mentary and competitive while others contend ear, associative structure of the Web in promoting
that there exists a continuum from objectivist to learners’ knowledge association. According to
constructivist views. The objectivist perspective Miller and Miller (1999, 2000), the nonlinear,
is that knowledge is observable and measurable. associative structure can be used to provide more
Instructional theories based on this assumption accurate representations of experts’ knowledge
tend to be prescriptive, that is, the theory specifies structures or to permit learners to build their own
particular strategies to help the instructor transmit representations of knowledge (Ayersman, 1995;
knowledge to the novice learner and strategies that Wilson & Jonassen, 1989; Yang, 1996).
aid the learner in acquiring this knowledge. The Discussions about the relative merits of dif-
assumption of constructivism is that knowledge is ferent theories, and sharply different views about
the making of meaning about a phenomenon and whether instruction should or should not be driven
this meaning-making involves either personal or by theories, have occupied the attention and
social agreement. The constructivist approach to interest of researchers and practitioners. Thus,
instruction uses strategies such as collaboration, this chapter can not address all issues involved
authentic context, and diverse perspectives to aid in such matters. However, from the standpoint of
the learner’s understanding (Bednar, et al., 1992; functional relevance, we propose that one or more
Cronin, 1997; Jonassen, 1999; Wilson, Jonassen, theories should be applied to online instruction
& Cole, 1993). depending on the extent to which such theories
In a sense, we need to consider both the poten- offer some added value for the online instruction
tial value that we might derive from theories and of interest. It may be possible, and even desirable
research findings and any costs (time, frustration, in some situations, to apply so-called competitive
incompatibility) involved—particularly any costs approaches in our online instruction.
that may be imposed on our student end-users. Previously, in this chapter, it was acknowl-
We should not do so simply to proclaim that edged that some designers consider objectivist
our design is based on good theory. Using good and constructivist approaches to be incompatible
theory can obviously be a good idea when it is with each other, often asserting that you have
reasonably clear that theories we have selected to choose one approach or the other. But, with
enhance learning. But, theories collectively can- careful attention to overall design requirements,
not address all aspects and attributes that exist in it is plausible that certain aspects of our online
practical situations. Functional relevance can serve instruction could benefit from applying objectivist
as a framework within which to decide whether procedures and other aspects could benefit from
particular theories or research findings support constructivist procedures. This can be accom-
the design and development of training for the plished successfully by observing that different
types of skills desired for a particular situation. components of online instruction can be identified
One can make the case that applying learn- and that those components may have contrasting
ing theories to online design after judicious design requirements. Moreover, it seems unlikely
consideration of costs and benefits constitutes a that any one theory will address all aspects of our
value-added decision. For example, by identifying instruction. A functional relevance perspective
constructivism with online design, we recognize could be helpful for designers in identifying and
that constructivist approach in teaching fits with making decisions about such responsibilities as
the unique characteristics of online learning en- the following: (a) make reasonably certain that

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procedures within each component make sense when people do not have accurate perceptions of
to students, (b) provide students with transition each other. However, for several decades it has
instructions and support so that they can move been recognized that how one perceives another
successfully from one component to another, and person may be more important than whether or
(c) help instructors and students to recognize how not such a perception is accurate. For example,
the various online instruction components “fit Sundland (1960) found that patients’ outcomes
together” and collectively have been designed to were correlated with their person-perceptions
enable students to attain the respective purposes, of their psychotherapists along relevant dimen-
goals, and benefits to be derived from that online sions; however, the extent to which those person-
instruction. perceptions were accurate was not correlated
with their outcome. Snelbecker (1967) found that
Social Presence college students’ perceptions of psychotherapists
in a laboratory analog were correlated with their
Social presence is an important concept for on- perceptions of two therapists. Both of those studies
line instruction, but too often its significance and used Barrett-Leonard’s (1959) idea of Relation-
impact seem to be ignored or minimized. Social ship, which was based on Carl Rogers’ theory
presence refers to the extent to which one feels concerning person-perceptions of patients.
that certain other persons are either both physically Online instruction designers might want to
and psychologically present or feels the sensation examine contemporary instruments and research
of their being “socially present,” even though said findings both to inform their practice. At least
persons are not with us physically. Connectedness with instructional design of some online courses,
is one term that sometimes is used in discussions it may be important for designers to examine the
about social presence. Think for a moment when extent to which students’ views regarding social
you were in the same room with another person presence could help identify what students expect
but the other person seemed to be oblivious to the with regard to social presence. It is important to
fact that you were in that same room. That is the note that the studies previously mentioned were
kind of situation where you most likely felt that conducted in psychotherapy relationships decades
you were not at all connected with this person, and ago. However, lessons from studies of those rela-
you may even have wondered whether there was tionships do raise some possibilities today. First,
any social presence between you and this person. how students perceive social presence matters in
If this person is an instructor of a face-to-face online instruction may be important, no matter how
classroom course you are taking, your feelings accurate they are. Second, it seems plausible that
probably would depend on the size of the class or online students’personal attributes might influence
on other factors. As one member of a class with their perceptions and feelings regarding social
several hundred students you might have mixed presence and also influence designers’ plans for
feelings, but as one of only five students, you creating instruction that is functionally relevant.
probably would not feel very happy. Although the term social presence is not always
How we perceive other people, and how they used, there is growing concern that increasing
perceive us, has been of interest in psychology and use of automated resources generally in society
other disciplines for at least half a century. Earlier might be having an adverse impact, partly because
terms for this area include personal perception, of reduced interactions with an actual person.
interpersonal perception, social perception, and This concern has been expressed about various
other terms related to communications theory. instances in society today where people are using
Some of the earlier work focused on implications technology resources as a replacement of person-

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to-person interactions. For example, James (2006) positive and socially supportive environment for
suggested that the automated systems that make learning. A recent effort in this direction is Yang’s
banking activities readily available as needed may (2007) STEP model, which includes scaffold-
actually be creating emotionally detached custom- ing, transaction, evaluation, and presentation.
ers. One recent major study (Katz, 2006) suggests The STEP model underscores the importance of
that, despite their proficiency with technology, establishing social presence in online learning. It
today’s college students do not necessarily prefer reflects the effort of designers and practitioners to
to have more than moderate levels of technology build functionally relevant components in online
in their college courses. More directly related learning by enhancing learner self-awareness in
to online instruction, Reio and Crim (2006) ex- online learning environment, facilitating social
pressed their concern about the lack of personal comfort of expressing and sensing affect, and
connection among learners while engaging in providing effective social navigation.
asynchronous online learning. They pointed out
that the online educators were overly enthusiastic Learner Characteristics
about the features of asynchronous learning and
overlooked the factor of social presence, which Students who engage in online instruction often
may result in overall learner dissatisfaction with come with different motivational demands. Carr
online learning. (2000) pointed out that some students attended
These contemporary observations, along with the online courses because of external motivation
earlier views, suggest that there may be insuf- such as job promotion, while others attended the
ficient attention given to social presence (Baer, online courses for internal motivational reasons
2000; Hill, Raven, & Han, 2002). Hill et al., such as self-improvement. Thus, online instruc-
pointed out that “explanation for high dropout tional design should attend to both external and
rates and dissatisfaction with distance delivered internal motivation demands. Some students
courses may relate to a lack of a perception of enrolled in online courses became very frustrated
community in courses” (p. 384). Tu and McIsaac because the courses were poorly designed and
(2002) emphasized that it is essential to explore the failed to address students’ internal and external
social presence in online classes, the relationship motivational demands associated with the online
between media and the social-cultural construction courses (Carr, 2000; Hill et al., 2002). A design
of knowledge. Many commercial Web systems issue in online learning is how to address the
like Web CT and Blackboard include built-in differing motivational demands that each learner
tools to accommodate and facilitate education- brings to a learning experience.
related communication—such as synchronous In most real life situations, people may share
and asynchronous online chat rooms. However, a common interest in some event (e.g., an ob-
many online courses continue to create “cyber servation or activity) while concurrently having
cubicles,” where learners are separated from considerable differences in the perspective they
each other and where the level of communication bring to that event. Despite such common interest,
is limited to “logon” without meaningful social it does not necessarily mean that all of these people
communication among learners. Good quality will have similar perspectives about that particular
effective online instruction involves more than event. This same co-occurrence of shared com-
introducing cutting edge technology. It involves mon interest along with diverse perspectives can
building functionally relevant components such involve (a) preparing good online instruction, (b)
as those that address social presence issues, mean- writing a good book chapter, (c) designing good
ingful communication, and so forth, to create a research studies, (d) practical application of some

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theory, or (e) even attending a sporting event. In recent years, certain commercial design
Thus it is not unreasonable to expect diversity firms regularly involve intended learner groups
and common interests among students who are or other targeted end-users throughout the design
intended recipients of the online instruction. and development process. Although such firms
Similarly, students enrolled in online courses recognize that additional costs are involved, this
or some role in making decisions about online practice is accepted because it can help ensure
learning can be expected to share some common that online learning will have higher prospects for
interest but also have co-occurring perspectives success. A key question is: By what cost-effective
with very different views about what constitutes ways can we obtain reasonably valid information
quality of online learning. In addition to the about potential students’ characteristics? As a start,
intended beneficiaries of this online instruction, let us acknowledge that designers should not be
other people with some interest in and views about expected to recognize all possible motivations and
the topics addressed in the online instruction could expectations of students. Available funds, time-
include: the authors and designers of the topics, frames, and administrative requirements need to be
instructors or employers of potential recipients, considered when making design plans. Although
and various theorists or researchers who focus on a first inclination might be to survey potential
online learning. students, it is usually best to start with pertinent
We suggest that, of all these potential per- existing information. Such available information
spectives, too often the intended beneficiaries’ could be valuable in designing, conducting, and
perspectives about the online instruction are not analyzing surveys of potential students.
adequately considered. More often, it seems that In established institutions with ongoing class-
the designers’ and other professionals’ perspec- room courses and online courses, some useful
tives predominate. This is not surprising because information may be readily available. Reviews of
designers and developers are so busy dealing literature about distance learning for the particular
with their online instruction responsibilities and subject matter area may yield some other helpful
pressures—typically also while wondering about insights about matters that should be considered for
potential critics’ views about the technical stan- our online course. In the case of a new course, at
dards that are supposed to be met in good quality many institutions this information about students
online instruction. would be required and carefully reviewed before
Why is it important to place the emphasis the new course proposal was approved. Thus, it
on clients’ or learners’ perspectives (instead of would be very important to obtain all pertinent
mainly designers’ perspectives)? Simply stated, documents about the new online course. When
if the needs and expectations of those intended an online course is replacing or extending an
beneficiaries are not met in a reasonable manner, established classroom course, helpful ideas could
it is quite likely that this online instruction will be obtained from current students or accessible
be judged to be either deficient or even a failure. students who previously completed this or similar
Functional relevance suggests that we need to courses.
maintain our focus on the intended beneficiaries Along with these ways for seeking information
of the online instruction from inception of the about learner characteristics, at some point it may
idea, iterative tests and revisions of the online be advisable to use a combination of procedures
instruction. That includes not only design and for collecting new information. One approach is
development processes but also follow-up evalua- to alternate between using interviews or focus
tions and implications for making any changes in groups and surveys. For example, one possibility
this present offering or in future online instruction. would be this: (a) after having reviewed available

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information, formulate a series of questions and downtime in learning. For example, problems
interview or hold group discussions with potential may occur when technology resource instructions
students. A goal here would be to ensure that we’re are confusing or not clear, when incompatibilities
asking reasonably appropriate questions. These exist between technology resource requirements
interviews and focus group discussions could help and students’ available equipment or software,
guide identification and formatting of appropriate with subject matter content that is different from
questions; (b) conduct surveys (in class, mailed what students had expected, or when students
surveys, or online surveys) of potential students; are not familiar with some particular pedagogical
(c) conduct interviews or focus groups to help procedures.
clarify and interpret survey results as well as to The concept of functional relevance focuses
get answers to questions that only emerged during on learners’ perspectives and perceptions as to
or after the surveys were conducted. whether instruction might be relevant for and fit
This information about potential students can with the way(s) that students function in their
be compared and integrated with ideas expressed work, studies, personal lives, and so forth. It is
by the experts. This should result in making proposed that teachers, trainers, and other educa-
decisions so that our resulting online instruction tors become aware of the functional relevance
can be more relevant to how our intended online aspect of their designs and programs. Doing so
students function. could help improve and enhance the design and
development of successful online instruction. In
particular, such efforts can lead to online learn-
CONCLUSION ing outcomes that intended learners will view as
being more relevant to their prior knowledge and
The chapter calls attention to an important aspect in as being compatible with they function in their
the design of online instruction: that online instruc- studies, work and personal lives. Those efforts
tional process will more likely be effective if and may facilitate students’ application and extension
when they fit with and are perceived by students of their online learning.
as being functionally relevant for their education,
work, or other personal contexts. Designers typi-
cally must cope with many different—and some- FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
times competing—responsibilities. They must
address subject matter requirements and expected Two general directions can enhance our ability to
outcomes, provide effective and efficient means design and provide better online learning: (1) study
for attaining designated educational standards, and classify the nature of respective approaches
make professional decisions about cost-effective to designing online learning, (2) create ways to
means for using technology resources, and comply incorporate learners’ perspectives throughout the
with numerous other conceptual, administrative design-development-dissemination process.
and practical matters. However, it is a key thesis
of this chapter that those efforts may not be so 1. For good reasons, novices initially are
successful if intended students ultimately do not encouraged to focus on only one or a few
recognize that the resultant online instruction is approaches because trying to learn too many
consistent with their needs and expectations. different approaches could be counterpro-
It is suggested that unnecessary deficits may ductive. But, with greater knowledge and
exist in online instruction causing students to have experience, they will learn about “new”
unanticipated problems that may cause serious approaches and wonder if some might be

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preferable in certain situations. Snelbecker developed such products and services. Instead of
(1999) suggested that facilitating such waiting until products are ready for “Beta testing”
advanced proficiency in design might the trend now for some design companies is to
benefit from psychotherapists’ experiences have end-users’ views made a part of the entire
with their Society for the Exploration of design-development process.
Psychotherapy Integration (SEPI). SEPI There is need for studies on: identifying the
helps psychotherapists learn psychotherapy kinds of people who might benefit from proposed
approaches’ strengths, weaknesses, and situ- online learning, obtaining and understanding the
ations where each can be especially helpful. perspectives of constituent groups, clarifying
A SEPI-type group could help instructional similarities/differences among constituent groups,
designers study and discuss merits of design and indicating ways potential students’ perspec-
approaches. tives can be synthesized with information more
2. To create functionally relevant online learn- conventionally used during design-development
ing, it is important that intended learners’ of online instruction.
perspectives be considered throughout There is long-term and continuing need for this
the design-development process — from research. Snelbecker (1974) described the need
initial ideas through design-development- to synthesize information from various resources
evaluation-revision, and during follow-up to design effective instruction, and proposed the
studies in various settings. importance of focusing on practical matters along
with theory. Milsum (1966) explained: “When
Of course, some of this work already is in- the biologist, social scientist, and indeed natural
cluded in most (if not all) instructional design- scientist collaborate with the engineer on these
development approaches, such as doing needs large new system’s problems, their classical roles
assessments of intended students, and getting as analyzers of existing systems in contrast to the
reactions of students at various stages. Research engineer’s role as the synthesizer of previously
could help clarify cost-effective ways (a) for non-existing ‘hardware’ systems needs reap-
identifying the nature of potential constituent praisal” (Milsum, 1966, p. vii).
groups, (b) detecting the range of views within
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This work was previously published in Understanding Online Instructional Modeling: Theories and Practices, edited by Robert
Zheng, Sharmila Pixy Ferris, pp. 1-17, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.11
Self-Regulated Learning:
Issues and Challenges for
Initial Teacher Training

Manuela Delfino
Institute for Educational Technology - Italian National Research Council, Italy

Donatella Persico
Institute for Educational Technology - Italian National Research Council, Italy

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

This chapter assumes the importance of developing Teaching is a very hard job. It has always been
Self-Regulated Learning (SRL) competences in hard, but it has become even more difficult and
students in order to cope with the challenges of crucial in the so called knowledge society, where
today’s and tomorrow’s society. To achieve this, the major assets of its citizens do not lie in the
it is claimed that it is crucial to train teachers who amount of information and skills they possess, but
are aware of what SRL is and are able to support in their ability to acquire knowledge and compe-
their students in developing these abilities. This tence and in the way they can make use of both.
chapter proposes examples drawn from a course in In this view, the aim of education is not to
Educational Technology where SRL competence make learners know all there is to know about
has been promoted through reflection on cogni- a given subject, but rather to make them able to
tive, meta-cognitive, emotional and motivational build, enrich and nurture their own knowledge.
aspects of learning, as well as through modelling Hence, what teachers should do is provide their
teaching practices that tend to shift the locus of students with some very basic and carefully
control from trainers to trainees. chosen notions and concepts and with the ability,
the will, the conceptual and technological tools
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch200 needed to elaborate on them. This is why teach-

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Self-Regulated Learning

ing is so difficult: because it is about empowering in Secondary Teaching of the University of Genoa
people, putting them in charge of their learning to discuss and exemplify the following points:
and teaching them how to control it by making
them aware of how to choose the best learning • If the aim is to train teachers about
strategies. But there is even more. Today we do Educational Technology, then Educational
not want to leave anybody behind, neither do we Technology must be used to do so;
wish to mortify talents or betray excellence. This • It is impossible to teach future teachers
entails achieving personalised learning, thereby all there is to know about Educational
giving each learner the chance to fully exploit Technology: a much more sensible ap-
their potential. And this makes teaching even more proach is to identify some basic concepts
difficult, in that it requires decisions about how and to lay the bases for further autonomous
to foster learning for each student, by adapting, professional development;
controlling and assessing the effectiveness of the • Awareness about the importance of self-
teaching and learning process. regulation in the teaching profession
However, there is some good news: learners should also be promoted, because instruc-
can, and should, help in the realization of this tional design in education cannot be re-
process. They can, and should, become aware of duced to rigid decision making procedures;
their learning styles, learn to evaluate their results, • If teachers must empower their students
exploit ICT to acquire, evaluate and elaborate and make them able to become better and
knowledge. Teachers will have to provide scaf- more autonomous learners, they will first
folds for learning by modelling how to carry out need to learn to self regulate their own
authentic tasks, by offering situated learning learning. To this end, they should receive
opportunities; by providing chances for learners explicit training on what self-regulated
to collaborate and therefore support each other learning is, how it can be promoted and
in this process. what its relationships with the use of
But how can we train teachers for such a hard Educational Technology and with the most
job? popular learning theories are.
According to Paris and Winograd (2001) the
best way is by using, with trainee teachers, the
same approach we expect them to use with their THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
students. They claim that it is a frequent paradox
that teachers are often trained with methods that The theoretical framework of this chapter lies at
contradict the principles they are being taught. the crossroads between two fields: the psycho-
Teachers naturally tend to replicate the same logical theories of Self-Regulated Learning (SRL)
teaching approach they have experienced. This and the interdisciplinary sector of Networked
accounts for their resistance to the educational Learning (NL).
use of technology, their tendency to engage in When we talk about the importance of develop-
perfunctory curriculum delivery, their focus on ing a learner’s ability to successfully cope with
contents rather than on learning methods. the challenges of today’s and tomorrow’s society,
In this paper, we will use the case of a course we acknowledge that this ability involves cogni-
in Educational Technology run by the Institute for tive, meta-cognitive, emotional and motivational
Educational Technology of the Italian National aspects. The theory of SRL subsumed research on
Research Council for the Post-Graduate School these aspects in one coherent construct emphasis-

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ing the interplay taking place among them when ing to scaffolding and fading techniques (Collins,
learning is the focus. Brown & Newman, 1989).
NL, on the other hand, is the term we will use Obviously, teacher training programmes
to refer to learning on the Web and with the Web, should aim to raise awareness of the need to
that is by using both its online resources and its nurture students SRL and to develop such com-
interpersonal communication facilities. In the petences among teachers. The case of pre-service
following we will set the scene for this paper by teacher training is particularly interesting and
discussing the respective contributions of research critical because trainees’ SRL competences may
in SRL and NL to the field of teacher training. We be quite well developed in connection with their
will also focus on the interplay between these two own disciplines, but some important components
fields, with emphasis on those aspects that are are often lacking: the awareness of the importance
relevant to the aim of the paper, that is, advocate of supporting their development among their stu-
the importance of SRL in teacher training, both as dents, the teaching skills needed to do so and the
an aim and as a content, and provide examples of competences required to self-regulate their own
how theory can be bridged into praxis, as well as of learning in a technology rich environment. While
the role that can be played by NL in this process. the first two points should be among the aims of
any teacher training programme, the third point
Self-Regulated Teachers for is one of the primary aims of teacher training in
Self-Regulated Learners Educational Technology.

SRL takes place when learners are in full control Networked Learning and
of their own learning, that is they plan, monitor Teacher Training
and evaluate their own learning processes, from a
cognitive, meta-cognitive, emotional and motiva- NL is used here to identify “the use of internet-
tional point of view (Zimmerman & Schunk, 2001; based information and communication technolo-
Boekaerts, Pintrich & Zeidner, 2000; Schunk & gies to promote collaborative and co-operative
Zimmerman, 1998). In principle, this entails learn- connections: between one learner and other
ers being able to set their own learning objectives learners; between learners and tutors; between a
and pursue them by choosing optimal learning learning community and its learning resources,
strategies and suitable media, according to their so that participants can extend and develop their
learning styles and pre-existing knowledge. They understanding and capabilities in ways that are
will also be able to regulate the whole process, important to them, and over which they have
possibly re-adjusting their own decisions based significant control” (de Laat, Lally, Simons &
on effective self-evaluation strategies. Wenger, 2006).
SRL is therefore a very desirable set of com- According to the aforementioned definition,
petences for students who are to become autono- NL comprises both learning through Information
mous citizens, and educators should pursue its Problem Solving tasks and Computer-Supported
development. Collaborative Learning (CSCL). The distinction
SRL competences develop through practice, between these two areas is quite blurred, the
and teachers can support such development by difference lying mainly in the fact that the first
modelling effective behaviour and by planning appears to focus more on use of the Web and its
the teaching and learning process in such a way online resources to retrieve, evaluate and reuse
that SRL strategies are increasingly adopted by information in a critical way (Brand-Gruwel
students while teachers’ support decreases accord- & Gerjets, 2008; Walraven, Brand-Gruwel &

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Boshuizen, 2008), while the second is mostly be able to control emotions but also disclose them
inspired by socio-constructivist views of learn- to contribute to the formation of a pleasant social
ing, and concerns the way people learn together climate, they should seek support and feedback
with the help of computers (Stahl, Koschmann but also provide it when needed and they should
& Suthers, 2006; Koschmann, Hall & Miyake, negotiate decisions and share achievements.
2002; Koschmann, 1996). CSCL enables, on the Networked learners, especially novices, should
one hand, distance learning students to participate not be left alone in such a powerful but complex
in collective activities and achieve shared goals, and unfamiliar world. To this end, the figure of the
and, on the other hand, tutors and teachers to ef- online tutor is of crucial importance. The roles of
fectively scaffold and support students in learning the online tutor have been widely investigated (de
together (Strijbos, Kirschner & Martens, 2004). In Laat, Lally, Lipponen & Simons, 2007; Conrad,
this field, written asynchronous interactions are 2004; Salmon, 2004; Berge & Collins, 1996) and
central, since they have the potential to activate include, among others: providing guidance and
collaboration and meta-cognitive processes. support to participants, especially at the beginning
In spite of the strong resistance initially shown of a new learning experience; facilitating access
by trainees (Wood, Mueller, Willoughby, Specht to the learning environment and providing help
& Deyoung, 2005; Uzunboylu, 2007), NL is being with its use; mediating between the instructional
increasingly used in teacher training, and there design decisions and the spontaneous dynamics
are many reasons for this. One is that the large of the learning group; helping individuals to
cohorts of trainee teachers are often characterised work collaboratively towards the achievement of
by very different backgrounds and expectations, common goals; stimulating discussion on specific
so they need to be addressed with a very flexible contents; promoting cohesion and favouring a
and personalised approach, which cannot easily positive social climate among students.
be done face-to-face, let alone in a transmissive As Goodyear, de Laat and Lally (2006) put
way. Another is that teacher training is mostly it, learners, on their side, have to (re)learn “to
about problem solving in instructional design, become active learners, need time to develop
and therefore requires reflective practice and the confidence to act as constructive learners, and
possibility of looking at problems from several exercise autonomy. […] Students also need to
perspectives, which is better done through discus- act as a community, where they take on active
sion among peers and with experts (Gray, Ryan responsibility for educational processes as well
& Coulon, 2004; da Ponte, Oliveira, Varandas, as managing cohesion, well-being, trust, emotion,
Oliveira & Fonseca, 2007). spirit and motivation within the group” (p. 216).
The design, investigation and evaluation of
The Interplay between SRL NL environments as well as the way they support
and NL in Teacher Training the development of SRL among trainees can be
made more systematic if we refer to an adaptation
SRL in NL contexts imposes demands that are (Delfino, Manca & Persico, 2007) of the Com-
peculiar to this kind of environment (Whipp & munity of Inquiry model (Garrison, Anderson &
Chiarelli, 2004) and have to do with the ability Archer, 2000). The original, well known model
to strike a balance between individual and social was based on three dimensions (i.e., the cogni-
aspects of knowledge construction. For example, tive, social and teaching presence): through these
in CSCL learners should be pro-active and goal components the model aims to provide a way to
orientated without disregarding the importance of understand and analyse the intertwining of sev-
peer contribution to the discussion, they should eral factors in a Community of Inquiry. Enriched

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by a fourth element, meta-cognition, the model The instructional design choices made for
was used to design our courses in Educational this course are discussed in the next sections,
Technology. The four components of the learn- with particular reference to those aimed at the
ing experience - the cognitive, the social, the development of SRL and collaborative abilities.
teaching and the meta-cognitive – also provide We will start with our view on how the subject
a structure to discuss, in this paper, the choices can be dealt with, bearing in mind that it is a large
made by the course designers. In particular, we and fast moving field. Then we summarise the
will discuss the decisions made about the learning delivery modes adopted in the various versions of
objectives, the contents and learning styles (the the course. The subsequent sections are devoted to
cognitive dimension); the course structure and the the cognitive, teaching, social and meta-cognitive
teaching/learning strategies adopted (the teaching components according to which the course was
dimension); the participants’ interactions and the designed.
emotional/motivational factors involved in build-
ing the online community (the social dimension); Training Teachers in
the reflection on the learning process and on its Educational Technology
effects (the meta-cognitive dimension).
“Educational Technology is the study and ethical
practice of facilitating learning and improving
INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN performance by creating, using and managing ap-
CHOICES TO TRAIN TEACHERS propriate technological processes and resources”
ABOUT EDUCATIONAL (AECT, 2004, p. 3). This is the latest definition
TECHNOLOGY AND SRL of Educational Technology diffused by the As-
sociation for Educational Communications and
The course in Educational Technology was ad- Technology (AECT). It emphasizes different
dressed to trainee teachers and run yearly from aspects of educational practice (through the verbs
2001 to 2006, involving a total of more than 600 facilitating, improving, creating, using, manag-
trainees. The objective of the course was promoting ing) without disregarding the role of theory and
the development of educational design compe- research in the field (concepts summarized in the
tences, with special focus on the evaluation and word study).
selection of learning strategies, techniques, tools, The double nature of this subject entails that
and on the infusion of Educational Technology the course programme should strike a balance
in the school context. Even though some of the between opportunities for the development of
contextual constraints remained the same every operative abilities (i.e., knowing how to do things,
year (e.g., number of participants; short duration using and managing processes and resources) and
of the course; limited amount of resources avail- for reflective practice, performance improvement
able; great differences among trainees as regards and competence building. The key role of practice
expectations, interests and background), the course in Educational Technology is emphasized in all
design changed according to the changing needs versions of our course by including extensive
and features of the target population, and to the hands-on experience in their programmes. This
experience gained during the previous versions choice also derived from the belief that Educa-
(Delfino & Persico, 2007). For this reason, in the tional Technology cannot be taught without using
following, we will refer to the different “versions” Educational Technology, because future teachers
of the course, meaning the various formats it took should be trained with methods and tools that are
in the six years of delivery.

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similar to those they are expected to use with their work. The distance learning component gained
own students. importance with time: in the second year it was
Furthermore, to develop know-how about an optional three-week online module; in the third
what kinds of technology suit different contexts, and fourth years it was a ten-week online course
trainee teachers should be given the opportunity that students could choose as an alternative to
to become acquainted with different forms of the face-to-face one; in the last two years there
technology and to reflect on their educational was no option but a blended course. The blended
limits and potentials (Cox, Preston & Cox, 1999; scheme chosen for the final versions of the course
Pope, Hare & Howard, 2002; Brush, Glazewski, entailed, for the first time in the course history, that
Rutowski, Berg, Stromfors, Van-Nest, Stock & all students had to take part in online activities.
Sutton, 2003; Dawson, Pringle & Adams, 2003; Distance communication among participants -
Ertmer, 2003). This can be done by emphasising students, tutors and experts - took place within a
the importance and the nature of the educational special configuration of the Centrinity First Class©
processes triggered by technology and by focus- CMC environment. Interactions were mostly
ing on methodological and educational aspects asynchronous, though synchronous communica-
rather than analysing in detail specific tools, that tion in the form of chat was occasionally used.
are likely to become outdated in a short time.
The Cognitive Dimension:
Delivery Mode Learning Objectives, Contents
and Learning Styles
In accordance with the earlier considerations,
CSCL was included among the training methods of Instructional design techniques suggest that
our course, for a number of reasons. Firstly, CSCL decisions concerning the learning objectives of
competences are highly valued for technology in- a course, in an academic context, should derive
tegration in schools. Secondly, collaborative forms from the learning needs and take into consider-
of Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC) ation both the features of the target population
are capable of fundamentally reshaping teachers’ (size, age, motivation, prerequisites, etc.) and
professional development (Pachler & Daly, 2006) the requirements and constraints imposed by the
since they increase teachers’ acquaintance with the context in which the training is to take place (times
different Web services and hopefully encourage and settings, tools and resources available, etc.).
their future participation in communities of prac- The nature of the subject matter also influences
tice, one of the most promising means of Teacher the design of the course. Educational Technology,
Professional Development (Fusco, Gehlbach & in fact, is a wide and complex domain, hard to
Schlager, 2000). Lastly, very few of our trainees cover in short courses like the one in question.
had experienced CSCL before and they therefore According to Issroff and Scanlon (2002), it in-
needed to try it out first hand to become aware of cludes a set of pedagogical and methodological
the pros and cons of its use in education. skills needed for a competent use of the various
While the first version of the course, held in strategies, techniques and media in teaching. It
2001, was entirely face-to-face, with lessons alter- was therefore necessary to provide a general idea
nated with laboratory activities, from the second of the field and its contents, but also to identify
year the course included a distance learning com- some indefeasible concepts to be dealt with in
ponent based on a socio-constructivist approach greater detail than others, posing the basis for
and therefore it relied heavily on task-based group subsequent autonomous learning.

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When learners are adults, or graduates as in Nevertheless, some types of choices should
the case of our trainee teachers, it is desirable that not be left to the students at the beginning of the
they have a say in the overall objectives of the course but postponed to a later phase.
courses they take, even if their lack of competence First of all, high level choices concerning
in the domain might limit their ability to do so. learning objectives and contents require some
In our case, to find a good balance between the competence on the subject, so they can only be
institutional aims of the course and the students’ made by people with previous knowledge of the
expectations, interests and desires, we found it domain. This does not mean that the students will
very useful to: never be able to make them but rather that they
need to be gradually guided towards this aim. To
• Provide students with a course guide, sent this end, students can be supported through tools
by e-mail a few weeks before the begin- such as advance organisers in fully fledged online
ning of the course and containing informa- courses (McManus, 2000) or face-to-face sessions
tion about the course (its objectives, struc- in blended courses. The role of these tools is to
ture, contents, method and the assessment provide an overall picture of the content so that
criteria). This helps students to plan their students can make informed choices as to what
learning and arrange the environment; and how they would like to learn in more detail.
• Monitor students’ expectations towards This is particularly helpful when there is not
the course and their previous knowledge/ enough time for the lecturer to completely cover a
experience in the field of Educational subject and the domain is a rapidly changing one.
Technology year by year, by using ad hoc In the online versions of our course, the overall
questionnaires and informal interviews. theoretical introduction was taken care of through
This also helps students to become aware readings and discussions moderated by competent
of their expectations, recollect ideas about tutors. In the blended versions, the face-to-face
previous learning experiences, and activate lectures provided the general picture of the topics
prior content knowledge; covered in the online modules, while these served
• Devote some time, at the beginning of the the purpose of carrying out in-depth analysis of
course, to discuss these expectations and one or more examples.
competences and negotiate the course ob- Secondly, choices regarding learning strate-
jectives and approach with the students; gies, methods and tools require awareness of one’s
• Offer the trainees a number of options as to own favourite learning styles and of the pros and
sub-objectives and topics to be dealt with, cons of each option. Among our trainee teachers,
and differentiate the activities proposed this awareness is unlikely to be well developed, at
(e.g., individual vs. group work; compul- least in connection with technology use. However,
sory vs. optional; based on discussion and since Educational Technology is the topic of the
knowledge building vs. based on tasks; course, the ability to make informed choices in
etc.), so as to give them the chance to iden- this respect is also one of the aims of the course.
tify those that best match their personal In particular, among the various possible methods,
goals within the course general aims; we wished them to appreciate the pros and cons
• Provide different ways to achieve similar of online collaboration. This is why we concluded
or alternative learning objectives, so that that all our students should try online learning at
learners can choose the learning strategies least once, and specifically CSCL.
according to their favourite learning styles.

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The Teaching Dimension: Course by the course designers. As the course progressed,
Structure, Social Structures, Tutors’ though, more freedom was granted and the ac-
Roles, Learning Evaluation tivity structure was more flexible. The learning
materials changed too: during the scaffolding
While deciding the activities to be carried out activities tutors provided students with analytical
online, many decisions about the course structure, grids and detailed worksheets, aiming to show a
the social structures, the tutors’ roles and the possible way to accomplish tasks, as the course
evaluation criteria must be taken, being aware of progressed, however, they granted learners more
their reciprocal influences. and more responsibility, letting them decide how
The balance between the institutional aims of to organize their documents and what to produce
the course, its method and the students’ expecta- in the reification phase.
tions, interests and desires can be achieved by Since our students had to learn how to handle
giving the course a modular and flexible structure, group dynamics and to experiment their future
where different modules pursue different objec- teaching role, they were encouraged to practice
tives and students can choose which topics to different roles, and in particular to act as modera-
investigate, with what methods, as well as how tors and facilitators of online activities. This was
deeply they want to investigate them. While this achieved through role-play techniques where
is hardly feasible face-to-face, especially with a students were invited to take up various types of
large audience, it can be done online, by proposing pro-active roles in a group, such as strongly char-
open learning tasks (i.e., tasks that can be further acterised teachers (e.g., the technology enthusiast,
specified by the students themselves) and by split- the technology detractor, the bureaucrat, etc.)
ting the whole cohort of students into small groups, while discussing strengths and weaknesses of an
working under the guidance of experienced tutors. online resource. Previous research seems to sup-
In our course, for three years, even the choice port the hypothesis that role playing fosters SRL
between the online and the face-to-face mode was fairly well, compared to other strategies (Dettori,
left to the students. However, there are drawbacks Giannetti & Persico, 2005). However, it was felt
concerning the management of such options. On that facilitation roles should be first modelled by
the one hand, the more freedom of choice the the tutors before asking students to do the same.
students have, the more the design and the tutors Designing the teaching dimension also entails
should be flexible and considering the investment decisions aiming to define the social structure of
required to design learning activities, especially the community, including the size and composition
online, it is desirable to limit the effects of these of groups as well as their reciprocal interactions. In
fluctuations. On the other hand, the students’ order to obtain a lively exchange, heterogeneous
choices are not necessarily the best ones from groups of seven/eight people were established
the point of view of the learning outcomes (e.g., and different learning strategies were adopted
extrinsic motivation can prevail over intrinsic in each module. Among these, an alternation of
motivation, and the easiest option is likely to individual and group work was aimed to consoli-
be chosen instead of one that is perhaps more date and assess specific topics dealt with during
promising but more demanding). face-to-face sessions or covered in educational
In addition, the balance between choice and materials; dialogical, argumentative and peer
imposition changed in time, during each course. review strategies were adopted to carry out criti-
The initial activities were, in fact, carefully planned cal analysis of different learning resources; the
and pre-defined: start date, end date, who does collaborative production of artefacts within the
what, by when, with whom, were decisions taken framework of the role-play activity was chosen

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to achieve thorough understanding of different To some extent, we let students choose on what
technology enhanced learning methods. basis they wanted to be evaluated, hoping that
Most of these decisions were taken during the this assumption of responsibility further fostered
instructional design of the course, while others SRL. Forms of self-evaluation were encouraged as
were left to the tutors. These were choices that factors belonging to the meta-cognitive dimension
had to be taken on the basis of the information but were not taken into account for summative
that tutors constantly receive from the monitoring evaluation.
process. Examples of these decisions are those
depending on the tutors’ sensibility to the students’ The Social Dimension: Emotional
emotional and cognitive status. The consequence and Motivational Factors
is a need for close orchestration between the work
of the instructional designers and the tutors: a lack The social dimension “relates to the establishment
of understanding of the course design principles of a supportive environment such that students
by the tutors might, in fact, endanger the whole feel the necessary degree of comfort and safety
design effort. It is no coincidence that in our to express their ideas in a collaborative context”
courses the tutors often took part in the design (Anderson, 2004b, p. 274). To reach this pur-
of the course. In this way, not only did we take pose, special attention was given, especially at
advantage of their invaluable contribution to the the beginning of the course, to familiarization
course set up, but we also made sure they really and socialization activities, considering them
shared its design principles. as crucial components, able (a) to increase the
Finally, methods and criteria for learning sense of togetherness among participants and,
evaluation should be mentioned. The central consequently, to increase the quality of learning
issue pertains the need to harmonize the socio- and the achievement of instructional objectives
constructivist approach with the requirement (Rovai & Jordan, 2004; Aspden & Helm, 2004);
of a summative evaluation of learning which is (b) to establish a suitable social climate; and (c)
peculiar to the academic context. In the solution to develop the emotional and motivational as-
adopted for our courses the final summative evalu- pects of SRL (Delfino, Dettori & Persico, 2008).
ation took into consideration both qualitative and Although much of the responsibility concerning
quantitative elements related to participation to the regulation of social dynamics is entrusted to
each online activity (Anderson 2004a; Benigno the tutors’ sensibility, the importance of keeping
& Trentin 2000). The criteria informing learning in mind the social aspects when designing online
assessment were made clear from the beginning courses should not be underestimated (Anderson
of the course. Although this point is a general & Elloumi, 2004).
principle in education, it is particularly impor- The measures taken to foster social presence
tant in online collaborative learning. Usually were deemed particularly important due to the high
the quality and regularity of participation in the number of participants and to the fact that only
collaborative activities is assessed by the online some of the participants had met before the course.
tutors and informs the final assessment, together In particular, the sense of belonging developed in
with the calibre of the products of the working the blended versions of the course seemed stron-
groups. In our course, this type of assessment, ger than in the online versions, perhaps because
based on the individual contribution to the group face-to-face meetings allowed its strengthening
work process (MacDonald, 2003) was combined by acting on participants’ identity, recognisability
with a more traditional type of assessment, based and participation. This was achieved, for example,
on the production of an essay or an oral exam. by allowing identification of colleagues through

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the use of badges, by inviting students to sit in The Meta-Cognitive Dimension:

the classroom according to areas corresponding Reflective Practice
to the online workgroups, etc.
The online activities usually started with some The meta-cognitive dimension deserves special
ice-breaking playful tasks, aimed at encouraging attention when SRL is one of the training objec-
students to socialise or at least communicate with tives (Dettori & Forcheri, 2004; Paris & Wino-
colleagues in order to get used to the environment grad, 2001). In particular, in our course, it was
and to familiarize with the basic rules of CMC. regarded as an essential element and therefore
Furthermore, they were provided with a common made explicit in the design principles because
Café area devoted to non-course related discussion. the course was addressed to trainee teachers, and
Sometimes, students used this area to talk freely the very nature of their future work requires the
about the course and its components. acquisition of critical thinking skills in the field of
An interesting way to encourage socialisation education through in-depth analysis and reflection
and expression of emotions is the use of metaphoric on learning processes (Parsons & Stephenson,
expressions and figurative language, as a stimulus 2005), including their own.
to manifest and share the emotions involved in any The meta-cognitive component of the course
new learning experience. A study based on tran- consisted of critical discussions on the approach
script analysis (Delfino & Manca, 2007) revealed adopted in the course, on its contents, on the
that many of our students made spontaneous use of students’ expectations, on the relevance of
metaphoric expressions to disclose their feelings Educational Technology within their training.
and support peers in the emotional control of the Furthermore, the fact that for the majority of our
learning experience. For this reason, the follow- trainees (about 90% per year) this was the first
ing years we decided to exploit the potential of exposure to CMC in formal learning activities
metaphors more systematically by adopting an made it advisable to focus on the peculiarities of
explicit spatial metaphor as a way to foster the this type of learning process.
students’ sense of belonging to a community, to In parallel with the contents-related main
provide a framework for role assignment, identity, stream tasks, another activity was devoted to
and responsibility and as an encouragement to the analysis of “what” and “how” participants
manifest and share emotions (de Simone, Lou & were learning. Since they were generally free to
Schmid, 2001). The activity proposed was based choose the topics of conversation, some of them
on the metaphor of navigation. Participants were gave their feedback on the course method, others
invited to choose the kind of boat they wanted to focused on the concept of online social presence,
use for their metaphorical voyage (the course), to yet others gave their opinion on the development
say why they had chosen that particular kind of boat of pragmatic and rhetorical skills.
and their feelings and their expectations about the The conclusive phase of the meta-cognitive
trip. Afterwards, each group of sailors had three reflection process took place during the final part of
weeks to negotiate and decide on a name for their the course and was aimed at reflecting on acquired
boat, a motto and a symbol, thus practicing in a skills, difficulties, satisfaction or dissatisfaction as
simple way methods of online collaboration. In to expectations and commitments for the future.
the conclusive activity, they were required to say The importance given to the discussion within
if they had changed their mind about the original the group and to the collaborative approach is the
choice, if they wanted to join another boat and consequence of the belief that the teaching skills
another crew, and why. to be developed within the course are complex,

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demanding, and may be best acquired through We started from the assumption of the im-
experience and reflection on it. The tutors, re- portance of first hand experience and reflective
cruited from researchers in the field of Educational practice, in both areas. In addition, we realised that
Technology and in-service teachers, proposed creating and managing a positive social environ-
discussion topics based on authentic or realistic ment in the learning community is a necessary
learning situations (van Weert & Pilot, 2003). For condition for any learning to occur. There is no
example, regarding topics such as instructional learning for pupils without an adequate process
design, trainee teachers need to become aware of socialization behind it, both with the teacher
that there is not one right-or-wrong choice since and among themselves. The same applies when
each decision is characterized by pros and cons collaborative technologies are introduced, and
that a good teacher should be able to detect and teachers must be prepared for that. A theoretical
evaluate. To this purpose, both self-evaluation and understanding of pros and cons of given educa-
peer interaction are more effective than listening tional software is not enough for teachers to feel
to or reading the expert’s opinion, whose point of at ease in using it in the classroom, they must also
view is too often assumed as correct. know what happens to someone to whom such an
At the meta-cognitive level, even if face-to-face activity is proposed.
sessions can be very useful (especially to solve The changes made to the course aimed to offer
latent conflicts or uncertainties about the method), flexibility and freedom without making the course
online discussion is often even more effective, too hard to run. Trainee teachers were given the
possibly because so many participants, overcom- opportunity to focus on the importance of social
ing the distance in space and time, could reflect relations, on meta-reflection; to emphasize the
on and react to each others’ postings. The storage chance to express feelings, moods, states of mind
of postings in the form of a threaded discussion towards the learning processes; to play different
developed over time, also provided a useful sup- roles within a community of learners; to reflect
port for reflection (Åhlberg, Kaasinen, Kaivola on the potential of language in social interactions,
& Houtsonen, 2001; Thomas, 2002; Macdonald to learn how to self-regulate in order to promote
& Twining, 2002; Meyer, 2003). It was mostly effective self-regulation processes. While the
through these meta-cognitive activities that par- course was in progress, we found that informal
ticipants become aware of what SRL is, how it can interaction among participants (e.g., that occurring
be promoted and what its relationships with the in the Café area) via the online platform was as
use of Educational Technology and constructivist important as the formal learning activities. They
learning theories are. were learning something meaningful even (and
perhaps especially) when they were not working
on a given assignment, but rather making use
LESSONS LEARNT of the online platform for personal communica-
tions of various nature. In the context of a post-
The experience gained throughout the six years of graduate training programme for teachers, some
this course, has provided us with a better insight, of their postings could be considered quite weird
though not with clear-cut solutions, concerning or out of place. However, they were not, because
teacher training in Educational Technology and ultimately what participants were doing was just
the way it can be brought to enhance trainees’ experimenting the potentialities of a Web-based
SRL competences. collaborative environment, and that was among
the objectives of the online course.

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 Self-Regulated Learning

CONCLUSION enrolment, investments in their preparation and

support building among parents, legislators and
Technology is changing the way we work and the institutions. The organisation of work in schools
way we learn. In particular, at the same time NL should favour, and not hinder, the achievement
requires us to become more autonomous in learn- of these objectives, providing time, space and
ing and more open to collaboration with peers. resources that can be used freely to these ends.
These two needs may appear to be contradictory, If it is true that teaching is a hard job - but very
but they are not. More autonomy is needed because crucial for any society, then consensus should be
learning on the Web entails personal commitment, built around its role and recognition for it should
personalised goal-setting, ability to manage time be granted in all senses.
and resources, successfully handle emotions and
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Instructional Design: Systematic approach to

the design of learning processes and environments.
Computer-Mediated Communication: Networked Learning: Learning on the Web
Communication process between humans through and with the Web.
ICT. Self-Regulated Learning: Learning process
Community of Inquiry: Virtual community controlled by the learner from the cognitive,
for inquiry learning. meta-cognitive, emotional and motivational
Educational Technology: Theory and practice points of view.
of systematic design of learning processes and Teacher Training: Process aimed at making
resources. teachers more competent for their work.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on New Media Literacy at the K-12 Level: Issues and Chal-
lenges, edited by Leo Tan Wee Hin and R. Subramaniam, pp. 839-854, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an
imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.12
Individualized Web-Based
Instructional Design
Fethi Inan
Texas Tech University, USA

Michael Grant
University of Memphis, USA

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION: STRATEGIES

AND GUIDELINES FOR
Adaptive (individualized) Web-based instruction INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGNERS
provides mechanisms to individualize instruc-
tion for learners based on their individual needs. Web-based learning environments have un-
This chapter will discuss adaptive Web-based limited opportunities for educational uses, but
instruction, paying particular attention to (1) the there are numerous implementation challenges.
implications of individual differences to Web- Significantly, Web-based learning systems’ con-
based instruction, (2) the adaptive methods that tent presentations, navigational methods, and
are available to designers and developers, and instructional strategies may not be suited to all
(3) the considerations for instruction design and users (Brusilovsky, 1998; Song, 2002). Most Web-
development with adaptive Web-based instruction. based instruction provides what the designers/
The primary purpose of this chapter is to provide developers consider to be the optimal interface
a framework to shape the development of future and content presentation, expecting learners to
individualized Web-based instruction. fit into the system (Brusilovsky, 2001; Chen,
Czerwinski, & Macredie, 2000; McLoughlin,
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch212 1999). Since Web-based learners typically work

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Individualized Web-Based Instructional Design

alone and asynchronously, instructors/trainers are an individual model based on the learner’s prefer-
unable to provide the just-in-time modifications ences and knowledge, (3) apply adaptive methods
afforded in face-to-face sessions. If the user is not to accommodate the learner based on the developed
comfortable with the Web-based learning system, model, and (4) monitor the learner’s actions and
many instructional advantages can be lost (Metros learning processes to provide new information to
& Hedberg, 2002; Oliver & Herrington, 1995). update the learner’s model, granting a more effec-
While many challenges affect all learners, there tive and efficient system (Inan & Grant, 2004).
is also a need for physically and visually challenged Although researchers agree on the influential
students to be appropriately accommodated and effects of individual differences during learning,
successfully integrated into the learning environ- the question remains as to which variables should
ment. Web-based instructional applications often be considered when designing an A-WBLE. Many
neglect impaired learners. Through the use of assis- researchers consider learning style and cognitive
tive and adaptive technologies, impaired students style to be important characteristics to take into
could leave their isolation and become an impor- consideration when developing adaptive web-
tant part of the learning community (Cavanaugh, based instruction (Gilbert & Han, 1999; Magoulas,
2002; Fink, Kobsa, & Nill, 1998). To overcome Chen, & Dimakopoulos, 2004; Papanikolaou,
these barriers, an online learning system should Grigoriadou, Kornilakis, & Magoulas, 2003).
be designed such that each individual’s needs are Brickell (1993) suggested the more enriched
identified, and appropriate guidance and support learning experiences occurred when the materials
are provided during the learning process (De Bra, developed considered students’ learning styles.
Brusilovsky, & Houben, 1999; Papanikolaou & Furthermore, Triantafillou et al. (2003) reported
Grigoriadou, 2004; Triantafillou, Pomportsis, & the majority of students were satisfied with the
Demetriadis, 2003). adaptations of learning strategies in relationship
to their cognitive styles.
Another trait, students’ prior knowledge and
ADAPTIVE WEB-BASED experiences, is also popular in designing adaptive
INSTRUCTION AND INDIVIDUAL systems (Brusilovsky, 2003; Foster & Lin, 2003;
CHARACTERISTICS Weber & Brusilovsky, 2001). Students’ prior
knowledge contains their previous understanding
Adaptive instruction means creating a learning of the content area and level of readiness for learn-
environment and finding instructional approaches ing new content. Many studies have considered
and techniques that conform to meet students’ prior knowledge in Web-based instruction (e.g.,
individual needs (Park & Lee, 2003). Adaptive Chen & Paul, 2003; Milne, Cook, Shiu, & McFa-
Web-based learning environments (A-WBLEs) dyen, 1997). Foster and Lin (2003) found students’
are one form of adaptive instruction that tailor acquisition of knowledge and skills were not just
individual differences in the online environment related to the presentation of the instructional tasks,
(Inan & Grant, 2004, 2005). In A-WBLEs, the but their prior knowledge and cultural background
fundamental focus is the individual differences also played an important role. Similarly, Far and
of learners, because individual differences such Hashimoto (2000) found a student’s background
as gender, prior knowledge, and learning styles knowledge and motivational state had a strong
have demonstrated significant effects on student influence on learning outcomes. Moreover, prior
learning (e.g., Chen & Paul, 2003). To provide technical knowledge may have an effect as well.
a guiding framework, A-WBLEs (1) gather a Learners have different degrees of familiarity
learner’s information and preferences, (2) build with Web browsers and communication tools,

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which can affect their learning in an online setting are several common adaptive technologies (i.e.,
(Magoulas, Papanikolaou, & Grigoriadou, 2003; adaptive interface, content and navigation) used by
Muir, 2001). adaptive instructional systems, but all adaptation
Additionally, a number of other variables have technologies are adopted from intelligent tutoring
been considered in the design, development and systems and adaptive hypermedia (Brusilovsky,
implementation processes of adaptive Web-based 1996, 1998). Unfortunately, these methods limit
instruction. These have included type of discipline adaptations to the Web-based environment, rather
(Chen & Paul, 2003), goals (Brusilovsky, 1998; than instructional aspects (Carro, 2002). Inan and
Magoulas et al., 2003), affective and belief states Grant (2004) proposed a broad range of adaptive
(Hudlicka & McNeese, 2002), motivations (Far technologies to improve the educational facets of
& Hashimoto, 2000), attitudes (Fink, Kobsa, adaptive Web-based instruction. Table 1 provides
& Nill, 1996), multiple intelligences (Kelly & a summary of adaptive technologies with their
Tangney, 2004), information seeking preferences educational implications.
(Stelmaszewska, Blandford, & Buchanan, 2005),
media preferences (Carro, 2002; Danielson, 1997), Adaptive Content
language (Carro, 2002), gender (Milne et al.,
1997), and disabilities (Fink et al., 1996, 1998). Adaptive content is changing the contents of the
Web page to a learner’s goals, prior knowledge, and
other personal information stored in the adaptive
ADAPTIVE METHODS system (Brusilovsky, 1998, 2001). The contents of
the page can be modified to better suit the needs of
As suggested previously adaptive methods are the learners based on diagnostic assessment of the
techniques, treatments, and strategies used to individual (De Bra, 2000; Fletcher, 1992). There
make adjustments and variations in various are many ways the same data can be presented
components of Web-based instructional systems to the learner. For example, the amount of the
to accommodate individual needs and prefer- content (e.g., condensed, summarized, extended)
ences that are stored in a student model. There or format of the content (e.g., audio, video, text)

Table 1. Summary of adaptive methods

Methods Description
Adaptive content Adjusting the organization, format, or amount of content
Adaptive sequencing Ordering content in the most suitable way
Adaptive navigation and orientation Changing the appearance and structure of navigations, for example, direct guidance, link
annotation, or hiding links
Adaptive support and feedback Providing intelligent help and feedback during the learning process regarding student actions
Adaptive learning activities Providing a different instructional treatment for each user
Adaptive interaction Adjusting interactions with content, learners, instructor, and interface to increase learner engagement
Adaptive assessment and grading Applying different types of assessment procedures and grading options
Adaptive collaboration Using system knowledge about different users to form collaboration groups
Adaptive interface Changing the visual interface of the pages according to individual preferences
Adaptive social context To maintain interest or user appeal by providing an adjusted social context
Adaptive learner control Giving options to each individual to decide the system adaptation level

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can be adjusted. Adaptation of content depends knowledge or no knowledge of a subject. However,

on several variables such as age, prior knowledge, the most appropriate approaches for learners with
study discipline, and learning styles. For example, reasonable knowledge are rich associative linking
a system could provide supplementary information technologies, such as multiple link generations
if the student does not possess specific knowledge and link annotations to extend learner’s options
or interest. Comparative explanations may be (Brusilovsky, 2003). Options such as site map-
presented to students who want to gain a different ping menus, bread-crumb menu details, graphic
perspective (De Bra et al., 1999). organizers, and system feedback help to orient the
learner within the learning environment, as well
Adaptive Sequencing as guide the learner in negotiating the learning
environment.
Adaptive sequencing is ordering content effec-
tively to provide a learner with the most suitable Adaptive Support and Feedback
way to acquire knowledge or skills (Brusilovsky,
2003). Sequencing can be at a high level, that is, Adaptive support is providing intelligent help dur-
determining the order of topics or content to be ing the learning process and giving extensive and
presented, or at a low level, such as determining creative feedback regarding the learner’s actions
the order of learning tasks with examples and and answers to questions (Brusilovsky, 2003).
problems (Fletcher, 1992). Adaptive sequenc- Pedagogical agents and intelligent feedback sys-
ing of the content can be arranged according tems within instruction, as well as error recovery
to instructional strategies, a student’s goals and within the learning environment, can coach the
preferences, or a student’s observed actions and learner. Although feedback can play an important
performances. Sequence of the content is mostly role in a student’s learning and attitudes, provid-
affected by the student’s prior knowledge and ing the same level and type of feedback to each
nature of the content (Morrison, Ross, & Kemp, student may not be as effective as adjusting help
2004; Wiley, 2001). For example, based on prior according to their individual needs. Some learn-
knowledge, rules or algorithms may be followed ers need to be encouraged or directed; some may
by examples (rule/e.g.) or the reverse (e.g./rule). only need approval to continue. Some students
may perform better when their self-confidence
Adaptive Navigation and Orientation increases. For example, to increase less confident
and less motivated students, the system can pro-
Adaptive navigation supports the learner in cyber- vide simple and similar tasks that are likely to be
space with orientation and navigation by chang- solved correctly. When this type of student makes
ing the appearance of visible links (Brusilovsky, a mistake, instead of providing the correct answer,
1999). Adaptive orientation helps students to informative feedback or retry opportunities may
locate their current position and how to move to be appropriate (Far & Hashimoto, 2000).
the next or previous position (Oliver & Herrington,
1995). Users with different knowledge levels of Adaptive Learning Activities
the content may appreciate different adaptive
navigational support (Brickell, 1993; Weber & Adaptive learning activities include providing
Brusilovsky, 2001). Navigational methods with different instructional and motivational strategies
restrictive approaches like direct guidance or hid- to support learners and increase engagement in
ing links are appropriate for learners with novice the learning process (Inan & Grant, 2004). In-

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Individualized Web-Based Instructional Design

structional strategies are often selected based on easier question next when he answers a question
content characteristics, available resources, and incorrectly (Schaeffer et al., 1998).
class size (Reigeluth & Curtis, 1987). Therefore,
one instructional strategy may facilitate learning Adaptive Collaboration
for one student but may inhibit learning for an-
other (Jonassen & Grabowski, 1993; Triantafillou, Group-based or cooperative learning activities
Pomportsis, Demetriadis, & Georgiadou, 2004). are appealing among educators due to their
For example, several studies on cognitive style well-established benefits. Basically, these ac-
indicated that field dependent students learn bet- tivities help students to create, learn, construct,
ter with group-based or collaborative learning and develop knowledge, attitudes, and values
activities, whereas field-independent learners through interaction with others while develop-
do better with individualized learning activities ing interpersonal skills (Butzin, 2001; Hancock,
(Chen, 2002; Liu & Reed, 1994). Similarly, the 2004; Jonassen, 1995; Roschelle, Pea, Hoadley,
need for motivational strategies changes according Gordin, & Means, 2000). However, one of the
to individuals. For example, allowing each learner challenges of collaborative learning is building
to select and work on projects or tasks relevant to the groups meaningfully. Adaptive collaboration
his/her expertise and interest can increase moti- can help instructors during generation of groups
vation and engagement to the learning process. by making use of the system knowledge about
On the other hand, if motivational strategies are students (Brusilovsky, 1999). This allows forming
not personalized and chosen carefully, these can better matching groups where students have better
even de-motivate learners (Song & Keller, 2001). chances to learn from each other. Other challenges
to collaborative learning, such as group decision
Adaptive Assessment making (Socha & Socha, 1994) and group forma-
tions (Tuckman, 1965), still must be integrated
Adaptive formative and summative assessments within the instruction.
provide learners with exposure to different types
of learning tasks and problems in addition to Adaptive Interface
targeting weaker skills. Furthermore, different
assignment types can be applied to different us- Adaptive interface is changing the visual inter-
ers, such as individual assignments and group face of the pages according to the individual’s
assignments (Muir, 2001). The type of testing can preferences (e.g., color, font style, font size, and
be adapted because some students are successful scrolling) (Inan & Grant, 2004). The appearance
with objective testing. However, only providing of the text and images on the computer screen
objective test items does not ensure these students influences readability (Metros & Hedberg, 2002;
can express themselves with more open-ended Smaldino, Russell, Heinich, & Molenda, 2005).
assignments. Other attributes of testing, such as There are many ways in which the same data can
order and difficulty level of items, can also be be presented to the learner. A variation in informa-
adjusted (Weber & Brusilovsky, 2001). Traditional tion presentation includes items such as layout,
adaptive testing is applied in several familiar organization, structure, appearance, and format
tests such as the GRE and TOEFL: If a student (Magoulas et al., 2004; Oliver & Herrington,
answers a question correctly, his score increases 1995). Furthermore, adaptive interfaces could be
and receives a slightly harder question, whereas useful for exceptional learners, such as visually
his score will decrease and receive a slightly impaired students who may need magnification

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of the text size or English language learners who (Inan, Yildirim, & Kiraz, 2004; King, 2002).
may need translations into native languages. Therefore, besides providing content and infor-
Technologies, such as cascading style sheets mation, some social activities could be provided
(CSS) and content management systems, allow according to user preferences. For example, some
for variations in control of Web page structures students enjoy publishing a personal home page.
and content display. So, these may offer easier The Web-based learning environments can cre-
methods for development with multiple audiences. ate a home page or blog space for each learner
and allow them to enable or disable publishing
Adaptive Interaction or modifying their pages. In combination with
adaptive social context, the system may also sug-
Adaptive interaction is adjusting the type of inter- gest study groups.
action that is more suitable to the learner’s model.
Interactions can include: (1) learner-content, (2) Adaptive Learner Control
learner-learner, (3) learner-instructor, and (4)
learner-interface (Hillman, Willis, & Gunawar- One of the most appreciated features of Web-
dena, 1994; Moore & Kearsley, 1996). All types based instruction is its non-linear structure, where
of interactions are critical in online learning learners select content and move around by their
(Shortrigde, 2001), but each individual can have own decisions and control (Chen & Paul, 2003;
his/her own interaction preferences (Sabry & Federico, 1999; Khan, 1997). However, previous
Baldwin, 2003). Sabry and Baldwin (2003) ob- studies indicated that some learners may have
served variation between learning styles and types problems taking control of their learning in an open
of interaction used in the Web-based instruction. learning environment (Chen, 2002; Song, 2002;
Furthermore, variations were revealed between Weber & Brusilovsky, 2001). For example, Ford
communication preferences and the gender of stu- and Chen (2000) indicated field dependent learners
dents. Bostock and Lizhi (2005) reported females are more comfortable with the system having con-
wrote more messages than males in discussion trol, whereas field independent learners prefer to
boards, showing more connected communication have control over the system. Similarly, McManus
patterns and a concern for a greater sense of com- (2000) revealed that highly self-regulating learners
munity (Rovai, 2001). Another serious concern perform poorly in most linear Web-based learning
involves non-traditional students. By examining environments, where limited choices were avail-
use of a discussion board, Jun and Park (2003) able. These findings suggest that some learners
indicated international students far less frequently might be able to decide which adaptive methods
initiated discussions or posted messages compared and level of adaptation is appropriate for their
to American students. learning. Therefore, the level of control could be
shared among the learner, instructor/trainer, and
Adaptive Social Context the system (Papanikolaou et al., 2003; Tsandilas &
Schraefel, 2004). Adaptive learner control offers
Like adaptive interactions, adaptive social context learners and instructors/trainers opportunities to
can provide options for reducing transactional individually or cooperatively decide the level of
distance (Moore, 1993) and isolation within Web- system adaptation (Inan & Grant, 2004).
based learning environments. A learning environ-
ment’s convenience and climate helps students in
developing a positive attitude toward the system

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INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN may include more specifics, such as assessment

CONSIDERATIONS FOR scores, communication preferences, and collabo-
INDIVIDUALIZED WEB- ration skills (Aroyo, Bra, Houben, & Vdovjak,
BASED INSTRUCTION 2004; Brusilovsky, 2001; Foster & Lin, 2003;
Gilbert & Han, 1999). The design phase now adds
When designing and developing individualized specifying adaptive methods, assigning roles to
Web-based instruction, instructional design and students and teachers, plus matching adaptive and
development must consider two implementations: instructional strategies to learner characteristics
(Inan & Grant, 2005; Triantafillou et al., 2004).
1. The development of new adaptive systems The development process incorporates generating
2. The updating or retrofitting of existing sys- a user model, content structure and prototypes of
tems; each of these are discussed next. the adaptive system (De Bra, 1999; Magoulas et
al., 2003; Papanikolaou et al., 2003). Implemen-
Development of New tation processes must include application of the
Adaptive Systems system in the real environment, where instruc-
tion is adjusted to meet learner needs (Magoulas
Following systematic guidelines or models et al., 2003; Papanikolaou et al., 2003). Finally,
throughout instructional systems development evaluation brings in assessment of student learn-
makes the system more reliable and effective ing, observations of student actions, formative
(Briggs, Gustafson, & Tillman, 1991; Gustafson evaluation of the system before it is completed,
& Branch, 1997; Zheng & Smaldino, 2003). There summative assessment of the system efficiency,
are numerous instructional design models (e.g., and updates to the student model (Federico, 1999;
Dick, Carey, & Carey, 2005; Morrison et al., 2004; Lee, 2001; Triantafillou et al., 2004; Weibelzahl,
Smith & Ragan, 2005). Although these models 2005). Table 2 summarizes the ADDIE framework
have been developed for different purposes, serve for the development of A-WBLEs.
different populations, and describe different steps
to achieve instructional products, they all include Updating or Retrofitting Existing
five core elements: (1) analysis, (2) design, (3) Systems
development, (4) implementation, and (5) evalu-
ation (ADDIE). The second type of implementation is updating or
Unquestionably, designing an adaptive instruc- retrofitting an existing system. Today, almost all
tion requires following an established model or universities have one of the common course man-
process. We believe that the ADDIE framework agement systems. Similarly, corporate Web-based
can provide guidelines for development of adap- training has been dominated by learning manage-
tive Web-based instruction with revising and ment systems and learning content management
supplementing necessary steps. The central change systems. It would be overly optimistic to suggest
in the framework is moving its focus from devel- that these non-adaptive systems will be replaced
oping and providing a high quality instruction that with adaptive ones soon. Therefore, if there is an
“fits all learners” to one that “fits each learner.” opportunity to use an adaptive approach within
In addition to typical ADDIE processes, the these systems, there is a need to determine how
analysis phase should include a collection of to integrate adaptive functions with the existing
students’ individual characteristics, which would systems. Two methods for integrating an existing
include elements of typical learning analysis but system are described below.

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 Individualized Web-Based Instructional Design

Table 2. ADDIE framework for development of A-WBLEs (Note: ADDIE = analysis, design, develop-
ment, implementation, and evaluation)

ADDIE Components Strategies for adaptive system development

Analysis Gathering: Collecting students’ prior preferences, knowledge, skills, and attitudes, which are important
factors in student learning in a Web-based learning environment
Design Inference: Inferring and predicting what these collected data tell about student and parameters
Matching: Specifying adaptive methods, assigning roles to students and teachers,
matching adaptive and instructional strategies to learner characteristics
Development Building: Generating a user model, content structure, and prototypes of the adaptive system
Implementation Accommodation: Making adjustment on the system based on collected and inferred data
Updating: Altering student model continuously according to collected and monitored data throughout the
learning process
Evaluation Monitoring: Observing student sequence, interaction, errors, pace
Assessment: Formative and summative evaluation of system efficiency and student
learning

• Patching adaptive functions: Through a systems—implementation modification—

patching method, a new module with adap- can be done by using the existing system’s
tive functions can be developed and linked functions in a novel manner or by utiliz-
to the old system by managing the sys- ing some functions and features of the sys-
tems on different Web servers (Richard & tem for a particular group of students to
Tchounikine, 2004). This approach helps accommodate individual differences. For
developers to maintain the existing course/ example, WebCT’s selective release func-
learning management system functions, tion allows instructors to modify instruc-
while incorporating new adaptive func- tional components based on student test
tions. This process may augment the exist- scores and/or other student characteristics.
ing instruction, but integrating two differ- Additionally, other popular encapsulated
ent Web-based systems under one interface instructional modules, such as Macromedia
may be too difficult or too costly. Flash movies and Camtasia simulations,
can build in adaptive methods for learners.
One of the rare examples of this approach, But these modules require sophisticated
experimental learning management system’s programming to connect with the course/
(eLMS), Building Block aimed to interoperate learning management system to report and
with commonly available course management update the student model.
systems, developed by the VaNTH ERC project
of Vanderbilt University and collaborating uni- CONCLUSION
versities (Howard, Remenyi, Pap, & Garay, n.d.).
Currently, the Building Block for Blackboard The Web has become a widely available and used
was developed to provide an interface that allows platform for educational purposes. Adaptive (in-
Blackboard users to access services provided by dividualized) Web-based instruction can provide
the A-WBLE (Howard, 2006) a mechanism to understand each individual’s
learning styles, preferences, prior knowledge,
• Implementation modification: The other and learning goals and provide different treat-
model for updating or retrofitting existing ments for each learner based on their individual

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needs (Brusilovsky, 2001; Inan & Grant, 2004). Briggs, L. J., Gustafson, K. L., & Tillman, M.
If implemented correctly, an adaptive Web-based (1991). Instructional design: Principles and ap-
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Wiley, D. A. (Ed.). (2001). The instructional use Adaptive Instruction: Adaptive instruction
of learning objects. Bloomington, IN: Association means creating a learning environment and find-
for Educational Communications & Technology. ing instructional approaches and techniques that
conform to meet students’ individual needs.
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Adaptive (Individualized) Web-Based
tional design elements for distance education.
Learning Environment: Adaptive Web-based
Quarterly Review of Distance Education, 4(2),
learning environment provides mechanisms to
153–166.
individualize instruction (e.g., content, strategies,
assessment) for learners based on their individual
needs and preferences in the online environment.
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Adaptive Interface: Adaptive interface is
changing the visual interface of the Web pages
Adaptive Assessment: Adaptive assessment according to individual preferences such as color,
offers different types of assessment procedures font style, font size, and scrolling.
and grading options that provide learners with Adaptive Learner Control: Adaptive learner
exposure to different types of learning tasks and control gives each learner the option to decide the
problems. system adaptation level and adaptive methods
Adaptive Collaboration: Adaptive collabora- individually or cooperatively.
tion means using system knowledge about differ- Adaptive Navigation: Adaptive navigation
ent users to form collaboration groups. supports learner orientation in the online environ-
Adaptive Content: Adaptive content means ment by changing the appearance and structure
adjusting the organization, format, or amount of of navigations.
content based on learner’s goals, prior knowl- Adaptive Social Context: Adaptive social
edge, and other personal information stored in context means maintaining interest or user ap-
the learner model. peal by providing an adjusted social context and
activities.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 582-595, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.13
The Virtue of Paper:
Drawing as a Means to Innovation
in Instructional Design

Brad Hokanson
University of Minnesota, USA

ABSTRACT forty years past. He could guess, however, that

the book was much older than that. He had seen
This chapter presents an argument in favor of using it lying in the window of a frowsy little junk-shop
paper to conceive, plan, and describe instructional in a slummy quarter of the town (just what quarter
design projects. Such a simple medium has great he did not now remember) and had been stricken
capability and, as is well known, a tenacious ubiq- immediately by an overwhelming desire to possess
uity; our offices, practices, and lives are filled with it…. Winston fitted a nib into the penholder and
paper. We will see how the attributes of paper help sucked it to get the grease off. The pen was an
us in both social and cognitive ways, particularly archaic instrument, seldom used even for signa-
as a medium for drawing. tures, and he had procured one, furtively and with
some difficulty, simply because of a feeling that
the beautiful creamy paper deserved to be writ-
PROLOGUE ten on with a real nib instead of being scratched
with an ink-pencil. Actually he was not used to
It was a peculiarly beautiful book. Its smooth writing by hand…. He dipped the pen into the ink
creamy paper, a little yellowed by age, was of a and then faltered for just a second. A tremor had
kind that had not been manufactured for at least gone through his bowels. To mark the paper was
the decisive act (Orwell, 1948, p. 23).
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch213

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 The Virtue of Paper

In this passage, Winston is about to engage the specifically the use of computer- and Internet-
simplest, most immediate medium—pen and based technologies in the service of learning.
paper. His creative process will be unencumbered Instructional design can be described as
by layers of technology involving complex skill “knowledge work” as described by Peter Drucker
sets, which, even when mastered, place their own (1999) and others, and this description may help
restrictions on their user and become to some us understand the use of paper in the field by
extent autonomous. Central to this act is his own comparison with other professions. Knowledge
intellect, and he recognizes the danger and im- work is a classification of work that involves the
portance, the intent of the mark, and its ability to generation, development, and implementation
connect with others. of ideas. It can be described as work where the
true means of production is the knowledge of
the worker. Other fields engaged in knowledge
INTRODUCTION work include the law, surgery, and architecture.
Knowledge work is generally complex, quite of-
However we use a notation system, a visible ten socially grounded, and involves complicated
language must build on our human experiences. technical issues. Knowledge work often requires
We choose the media and which technologies we significant education or training, and the work
work with, and we make those choices based on is generally done in organizations and/or teams.
our social and cognitive practices. Winston Smith’s Designing, including instructional design, is
use of paper embodies human attributes that are knowledge work.
politically rebellious: the capacities for private Many of the activities of knowledge work are
notation and independent thought. verbal and visual. They involve sharing, recording,
Our current challenges are not so much in the notating, and creating ideas—most supported by
technological systems we use, but in how people some technology, the most ubiquitous being paper.
conceive, develop, and disseminate ideas through There remains, as we shall see later, a continued
media. The choice is not how to use a new technol- use of paper in this electronic age. Knowledge
ogy or software to visually notate our process of work, particularly design, is tied to the use of
instructional design, but rather how to use visual paper because paper allows visual notations more
notation to innovate and improve instructional easily than other media. It is faster, simpler, more
design and education. Communication, creative immediate, and less separated (or mediated) from
thought, and interaction in complex processes our thoughts.
must be addressed by meeting the needs of the Later in this chapter, architecture will provide
human element of design. a good comparison to instructional design for its
use of notation systems: it has similarly complex
technical issues (of building and construction);
KNOWLEDGE WORK AND it is socially based, often practiced within a firm
VISUAL NOTATION and with clients; and it addresses theoretical
and philosophical issues in application. While
The focus of our effort is instructional design, the architecture may result in visual form more than
creation of materials for and the structuring of most instructional design, it still provides a strong
instruction itself. For our purposes here, instruc- analogy for an examination of design methods and
tional design is the knowing use of technology tools as applied to instructional design.
for the assistance of learning, and more recently,

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The general field of design can be said to have ies are now accessible online, and many people
evolved from craft when need arose to separate work using computers, particularly in knowledge
the work of creation from the work of production. and information fields, while management, com-
Within design, visual notation is needed to create, munication, and production in instructional design
direct, and communicate. “It is, above all else, is done principally on computers.
the separation of designing from making and the
increased importance of the drawing which char-
acterizes the modern design process” (Lawson, THE GOAL OF THE
2000, p. 241). Drawing, what first developed as PAPERLESS OFFICE
a means to direct others in the making of the end
product, has also evolved other purposes, notably The computer and information revolution have
to support the imagination. The word design, of significantly changed our work habits and our
course, derives from a Latin word meaning “to understanding of information. The concept of
mark” or draw. “atoms vs. bits” (Negroponte, 1999), of analog
Design as a profession and as a practice is vs. digital, and advanced vs. appropriate technol-
methodological, purposeful, and goal oriented. It ogy all pressed us forward to embrace computer
examines the entire problem, seeking a broader technology. Not using the latest technology in the
understanding, rather than small improvements workplace is considered laggard or Luddite. As
addressing known problems, as does craft. Both knowledge workers, we are centered in the use of
craft and design seek applied solutions; the crafts computers, and paper is passé. The conversion,
person creates the result, while the designer directs quasi-religious, is not complete:
others in doing so generally through visual means.
Advances through craft will be incremental, i.e. Yes, I’ve been to the crossroads and I’ve met the
minor continued improvements in efficiency or devil, and he’s sleek and confident, ever so much
detail; advances in design work may be significant more “with it” than the nearest archangel. He is
changes or substantial improvements. Currently, casual and irreverent, wears jeans and running
much instructional design is craft based, seeking shoes and maybe even an earring, and the point-
detailed changes in the end product, and often ing prong of his tail is artfully concealed. He is
building from existing models of instruction. For the sorcerer of binary order, jacking in and out of
greater innovation and invention to occur, how- terminals, booting up, flaming, commanding vast
ever, changes in the design process are necessary. systems and networks with an ease that steals my
breath away. … Do we know what we’re doing?
Do people understand that there might be con-
PAPER sequences, possibly dire, to our embrace of these
technologies, and that the myth of the Faustian
Throughout history, visual notation systems for bargain has not become irrelevant just because
information recording, conveyance, and inves- we studied it in school? (Birkerts, 1994, p. 211)
tigation have been tied to various media, most
frequently paper. Since its broad production and The “paperless office” remains as a broadly
use, paper has helped fuel the development and held belief; however, in real life, the use of paper
communication of the world’s knowledge. remains important in the workplace.
Over the past twenty years, electronic com-
munications methods and media have rapidly Computer technology was supposed to replace
developed—newspapers, books, and whole librar- paper. But that hasn’t happened. Every country

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in the Western world uses more paper today, on ments to read and annotate; our well-read books
a per-capita basis, than it did ten years ago. are marked up and personalized, the notations
The consumption of uncoated free-sheet paper, becoming part of the cognitive record of reading.
for instance—the most common kind of office Some of these choices are due to the simple
paper—rose almost fifteen per cent in the United physical attributes of paper that are easily rec-
States between 1995 and 2000. (Gladwell, 2002) ognized. Paper is (among other characteristics)
generally inexpensive, lightweight, light in color,
If we examine our own work experience translucent, durable in most situations, easy to
through reflection and the work habits of others use, easy to mark, and readily available. These
through research, we can see the continuing use physical attributes help determine for what it can
of paper for knowledge work and the reasons for be used, i.e. its capabilities or affordances.
its persistence. For example, while we use e-mail Affordances, per Gibson, are those capabili-
constantly, the promise of paperless communica- ties, properties, and attributes of a tool or medium
tion has not been achieved. In truth, as organiza- that “…make possible different functions for the
tions install e-mail systems, paper use increases person perceiving or using that object” (Gibson,
on average by 40% (Sellen & Harper, 1997). With 1979, p. 24). We often make choices about media
e-mail, we use more paper. Why? use by weighing various affordances, choosing
media with a perceived relative advantage for
our own use.
WE KNOW HOW PAPER IS USED For example, we chose to write the grocery
IN OUR OWN EXPERIENCES list by hand on a used envelope instead of on the
laptop because it is lighter and more transportable,
Our own work experience can provide a base for more easily carried to the grocery store. While it is
understanding the role of paper in the knowledge possible to carry the laptop to the store, we quickly
workplace. We understand first hand the use, ubiq- understand that it would be easier to use a lighter
uity, and commonality of paper. The management weight scrap of paper to help remember grocery
of “paper” is considered a hallmark of modern items. We mentally and often unconsciously weigh
professional travail; the clutter of our homes these attributes when we pick up a piece of paper.
comes significantly from paper; organizations Imagine the process of writing the list on one’s
seek to decrease the use of paper and encourage laptop to illustrate an alternative choice: go to the
its recycling. We print documents to read and edit, laptop, start the laptop, start the word process-
guilty about our use of the world’s resources, and ing program, write the list, visit the refrigerator
about our failure to fully achieve digital literacy. to check current supplies, start the printer, print
In general, knowledge workers make a series the list, close the program and laptop. One could
of choices that take advantage of how to use me- chose to carry the laptop to the grocery store in
dia. More often than not, we make rational and lieu of printing the list, but that would raise ad-
understandable choices to use paper. For example, ditional difficulties.
we print out e-mail to have a handy record of a We often know it is much easier to use paper
communication. We write numbers, names or ideas without going through a conscious decision
on available pieces of paper. The grocery list is put making process. We use paper because it has the
on the back of an envelope, a phone number on a capabilities we need for the tasks we are perform-
sticky note, and contact information is embellished ing. It does what we need it to do simply.
on the back of a business card. We print out docu-

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AFFORDANCES OF PAPER FOR • Manipulation: Paper allows for the multi-

KNOWLEDGE WORK/DESIGN dimensional display and reorganization of
documents. For example, paragraph five
Within the scope of simpler tasks, we understand can be physically put at the end of the re-
what works well, knowing needed skills and ef- port, or an image can be located for con-
fort. We use what is easy and cheap, paper, the nection to the text. The manipulation of
affordances of which stand well apart from our paper materials is grounded and first hand.
digital tools. There also are more complex or For example, we can examine the differ-
sophisticated affordances of paper that are tied ence between paper collage and digital col-
to knowledge work, particularly is how we use lage. There are real limits to a paper col-
paper as individuals and within groups to under- lage. One must budget unique resources,
stand and think. and creation is tied to real constraints of
paper, cutting, shaping, and gluing. This is
• Navigation: The tangibility, the physi- contrasted to the weightless world of the
cality, of paper helps one navigate and digital creation, which is unlimited and,
understand a document. Through spatial in the end, without gravity. The paper col-
understanding, through representation of lage is, however, immediate, personal, and
(textual) location, and through a physical unique.
gauging of location, we understand the • Placeholding: Paper documents serve as
structure of a document. One can under- cognitive aids to memory; they remain as
stand, visually and haptically, progress in left until addressed. They are a constant re-
reading a large document or the ease with minder of tasks undone.
which one could read a thin children’s • Portability: Paper is portable and can be
book. We can find summarizing arguments carried to various locations untethered to
in many books at the end, and the initial one’s workplace, e.g. away from one’s
challenge of the author at the beginning. computer. It can be read in the park, hand-
We know the main body of the book con- ed to an airline ticket agent, or presented
tains supporting information in greater to a flight attendant when “all electronic
detail. devices must be turned off”. Is it not place
• Cross referencing: Spatial flexibility al- bound, tied, at the least to an Ethernet wire
lows the easy comparison of multiple doc- or a battery pack.
uments, cross referencing between mul-
tiple pieces of paper. Multiple documents These capabilities of paper do not mean that
can be arrayed on a surface and easily other digital systems are not useful; these obser-
cross-referenced, even between paper and vations mean that the use of paper is often part
electronic sources. of the complete process of idea and document
• Annotation: Paper based documents can development: a document may be initialized and
easily be annotated using textual or sym- finalized on the computer, but in the process, it may
bolic notation, using pen or pencil. These be converted back and forth to paper many times.
marks vary from structural reorganizations
to textual comments to visual representa- Yet, if the computer is the canvas on which docu-
tions, often all within the same document ments are created, the top of the desk is the palette
and using the same marking system. on which bits of paper are spread in preparation

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for the job of writing. Without these bits of paper Authoring, reviewing, collaborating, and interact-
ready to hand, it is as if the writing, and more es- ing socially were all supported through the use
pecially the thinking [italics in original], could not of paper, even when electronic media for com-
take place in earnest. (Sellen & Harper, 2002, p.1) munication were available and well understood.
Authoring, an important component of knowl-
These affordances can be contrasted to com- edge work, is well supported by paper. As noted,
puter-based electronic systems; all of the tasks digital technologies may be used for the finished
could be accomplished using a computer. But all product, but the actual composition of ideas is
would require substantial investment in technol- done through a combination of paper and digital
ogy, skills, and cognitive effort. The tasks would technologies. We write, compose, draw, and
be divorced from direct human intervention and create on paper. We may implement those ideas
not grounded in the real world. Computers and through other media—digital software, oil paint,
most software packages separate users—through buildings, and sculpture—but we make our initial
interfacia such as keyboards, mice, screens, and authoring choices generally on paper. Even authors
requirements to learn and often extensively de- who extensively used word processing software
velop skills—from the act of creation. move back and forth between print and electronic
While paper has substantial value for text- versions of their work.
based communication and notation, it is also Knowledge workers also tend to review the
well suited to use to convey visual images or work of others on paper, both for approval and for
notation. Paper, broadly defined, is a surface for their own understanding. We understand informa-
making marks that require little experience; a tion through the formation of our own knowledge,
separate program or marking tool is not required. and part of the formation of our knowledge often
Most people have sufficient skill in non-textual occurs by marking written text.
visual representation, i.e. drawing, to accomplish Similarly, knowledge workers often plan their
rudimentary representations and to decode vi- work using paper, where a lack of imposed struc-
sual images (Goldschmidt, 1999). This is often ture affords ease and flexibility in jotting down
more efficient than text alone. The hand, unlike notations, making diagrams, marking emphasis,
computer programs, has never had a significant or connecting ideas. Word processing, by com-
division between writing and drawing, between parison, focuses one type of information and is
textual notation and visual notation. While skills structured for written documents on a page. The
may vary, the medium is not forcing the use of diagram sketched by hand into the paper docu-
word or image on the page; a mark is a mark, ment is easy; that same diagram in an electronic
whether text or image, or visual notation. document requires many additional steps and
substantially more skill in software use.
Collaborative activities are also often more
EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE OF PAPER easily undertaken through the use of paper. Pa-
SUPPORTED KNOWLEDGE WORK per allows the sharing of a common document
and making of multiple and diverse marks on
Sellen and Harper (2002) found that knowledge it. Knowledge workers can pass around a draft,
workers employed paper in ways that were com- or even copies of a draft, for annotation and re-
plex and sophisticated, and which also illustrated view. Paper often provides the media to record
some of the nature of knowledge work. Their ideas, plans and discussion for working groups.
research involved observing work in air traffic Examples of collaborative paper or paper-based
control, financial management, and policing. activity in the workplace include the large paper

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easel pads used to record and archive ideas in of thought. The reports, consistent with Toyota
team brainstorming sessions, or sticky notes used management principles, are highly structured,
to plan staffing or procedures. yet created to encourage ongoing input, including
Finally, paper is often used as a reason for editing and marking, by others.
added, informal interpersonal meetings, greas- The value of the A3 report is that it ensures
ing the wheels for further creativity. Written communication, either formalized or incidental.
documents, such as a report or a memo, are often Reports are duplicated and presented to others
delivered in person. This provides an opportunity for input. The development of the A3 document
to review the materials with the intended audience is often done in teams or collaboratively; reports
and to increase creative social interaction in the can be printed or posted for review, and are eas-
workplace. Such documents could often be sent ily folded for inclusion in a notebook. Informal
by other means, such as e-mail, but the personal annotation of the A3 reports by others, including
meeting is valued more highly than electronic on the factory or shop floor is encouraged as part
expediency of the ongoing process.
One of the most developed paper-based collab-
orative systems is the A3 Report used by Toyota.
“These single page data-dense reports are used DRAWING AS A MEANS TO DESIGN
as part of a process to gather information, share
information, make comments, track progress and Much of our understanding and use of paper is
graphically represent the improvement process” for text; most of our communications efforts are
(Liker and Meier, 2006, p. 201). The A3 Report centered around words and writing. However, be-
method involves using one side of an A3 sized yond the linear use of one symbol system, writing
piece of paper. “It allows only the most critical is an entire array of ways to communicate more
information to be shared with others for careful effectively and expressively. Drawing, a visual
evaluation of the thought process used, as a means notation system, is central… and common to all
of requesting support or advice, and for arriving design fields. Historically, humans have relied on
at a consensus.” drawing to communicate.
Initially, A3 Reports were developed as a
standardization choice allowing worldwide com- Drawing is a kind of Universal Language, under-
munication through a single, simple format: “… stood by all Nations. A Man may often express his
this was the largest size paper that could fit in a fax Ideas, even to his own Countrymen, more clearly
machine: 11 × 17 inches” (Liker & Meier, 2006, with a Lead Pencil, or Bit of Chalk, than with
p. 203). While the documents could be done in his Tongue. And many can understand a Figure,
electronic form, the use of paper allows for easy that do not comprehend a Description in Words,
distribution, broadly distributed use, and allows tho’ ever so properly chosen. (BenjaminFranklin,
input from all. They are dynamic and collaborative 1749)
documents, not frozen and uni-directional Power-
Point presentations (Sobek & Jimmerson, 2004). Central to the use of paper is the ability to
A3 reports are a hallmark of the “lean” man- generate graphic images or diagrams easily. For
agement movement. These single pages of A3 the architect or artist, these images are essential
sized paper are used for planning, communicating, to their creation: Drawing, or “making marks,”
generating new ideas, and resolving problems. is an act of decision and exploration. Designers
Use of the single sheet for planning reports forces make marks, adjust symbols, manipulate forms,
conciseness, summarization, and organization and from that manipulation and iterative design

395
 The Virtue of Paper

process develop new and better ideas (see for Both Lawson (2004) and Fraser and Hemni
example, Waters & Gibbons, 2004). (2000) describe multiple functions for drawing in
How we view visual notation, drawing, is an the architectural design process; drawing is used
important key to advancing instructional design. to plan, to communicate, to convince, and most
If we use it solely to communicate, we will limit importantly, to ideate (See Figures 1-3). Each of
its effective use. Communication with colleagues these modes of drawing can be applied to use in
and clients is an important use of visual notation, the field of instructional design. These types of
to be sure, but more importantly, drawing can drawings include:
serve other functions in our design process. It is
where we can generate ideas, its principle role in • Public communication: Most design
many other design fields. work in architecture is very public; public
Why is drawing effective in the development reviews are common. Many drawings in
of ideas? Visual form is instantly recognizable, the design fields are used to present work
and at the same time encourages interpretation. and communicate intent to outside parties.
The generation of visual forms allows the abstrac- In architecture, plans are reviewed by gov-
tion of ideas and the summarization of complex ernment agencies, clients, and communi-
concepts. One can scribble a drawing, change ties. These drawings can be described as
it, and reinforce one’s thoughts. It is “media-as- presenting a positive and finished image to
environment,” a place for the development of the public (Lawson, 2004). Drawings may
ideas (Meyrowitz, 1999, p. 45). be used to support marketing of buildings,
securing public approvals, or in convinc-
ing a client of the project’s value.
REASONS FOR DRAWING
Within instructional design, there currently
In the design fields, drawing or visual notation is less use for representation of design work,
is central to the design process and is used for a as often the preference is to have non-working
variety of purposes, ranging from the presenta- digital models for presentation of early stages.
tions to the public and reviewers, to the cognitive In architecture though, the economics of physical
efforts of individual practitioners.

A drawing is like a theatrical scrim, a gauzelike Figure 1. Thinking drawings by the author
screen whose properties change dependent on
lighting conditions. Like a scrim, a drawing is
both opaque and translucent, a filter between the
drawer and viewer, drawer and object, between
ideas conceived and their two-dimensional mani-
festation. A scrim and a drawing both prevent as
well as allow view, asserting their presence with
varying authority and in different ways. When the
back light turns on, the scrim disappears. In a
similar way, drawings dissolve and open a world
of rich possibilities. (Fraser & Hemni, 2000, p.18)

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The Virtue of Paper

construction compared to the cost of producing through the use of drawing. For example,
a digital prototype encourages visual and often the efficient layout of clothing patterns on
animated representations. milled fabric is important for cost effec-
One other comparison for the field of instruc- tive production; developing hypothetical
tional design would be movie production. The layouts of furniture in visual form by in-
development of movies is based on an extensive terior designers helps to understand room
series of drawn visual representations, story use; and urban designers use visual models
boards, and iterative representations as the cost to understand the ramifications of zoning
of final production is quite high. Most animated laws. If verbal annotation is helpful, dia-
movies such as Disney/Pixar’s The Incredibles grams, visual representations, or mapping
(Walker, 2005) are extensively developed on paper is more so.
in hand drawn form prior to the computer-based
rendering of the final product. In the virtual world of technology-rich instruc-
tional design, the real world limits of room layout,
• Work communication: Drawings are ex- fabric width, and neighborhood density are not
tensively used to communicate within the immediate concerns. However, early develop-
field of architecture. These may take the ment of screen designs could benefit from rapid
form of diagrams, representations of data, visualization through hand-based drawings, and
or representations of ideas. The value of hand drawn maps are a good starting method for
this type of drawing or visual notation is Web site design.
beginning to be well understood in the field
of instructional design (cf. Botturi, 2006). • Research drawing: Architects and others
Design teams in all areas need to commu- also use drawing as a means to understand
nicate structure, sequence, and organiza- observed phenomena. The “grand tour” of
tion of their work; visual representation Europe, undertaken as part of formal stud-
and notation can provide a better under- ies in architecture, is often documented
standing than by text alone. with drawings in a sketchbook. Not mere
• Vendor communication: Drawings are drawing practice, this custom helps the ar-
commonly used to communicate directly chitecture students cognitively engage and
with those providing services or products; internalize what they see.
within architecture, some drawings have
the legal force of contract and are literally Most travelers today carry a camera and forsake
called “Contract Documents.” As more of the personal time and engagement of drawing
the actual production work in instruction what they see, yet for most the cognitive residue
design is done by outside vendors, com- of taking a photograph is minimal while the un-
munication will become a higher priority. derstanding gained by drawing one’s observation
Much of this communication will be ver- is long lasting. In Japan, hikers still climb Mount
bal, but visual notation and communica- Fuji to paint the sunrise. Again, the reflective
tion will also be increasingly valuable. experience is of considerably greater value.
• Development testing: Many ideas cannot Drawing as a tool to research and understand-
be fully understood unless represented vi- ing is not limited to architects and tourists. Early
sually and those ideas are often explored scientists, including Sigmund Freud, used draw-
through drawings. Understanding complex ing as a means to understand and develop ideas.
and intricate technologies can be assisted

397
 The Virtue of Paper

In the latter part of the 19th century, German re- The imperfect feedback (or “backtalk” per
searchers considered drawing to be instrumental Goldschmidt, 1999) of media is an important
to scientific discovery, both as a way to capture component of the design process. Representing
the microscopic detail of nerve cells, for example, an idea through drawing is not always an exact
and to illustrate theories of how the brain might science; through the vagaries of the media, the
work. (Gamwell, inCarey, 2006) roughness of the paper or bleed of ink, or even
through the inaccuracy of the hand, differences
For example, Darwin’s drawings were essential and changes occur. This can be a conversation as
to his seminal work in The Origin of Species. And challenging as an engaging argument with a peer,
the recorded anatomical observations of Leon- and it is where ideas develop. Lawson (2004) calls
ardo da Vinci are early examples of the use of these drawings “proposition drawings.” “These
drawings for research. Mechanical or electronic are drawings where a designer makes a ‘move,’
reproduction of visual images does not require the or proposes a possible design outcome” (p. 45).
same cognitive effect as the engaged and personal Designing, particularly within architecture, is
representation. often iterative, making a series of choices within
a larger conceptual goal. This type of drawing
• Sketching as visual thinking: The most becomes game-like, combative, an interactive
important aspect of drawing is its ability argument, and, as often described, conversational.
to help create and develop new ideas. This It is an interaction with a sheet of paper, akin to
type of drawing, called “study sketching” “thinking out loud,” helping ideas and decisions
by Goldschmidt (1999), and “design draw- emerge from the page, away from the brain, in a
ings” by Fraser and Hemni (2000), occurs two dimensional use of symbols comparable to
in many fields. It is finding answers to com- the leap to writing envisioned by Ong: Thought
plex problems through visual representa- requires some sort of continuity. Writing estab-
tion, and is “…practiced by individuals lishes in the text a ‘line’ of continuity outside the
who attempt to conceive of a new entity, mind” (Ong, 1982, p. 39). Drawing expands this
be it a work of art, a building, a techni- capability in multiple dimensions.
cally-oriented invention or novel artifact, This method of drawing is closely related to the
or a scientific concept” (Goldschmidt, concept of cognitive tools developed by Jonassen
1999, unnumbered). Many design fields and others to describe the use of computer-based
such as architecture, graphic design, and tools to investigate various hypotheses and direc-
industrial design have active histories of tions. A spreadsheet, for example, can be used as
design sketching. This process is drawing a cognitive tool to define, structure quantitative
to invent, to generate the new, drawing to relationships, and to iteratively advance various
create. numerical scenarios. The use of drawing in design
can easily fit within Jonassen’s (1996) description
This type of drawing is often intensely per- of cognitive tools as “…readily available, generic
sonal. It is a one-to-one visual conversation with applications; they are affordable; they are used to
oneself through the medium of drawing, and it is represent knowledge in content domains; they are
generally not meant for extensive communication. applicable across different subject domains; they
Such sketches can be decoded, understood, and engage critical thinking in learners; they facilitate
valued by knowledgeable others, but their primary transfer of learning; they are simple, powerful
purpose is one of supporting thought. formalisms; and they are reasonably easy to learn”

398
The Virtue of Paper

Figure 2. Thinking drawings by the author

(p. 709). How parallel is Goldschmidt’s descrip-
tion of the cognitive mechanism of drawing: “…
this is a ‘front edge’ process in which partial and
rudimentary representations are produced, evalu-
ated, replaced by others if need be, transformed,
modified and refined, until their maker is satisfied
with the result” (1999).
As we have seen, the visual notation of archi-
tecture, drawing, serves a wide variety of needs,
which can be compared to the work in instructional
design. Drawing, i.e. paper-based, free flowing
visual notation, has value on many levels, from
public communication to private cognition. In both
fields, ideas and concepts need to be explored and
described in ways beyond simple text. Similarly
to architecture, the drawing of instructional design Figure 3. Preliminary site concept drawing for
must be free flowing, inventive, both personal and Cambridge Community College, Minnesota,
public, and easily used. USA. Courtesy Hokanson/Lunning Associates,
Visual notation must have both a cognitive and Inc., architects.
practitioner base in drawing, a basis gained by
making marks by hand on surfaces, which occurs
most easily and commonly on paper.

DRAWING ON PAPER

Media, of course, are needed to communicate and

to support thought. The use of some technology
is necessary to extend our thoughts to others. But
the type and extent of media technology imposes
change on the message and change on the process.
Two things stand out: first, the cognitive load
and communication skill required to use more
complex technologies detracts from the capacity
for thought. Using simple media allows greater
concentration on the task at hand – design, infor-
For example, a word processor often completes
mation, communication, or invention.
or re-spells words; presentation programs such as
Simpler media also impose less of their own
PowerPoint utilize wizards to summarize presen-
structure on the interchange and allow a freer form
tations, limiting expression and communication
of idea development. Software is an indispensable
(Tufte, 2003), and desktop publishing programs
tool of instructional design, but any software, as
make some layouts easier to use than others,
a medium, structures the results, “perfecting” ill-
encouraging their use.
formed ideas in its own likeness (Drucker, 1999).

399
 The Virtue of Paper

If the meaning of Goethe’s Faust, of Van Gogh’s drawing is a cognitive tool, unmediated through
Landscapes, or Bach’s Art of the Fugue could a computer.
be transmitted in discursive terms, their authors Perhaps the most critical element in the use of
should and would not have bothered to write po- drawing or visual notation is the ability to generate
ems, paint, or compose, but rather have written ideas, to create within this simple medium. Ideas
scientific treatises. (Von Bertalanffy, 1965, p.44) are created through various processes, through
thinking, working, communicating, and experi-
Media biases communication, whether the menting. They are not birthed fully formed. Highly
media is computer-based software or oral speech developed programs and media short-circuit the
(Innis, 1951). The clearest, easiest, and least process and pre-structure the results. Ideas need an
biased use of visual notation (for the foreseeable environment, a medium that allows their formation
future) will occur through the use of drawing like a cloud of matter coalesces into a planet; an
directly on paper. environment for the growth of ideas.
While Einstein was able to mentally generate
images, most mortals require some sort of cog-
CONCLUSION nitive assistance and some exploration with an
external medium. Few humans can completely
We have seen, through both our own experiences envision the results of their ideas, whether that
and through research, that paper continues to be an is quantum physics, mathematical examples, or
important component in knowledge work, the work designing a new bathroom. This envisioning must
of thinking, invention, design, and innovation. This occur with ease, with the tools at hand, with the
will be the important work of the coming century, least mediation. That is why Sellen and Harper
and it also includes instructional design. Paper (2003, p. 185) have written that “the reality [is]
will continue to be used for a number of reasons, that the workplace of the future [is] full of paper.”
both common and complex. In modern society, And it’s marked with the results of our thinking.
it is always present, inexpensive, light weight, As we develop a common symbolic language
flexible, and relatively stable. We note things on for instructional design, we may learn from the
scraps of paper or in more developed notebooks, work of Christopher Alexander, architect, and
on agendas, on programs, and on napkins and note author of Pattern Language (1971). The book
cards. It also has value in more complex ways; it extensively explores hundreds of architectural
remains less mediated than computer-based com- elements in diagrammatic and photographic form.
munication as fewer processes are needed to use Ideas for houses, cities, rooms, and spaces are ex-
and understand it. Further, paper provides abilities amined and diagrammed as a means to understand
in the areas of editing, annotation, collaboration, the richness of architecture. Far from a template
and manipulation that remain more difficult on for design, it can be better used as a descriptive
the computer; and it supports close interpersonal observation of the built environment, an artifact
contact in meetings, conveyance, and personal from Alexander’s own observations. What was
delivery, i.e. it encourages face-to-face social most important was the making, not as a product
interaction. for codified reuse
Our ideas come from our use of media. While While there are a number of computer-based
the other tasks of visual notation or drawing that notational systems in use, there remains no com-
are primarily representational are important to mon system for instructional design. The develop-
the process, the generational aspects of any nota- ment of any notational system must be more than
tion, whether drawing or writing are paramount; a one-off program; it must be based in the human

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process of design and development, and its use Brown, J. S., & Duguid, P. (2002). The social
must be easy, inexpensive, shared, and widespread life of information. Boston: Harvard Business
to be of value. Designers will need to use the School Press.
system on an informal and unmediated manner.
Carey, B. (2006, April 26). Analyze these. New
They have to be able to use it without a computer,
York Times. Retrieved 05.06.06 from http://www.
anytime, anywhere, and at a moment’s notice.
nyam.org/news/2657.html
Such a system will evolve bottom up, through
usage by drawing, much as the rules of writing Drucker, P. F. (1994). Knowledge work and knowl-
have evolved from informal oral speech: “The edge society: The social transformations of this
rules of grammar in natural human languages are century. [transcript of a lecture]. Retrieved Au-
used first and can be abstracted from usage and gust 11, 2006 from http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/
stated explicitly in words only with difficulty and ifactory/ksgpress/www/ksg_news/transcripts/
never completely” (Ong, 1982, p. 7). drucklec.htm
Visual notation in design must encompass
Drucker, P. F. (1999, April). Beyond the informa-
many tasks. It will be used for communicating
tion revolution. Atlantic Monthly, 284(4), 47–57.
with other team members, but will also be used
to plan out tactics and set goals as a decision re- Franklin, B. (1749). Proposals relating to the
cording method, to define components created by education of youth in Pensilvania, B. Frank-
others, to present ideas and progress to clients, or lin, Printer, Philadelphia. Retrieved online
to develop ideas for the invention of new forms 7/29/06 from http://www.archives.upenn.edu/
of instructional design. What is not needed is a primdocs/1749proposals.html
canned set of symbols, like logos, icons, templates,
Fraser, I., & Henmi, R. (1994). Envisioning ar-
or emoticons, but a broad-based development
chitecture: An analysis of drawing. New York:
of representational or generational skills: skills
Van Nostrant-Reinhold.
at conceptualizing, summarizing, editing, com-
municating, organizing, ordering, and structur- Gibson, J. J. (1979). The ecological approach
ing for instructional designers. In simpler terms, to visual perception. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence
instructional designers need to draw to plan, to Earlbaum.
conceive, and to communicate.
Gladwell, M. (2005, March 25). The social life
of paper. The New Yorker. Retrieved 5/7/06 from
http://www.gladwell.com/pdf/paper.pdf
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Jonassen, D. H. (1996). Learning with technol- Sellen, A., & Harper, R. (1997). Paper as an ana-
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This work was previously published in Handbook of Visual Languages for Instructional Design: Theories and Practices, edited
by Luca Botturi and Todd Stubbs, pp. 75-89, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.14
LDL for Collaborative Activities
Christine Ferraris
Université de Savoie, France

Christian Martel
Pentila Corporation and Université de Savoie, France

Laurence Vignollet
Université de Savoie, France

ABSTRACT facilitate the modeling is also presented. Its use

is illustrated by the example of the planet game,
LDL (learning design language) is an educa- which was practically tested with other research
tional modeling language which was conceived teams as a benchmark/competition during the
to model collaborative activities. It has roots in ICALT 2006 conference.
social sciences, mainly linguistics, sociology
and ethnomethodology. It proposes seven con-
cepts that allow instructional designers to build INTRODUCTION
the model of a collaborative learning activity.
It has both a visual and a textual notation, the Learning design language (LDL) is a language
latter being computer-readable. This means that intended for use by instructional designers. It has
the produced models can be easily operational- been created to allow them to describe and specify
ized and executed in an existing virtual learning learning activities on the Internet. Lots of activities
environment. This chapter introduces LDL, its may take place on the Internet—like a treasure hunt
concepts and the graphical notations associated between groups of children, a training session to
with each of them. The methodology proposed to improve reading, a discussion between a teacher
and students, an examination, etc. So, the focus
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch214 is placed on collaborative activities, as the LDL

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 LDL for Collaborative Activities

authors are convinced that learning can no longer After this preparatory phase, the teacher will be
take place without considering and enhancing the in charge of adapting the activity designed by the
interactions between the learners. instructional designer. The teacher will consider
The ambition of the LDL authors is twofold: the following:
on the one hand, we want to provide instructional
designers with simple means to build the formal • The students to be involved in the future
description of whatever kind of learning activi- activity, because the teacher knows their
ties (such as the ones previously mentioned, for skills and their work practices,
example) and to combine them. On the other • The personal objectives defined for each of
hand, we want the teachers to be able to transform these students,
easily these formal descriptions into effective • The technical context in which the teacher
online activities, without any intervention from is operating.
computer science specialists. These activities will
involve services and digital resources available on Using LDL during the preparation phase leads
the teachers’ school network and on the Internet. the instructional designer to create a scenario. A
We did not take into account the division of scenario is a codified and formal description of
labor that usually occurs between the instructional a future activity. It can be considered as a speci-
designer and the teacher. On the contrary, we fication of this activity. Designing a scenario to
have considered that, in order to be exploited by specify an activity consists in describing:
an instructional designer, the language should
allow the designer to describe activities as if she • Where the activity will take place,
or he were a teacher and had to solve some of • Who the participants in the activity will be,
the problems encountered by teachers preparing • What the participants’ interventions will
lessons. Examples of these problems include be,
determining the theme of the activity, gathering • How and when these interventions will be
adequate documentation, defining some attainable connected throughout the activity,
learning objectives, evaluating the duration of • The rules the participants will have to com-
the activity, proposing a division of the activity ply with,
into sessions, indicating the way students will • What the consequences of the participants’
be arranged during learning sessions, defining reactions, actions and points of view on the
individual work sequences and positioning them activity will be and how they will be able
in the overall activity, defining the way and the to express these points of view.
means to measure the students’ progress. They
concern learning and pedagogy, of course, but The distinction between a scenario and the
also logistics, organization and evaluation. activity modeled by this scenario is the same as
This is an important preparatory task, which the difference between a recipe and the future dish
may be more or less precise, more or less detailed. whose preparation is described by this recipe. If the
It guarantees the teacher being able to conduct the ingredients used by the cook are actually the ones
activity once it has begun while keeping control mentioned in the recipe, and if the way the dish is
of his or her objectives. Improvisation, on the prepared is in conformity with the instructions in
other hand, is more risky. It is probably limited to the recipe, then the tasting of the dish should go
the best teachers, in the same way that rally-style off well. In particular, if the codification proposed
driving is restricted to the best drivers. It supposes by LDL is respected, then a computer will be able
a complete mastery of pedagogy. to interpret a scenario. Thus the teacher will be

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

able to operationalize it in a technical computer What follows is a description of LDL. Before

environment. the description, the background of the language
To support the description of a scenario, a will be presented. This will explain the origin
graphical notation was defined. This enables of the language and will position it in the field
the instructional designer or teacher to represent of VIDLs. We will then categorize the language
the scenarios produced more easily and compre- according to Botturi et al. (2006) classification.
hensibly. Once these representations have been Next, a detailed description of LDL concepts will
produced, they are translated into a corresponding be given. For each of them, a definition will be
XML binding in conformity with the LDL syntax. provided together with some examples and the
(These bindings are not provided here as they are notation proposed to instructional designers to
of no use in helping the reader understand the represent the concept in the activity modeling
models or the notation.) They are the computer- process. After that, the methodology defined to
readable representations of the scenarios. They model learning activities with LDL will be de-
are also a way of representing the scenarios in scribed. The use of this methodology will then
a normalized format suitable for exchanges and be exemplified in the planet game example. This
operationalization. example is a case study which was proposed as
LDL does not describe the actual nature of the a modeling and implementing challenge during
services and resources used by the learners and the last International Conference on Advanced
teachers during the ongoing activity. Neither does Learning Technologies (ICALT) (Vignollet et al.,
it describe the functionalities of these services. The 2006). It will be introduced just before describing
transformation of a scenario, in which services and how LDL was used to model it within the LDL
resources are described in an abstract way, into methodology. Finally we will present the first
an actual online activity, in which actual services results obtained, the strengths and the limitations
and resources are involved, is carried out during of LDL and the future work.
the operationalization phase. It is supported by
learning design infrastructure (LDI), a global in-
frastructure which has been developed in relation THE ORIGIN AND
with LDL to deal with both the operationalization BACKGROUND OF LDL
and the execution of scenarios.
The authors of LDL think that teachers and in- Modeling Collaborative Activities
structional designers, who design activities for the
teachers, should not have to concern themselves The definition of LDL follows upon research we
with the technical features of the computer tools conducted in the domain of CSCW (computer
they use. That is not their problem. They should support for collaborative work). Such research
be allowed to forget about it so that they can works asked the following questions: What are
concentrate on the specification of the activities the essential properties of a groupware so that it
they intend to carry out with students. They have effectively supports group activities while taking
to suppose that the technical environment will be into account the social aspects of these activities?
able to adapt to their needs. This is a strongly-held On which model should these tools be built?
position of the LDL authors, which has had a huge The answer was to propose a model for group
impact in defining LDL and developing LDI. activities: the participation model (Martel, 1998;
Indeed, LDI is in charge of seeking, finding, and Ferraris et al., 2002). This model is grounded on
building the technical environment best adapted properties that are inherent in the nature of collab-
to the teachers’ needs. orative activities. These properties were analyzed

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

and revealed by research in social sciences. We we consider an activity as a set of exchanges

have considered the following ones: and interactions between the users involved (the
participants). As in a conversation, the exchanges
• Activities are situated in various contexts are structured and scaffolded by rules. And as in
(social, cultural, technical, geographical, a conversation, every exchange involves at least
etc.) (see Suchman, 1987; Fitzpatrick et two participants: an addresser who acts and whose
al., 1995; Garfinkel & Sacks, 1972). Thus actions are aimed at an addressee.
it is necessary to consider both the places
of the activity and the roles the participants A Socio-Constructivist
will have in these places. Roles are relative View of Learning
to the location of participants: i.e., they are
also situated (see Chapter XIII). Contemporary pedagogical movements attach
• Activities are unforeseeable. They are built great importance to socio-constructivism, a learn-
gradually as they proceed (see the works on ing theory developed by Lev Vygotsky at the
activity theory by Vygostky and Leontiev). beginning of the 20th century (Vygotsky, 1934).
So it is impossible to produce an a priori This theory rests on the idea that knowledge
description of what an activity will be. acquisition is facilitated by the various social
Such a description can nevertheless be use- interactions a learner may have during her or his
ful to support collaboration in CSCW tools learning process.
but if and only if it can be revised in situ, This point of view seems to be shared with
according to what actually happens in the problem-based learning proponents such as Savery
ongoing activity (Suchman, 1987). and Duffy (1996). These researchers also state that
• Collaborative activities suppose the exis- cooperation influences learning. Indeed, generally
tence of a compromise between the inter- in their approach, learners, grouped in teams, are
ests of the group and those of the individu- expected to collaborate, helped by their teacher, to
als, between the dependencies that stem explain phenomena underlying a problem.
from relationships among individuals and Both theories thus state that learning activities
their autonomy. Each individual must be are intrinsically cooperative: they are based on
able to negotiate her or his commitment interactions which are richer and more complex
to the activity (Martel, 1998). This was than the traditional face-to-face exchanges be-
inspired by Goffman’s theory (Goffman, tween a teacher and her or his learners.
1981).

In addition, we were inspired by works in THE IMS-LD PROPOSAL

linguistics, mainly the dialogue models of the
University of Geneva (Roulet et al., 1985) that The main proposal in the domain of learning
attempt to explain the succession and the inter- design languages is IMS-LD, which was a result
weaving of conversational exchanges. Indeed, of the work conducted at OUNL (Koper, 2002).
we have drawn a parallel between a teaching It is based on a theatrical metaphor. Indeed, it
activity and a conversation. In a conversation, considers a learning activity as being a succession
locutors speak to their interlocutors, who make of “acts” (in the theatrical meaning of that word)
an interpretation of what is said and may react that leads to the realization of the “drama” which
in turn (Austin, 1955). Just like a conversation, occurs between learners and teachers. Modeling

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

such an activity is thus a matter of modeling the Difficulties in Modeling

alternating or the sequencing of the exchanges Collaborative Activities
that occur in the class.
The main contribution of this approach is to Miao et al. (2005) have done an interesting and
put forward this learning flow modeling, consid- deep analysis of the capacity of IMS-LD for for-
ering that the learning flow reflects the activity malizing collaborative learning scenarios. They
in an overall way. However, even though EML have pointed out five major difficulties, among
has been adopted by IMS, there remain barriers which is the difficulty of modeling varied forms
to its adoption. We mention in what follows the of social interactions. They show evidence that
barriers which are particularly significant to our by using IMS-LD “it cannot be clearly modelled
purposes. They led us to choose to develop a new whether and how people collaborate” (see p.3 of
LD language instead of using IMS-LD. Miao et al.’s paper).
As Hernandez-Leo et al. also noted this prob-
A Complex Language lem, they have proposed an extension of IMS-LD
(see Chapter XX). But, as Harrer mentions in
The first barrier is the complexity of the IMS- Chapter XIV, this extension at service level rather
LD language. Several researchers and end-users than at activity level cannot appropriately capture
(teachers, instructional designers) share the point the characteristics of social interactions.
of view that IMS-LD is complicated, in particular These difficulties were also reported by Caeiro
because of its high number of concepts. Conse- (see Chapter X). They put forward that the theatri-
quently, only someone who knows it well can cal metaphor is not suitable to model collaborative
handle it and capture its subtleties. For instance, it learning situations when they are not a succession
is very difficult to define the appropriate properties. of acts, in the theatrical sense. This led them to
Even if the associated best practices try to offer propose the poEML language.
a method, it is still extremely difficult to use for
instructional designers, and quite impossible for No Concept Dedicated to the
teachers to use (Le Pallec et al., 2006). Activity Observation
Indeed, as IMS-LD (EML in fact, its ancestor)
has been designed to industrialize the creation of All of the actors in the field of education are in
distance learning activities, it is not dedicated to agreement about the fact that an educational ac-
teachers organizing learning activities in their tivity is characterized by its unpredictable nature.
classes. It operates as though the modeling phase Le Pallec et al. (2006) claim that “a large part of
has to be dealt with by an instructional designer scenario can only be defined during runtime” and
who has a discussion with the teacher and who “in learning science, models are driven by learn-
translates into IMS-LD the informal description ing events to detect and to react upon” (Le Pallec
of the learning activity the teacher has produced. et al., 2006, p. 2). In fact, teachers are usually
However, once the modeling has been done, the able to give prescriptions of an activity, but they
teacher and the instructional designer have to know that they will have to take into account the
discuss the formal model produced. This requires learners’ reactions and what will happen during
the teacher to be able at least to understand, even the activity to adapt it as it proceeds.
if she or he cannot produce, the model in a general IMS-LD does not include a semantically-
way. If the language is too complex, this may not founded concept which could capture these re-
be possible actions and the events coming from the ongoing

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activity. This is probably due to the theatrical Towards the Creation of

metaphor which intrinsically does not take the a New Language
reactions of the actors into account. Indeed, actors
are supposed to play the part without deviating In 2003, we were facing the following situation:
from the original text. So there is theoretically no
need to consider these reactions and what is going • We needed a language enabling one to de-
on. Everything should go on according to what is scribe collaborative learning activities and
written in the author’s original text. their learning flows,
The IMS-LD “property” concept could be • We wanted the language to take into ac-
used to try to capture these reactions. However count the unforeseeable nature of learning
it has not been defined for that purpose but to be activities,
computational. That is probably why it is so dif- • We wanted the language to consider the
ficult to use it to capture reactions and points of situated and interactive nature of collab-
view of the participants. Moreover, it cannot be orative activities,
used to capture what is going on in the activity. • We wanted the language to be computer-
readable so that it would be possible to
Learning Tools Confronted with automate the construction of an adapted
Virtual Learning Environments VLE and the delivery of learning activities
via this VLE starting from the activities’
Learning tool designers were concerned very description,
early on by the modeling, or, more exactly, the • The incipient IMS-LD standard language
orchestration of these tools. They tried to describe did not meet our requirements.
and formalize the ways of interacting with them,
taking into account the specificity of the learn- So we decided to define a new LD language,
ing activities they wanted to plan. This is true in based on the participation model. As this model
all learning contexts: lifelong learning, school- had been improved and validated—it had been
based instruction, etc. This is for instance what used to specify and develop successfully one of the
Gueraud and her colleagues propose in FORMID very first extant VLE in France, which has been
(Gueraud et al., 2004), which implements learn- used daily since 1999 at University of Savoie by
ing activities that include the use of simulations more than 15,000 users (Martel et al., 2004)—the
in the electricity field. challenge sounded possible.
However, the deployment of virtual learning LDL was thus created in 2003 by Christian
environments (VLE) leads one to reconsider Martel, Laurence Vignollet and Christine Fer-
their proposals. Indeed, learning tools are now raris from “scenario Team” in collaboration with
included in the VLE and can interact with other Pentila corporation (http://www.pentila.com/)
services (Durand & Martel, 2006). Then teach- and Jean-Pierre David and Anne Lejeune from
ers or instructional designers populate the VLE LIG-METAH (Laboratoire d’Informatique de
with several resources, including instructions, Grenoble—METAH Team). The related infra-
learning tools, documents, case studies, etc. All structure LDI was specified by “scenario team”
these resources can be considered as small pieces and Pentila corporation, and developed by Pentila
of learning scenarios. Only the sequence which corporation.
orders these elements is missing.

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

POSITIONING LDL TOWARDS building the scenarios. This still has to be

BOTTURI ET AL.’S CLASSIFICATION validated.
• Perspective: (multiple) If we consider
LDL can be considered as a finalist communicative only the textual notation of LDL (i.e., the
language, in reference to the framework presented XML binding), the perspective is single. If
in Botturi et al. (2006). In the same paper, they we consider both the textual and visual no-
have also defined a classification scheme for ID tations, it is multiple. In fact, several views
languages. According to this classification, LDL are required for some of the LDL concepts,
can be categorized as: for instance the position one (see Figure 13
and supplementary Table 1).
• Stratification: (layered) LDL proposes
seven different concepts to describe the
model of a learning activity. All these con- LDL: SEVEN CONCEPTS
cepts are linked with each other in an infor- TO BUILD A SCENARIO
mation model (a meta-model).
• Formalization: (formal) LDL combines To build a scenario using LDL, the instructional
a graphical notation and a textual one. designer has to analyze the activity to identify:
Indeed, the instructional designer is sup-
posed to use the graphical notation to cre- • « Who »: Who takes part in the activity?
ate a scenario. The resulting diagrams have • « Where »: Where does the activity take
then to be transformed in a corresponding place?
LDL-XML binding, so that a computer • « What »: What is done during the activity?
will be able to make the scenario run on an • « How » and « When »: In which order do
existing VLE. The binding is of course for- we play and under which constraints (when
mal as it is expressed in XML according to does it start and when does it stop)?
the LDL grammar. As the transformation is
supposed to be carried out automatically in To those “classical” concepts. LDL adds two
the future (this is not the case currently), other, more original ones (Martel et al., 2006a):
the graphical notation requires precise syn-
tactical rules. • The « reactions » of the participants: What
• Elaboration: (Specification) The lan- is the participant’s evaluation of the dif-
guage has been primarily defined to build ficulty of an activity? What is his or her
the specification of a learning activity. The point of view on a document? How does
specifications built have the particularity a participant view his or her place in the
of being computer-understandable. They activity?
can be transformed automatically into ma- • The « rules of the game » of the activity:
chine-code in order to automate the deliv- What is allowed? What is not? How could
ery thanks to technology. we take into account the participants’ reac-
• Notation: (Both visual and textual) tions to adapt the activity?
Initially, there was only a textual nota-
tion (an XML binding). We have added LDL concepts are detailed below. For each de-
a graphical notation, assuming it would tail, we provide a definition of the concept together
help teachers and instructional designers in with its UML representation (which positions the

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 1. Role model (UML representation)

concept relative to the others within the LDL meta
model), some examples and the corresponding
LDL graphical notation. This notation is intended
for instructional designers. We have defined it
in order to prevent instructional designers from
having to use the XML notation. The objective is
twofold: (1) to provide instructional designers with
a graphical notation which is much easier to handle
than XML and (2) to provide both teachers and
instructional designers with a more user-friendly
means of communication. The reader who is not
familiar with UML will be able to find a good Notation
UML primer in Chapter IX of this handbook.
The Figure 2 gives the graphical notation of the
The Roles roles. This notation is taken from actors’ notation
in UML.
The roles represent “classes of” participants who
take part in the activity. In activities, participants The Arenas
have coherent interactions. A set of interactions
reflects a “thematic” role. The arena is the place where the activity takes
place: a service or a content. A forum, a search
Definition engine or a chat room are considered as service
arenas. A course, an exercise, a photo album or
The activity’s participants are represented by the a Web site are content arenas. This referencing
role concept (see Figure 1). A role is the set of to real space guides the modeling and delimits
interactions a participant can have with others the interaction perimeter. Participants interact in
taking part in the activity. these arenas through the interactions specified
It is characterized by a name (the role’s name), by their roles.
chosen by the instructional designer because of
its relevance to the activity to be modeled. Definition

Examples Places where activities take place are arenas. An

arena refers to a service or digital content which
Participants who write a course for their students, supports the participant’s activity. It is defined
annotate their work and mark their examinations
are teachers; participants who read the course, Figure 2. Role notation
do the exercises and take the examination are the
learners; participants who write an article for an
online newspaper’s readers are writers.

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

at least by a name and may contain other arenas places where they occur (for instance, a content
(see Figure 3). can be read, a forum can offer communication
functionalities, etc.)
Examples
Definition
The library is an arena where participants can
search for a book; the amphitheater is the place Any exchanges which take place between the par-
where the teacher gives a lecture: it is the lecture’s ticipants during the activity are called interactions.
arena. The usual arena used by participants for In its simple form, an interaction is character-
asynchronous online discussion is a forum. ized by (see Figure 5):

Notation • An identifier,
• The action, which describes what is done
The Figure 4 gives the graphical notation of the during the exchange,
arena called “Forum to discuss the lecture.” • The roles of the participants involved in
the exchange,
The Interactions • The arena in which the interaction takes
place.
The interactions represent what is done during the
activity. They specify the exchanges the partici- An interaction always takes place between at
pants will have during the learning activity. They least two participants, represented by their roles.
usually consist of verbal communication, docu- The initiator is called the addresser, the one to
ment exchange and collaborative productions. whom the action is addressed is called the ad-
They are situated: they occur in contents or via dressee. Addresser and addressee represent the
services. So they depend on the capacity of the respective places of the interaction’s participants
(here we have transposed the duality that exists in
conversations between locutors and interlocutors).
Figure 3. Arena model The association called “involves” which appears
in Figure 5 between the “role” and “interaction”
concepts thus needs to be divided into two more
precise associations which consider these respec-
tive places: the ones appearing on Figure 6.
Furthermore, LDL allows the specification of
start-up and stopping conditions of interactions,
using rules. The rules are described further.

Examples

Figure 4. Notation of an arena “The teacher provides a document to the learn-

ers,” “the project leader sends an alert message to
the members of her or his working group,” “the
learners answer a question given by the teacher”

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 5. Interaction model

Figure 6. Addressers and addressees during an interaction

are just a few examples of interactions which can Notation

happen between an activity’s participants.
Students doing an exercise and sending it to Interaction notation consists of four constituents:
their teacher are the addressers and the teacher its identifier, the action’s name, the roles involved
is the addressee. Sometimes, the addresser and and the arena where it takes place. This is ex-
the addressee are identical and correspond to the pressed by the notation presented in Figure 7 (R1
same participant. It is for instance the case when and R2 correspond to the name of the roles).
a learner reads a document for her or his own
information. It is also the case when a participant This notation has to be completed with the rules
uses a search engine to find information. that express the start-up and stopping of the inter-
action. They are referenced by a diamond, which
symbolizes a condition, as shown in Figure 8.

Figure 7. Notation of the interaction I

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 8. The interaction I_talk referencing its

• A sequence structure means that the inter-
start-up and stopping rules.
actions will be executed one after the other,
sequentially;
• A parallel structure means that all or some
of the interactions will be executed in paral-
lel. With this type of structure, the instruc-
tional designer could, if necessary, indicate
the maximum number of interactions that
the participant has to perform. By default,
this number is equal to the total number
of interactions which corresponds to the
progress in parallel of all the interactions.
The Structures
Like the interactions, the structures contain
How and when the interactions are connected
information on their conditions of start-up and
throughout the activity is captured by the struc-
stopping. These conditions are also expressed
ture concept.
by rules. Finally, a structure can include other
structures.
Definition

During the activity, interactions are played either

Examples
sequentially or in parallel. In LDL, the structures
A sequence structure will allow one to express
describe these sequences.
that an alert will be sent to tutors as soon as the
teacher gives the specified document to learners. A
A structure is characterized by (see Figure 9) a
parallel structure will make it possible to express
title, which identifies it in a unique way within a
that the learners must carry out three exercises,
scenario, the list of the interactions, and the type
in any order, that they will have to choose from
which defines the interactions’ organization. LDL
the list of the five proposed.
distinguishes two types of structure, which cor-
A more complex structure could be for ex-
respond to two different manners of linking the
ample: the learners read the instructions, they can
interactions:
then play a learning activity, and finally, they have
an assessment to perform. In this example, three
steps are sequentially performed. The first one and
the last one are simple interactions. The second
one corresponds to a more complex activity where,
Figure 9. Structure model (types are represented for instance, the learners can, in parallel, read the
using sub-class notation) lesson, discuss with their peers and do exercises.

Notation

The sequence structure is represented vertically

and the selection structure horizontally. If the
number of interactions to be performed is limited,
this number is mentioned in brackets.

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 10. Sequential structure notation

Definition

Rules are used to express the start-up and the

stopping of interactions and structures. They are
production rules of the form: If condition Then
action. The conditional part of a rule is a logical
expression using the connectors OR, AND and
NOT. The action can be the start-up or the stop-
ping of a structure or an interaction.

Examples

In Figure 10, we represent the main structure Rules make it possible to express for example that
of the last example above: a sequential one which a discussion can begin when all the learners have
starts automatically and specifies that the reading read the instructions and that it will stop when the
interaction called I_ReadingOrders is followed teacher gives the signal.
by the learning structure called S_Learning, and
closed by the assessment interaction called I_As- Notation
sessment.
Figure 11 shows the “S_Learning” structure, A reference to the rules is added to the structure
a structure where three interactions can be played and interaction notations, as shown in Figures 8
in parallel: the “read the lesson” interaction (I_ and 10.
ReadingLesson), “discussion” interaction (I_Dis-
cussing) and the “exercise” (I_Exercising) inter- The Positions and the Observables
action.
The conditions of the rules depend on the reac-
The Rules tions of the participants. LDL includes a concept,
that of position, which allows one to specify these
The rules correspond to the rules of the game of reactions and thus to adapt the activity according
the activity. to them. The value of a position is tested in the
conditional part of a rule.

Figure 11. The parallel structure called S_Learning

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

Table 1. Examples of position

Position Id Title Value Type Taken by On

P_stop_act I stop the learning ac- True or false declared teacher The learning activity
tivity
P_vote my evaluation of this an integer between 0 and 20 declared teacher The learner work
work is
P_is_inside I am present True or false observed learner The group space

Definition progression. The instructional designer will have

to define which aspects are to be observed. These
The position of a participant is the means of ex- aspects are called the observables.
pressing the participant’s reactions, perception
and points of view on an ongoing activity. It is Examples
characterized by (see Figure 12):
A teacher can choose to interrupt a working ses-
• An identifier, sion to allow learners to play games. This is a
• A title, which expresses the semantics of declared position taken by the participant having
the position, the “teacher” role on the “learning activity” arena.
• A value, Its title may be “I stop the learning activity.” Its
• A type: declared or observed, value may be “true” or “false” and may vary as
• The role of the participant who takes the the activity proceeds. Another declared position
position, allows the teacher to give a mark to the work of
• The arena on which the position is taken. the learner. The presence or the absence of the
students in the digital space shared by the group is
Two types of position exist, depending on how an observed position. Table 1 shows the complete
the value of the position is obtained. A declared descriptions of these three positions.
position means that its value is given explicitly
by the participant involved. The value of an ob- Notation
served position is assigned by the system which
deduces it from observation data on the activity’s Positions are represented by:

• A hand symbol for a declared position,

Figure 12. Position model with the links to other • A magnifying glass symbol for an ob-
concepts served position.

The role of the participant who takes the posi-

tion is specified under the symbol.
In Figure 13, the discussion can begin when
all the learners have read the instructions and it
will stop when the teacher gives the signal.
When appearing on an interaction representa-
tion (such as in Figure 13), positions are not

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 13. Interaction notation supplemented

the instructional designer could intend to propose
with positions
an activity on the subject of planets and their or-
ganization in the solar system. In this example,
the objective could be to enable the learners to
discover that the differences between the distances
of the planets from the sun can be explained by
their properties. Another objective could be to
allow the learners to acquire knowledge in the
field of astronomy: the difference between a planet
and a star, the notion of orbit, physical mass, etc.
To build a scenario, the instructional designer
completely specified. Thus their definition has to will first of all take into account the learning
be supplemented by fulfilling a table like the one objectives of the teacher. Existing reference lists
presented in Table 1. of skills will also be taken into account. Then the
Please note that the rules are the means to learning design consists in thinking about how
personalize activities. For instance, a rule can the learners could individually or collectively
be defined to propose complementary lessons to use the resources during the activity. In other
a learner who has declared that she or he is not words, it is the construction and the description
able to do an exercise (her or his position to the of interactional arrangements in which resources
arena “exercise”). are used to facilitate effective learning. If possible,
The presentation of LDL and its concepts is this learning has to be assessable.
now complete. The next three sections are devoted
to the presentation of the methodology we have Step 2: Formalizing the
defined to help the instructional designer build Informal Scenario
a scenario with LDL. The methodology is of
course subordinated to the LDL language. After One only has to observe a group of learners work-
this presentation, we will apply the methodology ing to become aware that the slightest educational
to an example. activity is complex, and that its modeling could
be quite difficult to carry out. In fact, a learning
activity often conceals a myriad of interwoven ac-
THE METHODOLOGY tivities, whose relationships are confused. Within
this myriad of activities, we distinguish four types:
The proposed methodology distinguishes two
steps clearly. Step 1 aims at building an informal • The first type is obviously the learning
scenario. Step 2 aims at formalizing this informal type. Activities of this type are the heart of
scenario. the learning. Learners manipulate the re-
sources put at their disposal. They produce
Step 1: Building the contents related to the learning objectives.
Informal Scenario They work individually or collaboratively.
• The second is the observation type. During
Usually, a learning design begins with a more or activities of this type, the teacher observes
less precise idea of a learning activity described the ongoing learning activity. The objec-
in a narrative way. For instance, the teacher and tive of this kind of activity is twofold. First,

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

they are intended to help the teacher per- identifying the activities and their relationships
form a formative assessment of the learn- and (2) modeling each identified activity. These
ing activity, for each participant. Second, two phases are presented in the next two sections.
they can allow the supervision and the reg-
ulation of the progression of the activity.
Usually, teachers are the only participants FORMALIZING THE INFORMAL
in this kind of activity. SCENARIO (PART 1):
• The third is the assessment type. Any learn- IDENTIFYING THE ACTIVITIES
ing activity is preceded, associated with or AND THEIR RELATIONSHIPS
followed by at least one assessment activ-
ity. This is the place and time to assess the At this stage of the methodology, the instructional
knowledge of the learners. The place of the designer has to:
assessment activity in the overall learning
flow depends on the kind of assessment • Analyze the overall activity to identify the
desired by the designer (diagnostic, forma- activities that constitute it and that corre-
tive, summative, etc.) (Durand & Martel, spond to the four types of activities men-
2006). tioned above: organization, learning, ob-
• Finally, we consider the organizational servation and assessment;
type. Activities of this kind are dedicated • Define the relationships between these
to organization problems. It is usually the activities.
time and place where the resources and
tools are made accessible, and the orders Identification of the Activities
are given to the learners. If needed, it is
also the time and place where groups of It is easier to begin with the identification of the
learners are created. Finally, it is the time learning activities, as most of the time the informa-
and place in which the other activities are tion provided in the informal scenario concerns
started. learning. The identification of the observation ac-
tivity is next, followed by the assessment activity.
We regard these four kinds of activities as basic Then comes the identification of the organization
elements that constitute every learning activity to scenario, as it may start the other activities. The
model. The overall learning activity results from description of what usually happens in these ac-
the combination and the interrelations of these tivities (see previous section) may help.
activities. Being activities per se, they can be mod-
eled as independent scenarios. Building the formal Identification of the Roles Involved
scenario of a learning activity is thus no longer
a matter of defining a unique scenario, which The “identification” phase has to be completed
encapsulates everything. It becomes a matter of with a description of who is to be involved in
defining at least four scenarios, corresponding to each activity by identifying their roles. For each
the four different kinds of activities identified. As activity, the instructional designer identifies the
a consequence, it becomes a matter of describ- main roles of the future participants. For instance,
ing the relationships between these scenarios. It the teacher is the role of the observation activity.
is also a matter of describing each scenario in For each activity, she or he also has to define the
terms of the concepts proposed by LDL. Thus the participation modes.
current step of the methodology consists in: (1)

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Identification of the Participation Mode changes and in communication. This is the case
for example of a course at university in a lecture
“Participation mode” is the overall way partici- hall: the teacher is in front of the students giving
pants will exchange and interact in an activity. a lecture and the students are allowed to ask ques-
It describes the kind of situation a teacher wants tions; to do that, they have to raise their hand to
to carry out with his or her students. It allows ask to speak. Figure 16 presents the notation
individual participation in an activity to be distin- proposed to describe such frontal situations.
guished from collaborative participation. In open situations (see Figure 17), participants
In individual participation, participants have can cooperate freely with their peers or with the
individual activities and no relationship with each teachers. It is the case for example of a panel
other. This is the case, for example, of an exami- session in which participants are invited to discuss
nation in which, by definition, learners have to and express freely their opinions and points of
work on their own. Figure 14 presents the notation view.
proposed to describe individual participation. In real educational practices, these various
On the other hand, in collective participation forms can be combined with each other to produce
(see Figure 15), participants work and interact hybrid educational situations that can evolve over
together. They are supposed to act in the activity time. Figure 18 is an example of such a case. It
as interdependent and engaged partners sharing combines individual participation for participants
a common goal. For example, teachers may ask having a role (represented on Figure 18 with a
students to work in a group of four to read texts black head) with open situation for participants
about “instructional design,” analyze them and having another role (represented on Figure 18
produce a synthesis of their readings. In each with a white head). It could be the case, for ex-
group engaged in this activity, members work ample, of a panel session with attendees. On the
jointly. They will produce a unique synthesis. one hand, participants having the “attendee” role
In collaborative participation, we distinguish have an individual activity: they listen to the
frontal situations from open ones. In frontal situ- discussion and may take some personal notes. On
ations, participants have individual activities but the other side, participants having the “speaker”
no relationships with the other participants, except role are involved in an open situation: they are
with the person having a particular role who debating on a given subject.
oversees, stimulates, coordinates and controls.
This person has a central position in the ex-
Figure 15. Notation for collective participation
in an activity
Figure 14. Notation for individual participation
in an activity

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 16. Notation for a frontal situation

Definition of the Relationships

Figure 17. Notation for an open situation Between the Activities

Once the instructional designer has identified the

activities, the roles involved and the participation
modes for each of them, these activities have to
be positioned by the designer with respect to each
other. This means that the designer has to:

• Define the learning flow; and,

• Define the objects the activities may share
(arenas and positions).

Figure 18. A hybrid situation.

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

These elements are presented in what follows, stopping of activities. Two activities may start in
together with the notation proposed to represent an asynchronous way. If so, they will have dif-
them. ferent start-up conditions. This is represented by
the notation proposed in Figure 21.
Defining the Learning Flow On the other hand, they may start simultane-
ously. This means that they share the same start-
The definition of the learning flow leads to both up rules. This is expressed by the notation pre-
the building of the activity schedule (specifica- sented in Figure 22.
tion of the order according to which activities Finally, the instructional designer may want
will have to be performed) and the definition of to express synchronization at the end of activities.
synchronization points between these activities. Figure 23 shows the notation proposed to express
We have defined a notation to represent these two this in the case of three activities A1, A2 and A3:
dimensions. For the schedule, the instructional A3 cannot start until A1 and A2 are over.
designer may use the notation proposed in Figure
19 to represent activities which are connected Defining Shared Objects
sequentially. The notation proposed in Figure 20
is for those activities which proceed in parallel. Activities may share some objects. Two kinds of
The synchronization points allow the instruc- objects can be shared: arenas and positions. Two
tional designer to deal with the start-up and the activities may share an arena if their respective
participants need to have interactions in the same
arena. Let us consider the example mentioned
Figure 19. Activities performed sequentially
previously (concerning collective participation) in
which groups of students work on the production
of a synthesis on instructional design theories.

Figure 21. A1 and A2 start asynchronously

Figure 22. A1 and A2 start synchronously

Figure 20. Activities performed in parallel

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 23. Synchronization between activities

FORMALIZING THE INFORMAL
SCENARIO (PART 2): MODELING
EACH ACTIVITY

Until now, the instructional designer has focused

on the identification of the activities and their
relationships. She or he has built an overall view,
positioning the activities with respect to each
other. It is time now to change the focus and to
go deeper into each activity. That means building
a model, i.e. a scenario, for each of them.
An LDL scenario needs the definitions of the
structures, interactions, roles, arenas, rules, posi-
tions and observables suitable to the activity to be
modeled. We recommend defining these concepts
Imagine that in the learning activity, students have in the following order:
at their disposal a forum to support their discus-
sion about the synthesis they have to produce. The • First, identify the learning flow of the ac-
observation activity and the learning activity will tivity. This leads one to make an inventory
have to share this forum, as the teacher involved of the structures and the interactions they
in the observation activity will have to be able to organize. At this stage, the instructional
observe it. The notation proposed for the sharing designer only needs to identify the interac-
of arenas is given in Figure 24, on the example tions in a general way (only their names).
of a shared forum. This will give a first, overall view of the
In the same way, activities may share positions. expected activity.
For example, imagine that an assessment activity • Second, give a more precise specification
is going on. The teacher wants to propose an of each interaction. That means identifying
adapted remediation activity to the students whose the roles and the arenas involved in each
marks are not as good (this is a learning type interaction.
activity). To do that and to adapt the remediation • Third, complete the specification of the in-
to the students according to the obtained mark, teractions and structures with the definition
the two activities will have to share the marks of their start-up and stopping conditions.
(see Figure 25). It is an “observed” position This supposes modeling the corresponding
given by the teacher in the assessment activity. It rules.
will be used in the remediation one.

Figure 25. Notation for two activities sharing a

Figure 24. Two activities sharing a forum position

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

• Fourth, define the positions. The condi- of it, which illustrates the approach satisfactorily.
tional part of the rules tests the values of Additional information can be found in Martel et
the positions. So, from the exhaustive list al. (2006b) or at http://ld.pentila.com.
of rules, one can obtain an exhaustive list
of positions to be defined. Step 1: The Planet Game
• Last, define the observables. The in- Informal Scenario
structional designer has to define for
each “observed” position the associated The Context
observables.
The chosen activity is part of a real lifelong learn-
The description of the methodology now is ing scenario in astronomy. The students have the
completed. With this approach, the instructional same problem to solve. They are grouped into two
designer has all the material required to model a teams. Each team has only a part of the knowledge
learning activity: a language, allowing a model of and data required to solve the problem. So, they
the targeted activity to be built, and a methodol- must collaborate.
ogy for explaining how to handle the language
and how to carry out the modeling process. The The Proposed Activity
next section shows an example of how LDL and
its associated methodology were used to create The activity objective is for learners to acquire
the model of the planet game case study. knowledge in the field of astronomy. More pre-
cisely, they have to classify the planets with respect
to their distance from the Sun (from the nearest
APPLICATION OF THE to the most distant).
METHODOLOGY TO AN EXAMPLE The strategy used by the teacher to reach these
objectives is to propose a game for the learners.
We have chosen to show the use of LDL and the The latter are grouped into two teams (Team A and
methodology with the planet game example. This Team B). Resources and services will be available
example was proposed as a common case study to to help the learners in acquiring new knowledge,
work on within the workshop entitled, Compar- in exchanging with their team members, and in
ing Educational Modeling Languages on a Case negotiating.
Study (Vignollet et al., 2006) we organized during
ICALT’2006. Each research team engaged as a The Game Rules
competitor (they were 9) had to study a given
real situation (the same for every team: the planet Clues are distributed among teams. Team A knows
game), had to at least model this situation by us- some planets’ properties, taken from an expert
ing its own models and languages, and was asked interview it has at its disposal. Its members can
to implement it as an activity running in a web deduce the planets’ order, but not the planets’
learning environment. names. Team B knows the planets’ names and some
The methodology recommends building the in- properties taken from another expert interview.
formal scenario first. Thus we begin by presenting However, many properties are missing. Each team
the informal scenario of the planet game. Note that can use a chat room to enable its members to have
we will not provide the complete specification, as discussions (about the problem to solve, the clues
this would be too long. We will just show a part they have, etc). Each team also has at its disposal

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

a shared whiteboard allowing its members to list which occurs at the end of the learning period.
the already discovered information. It aims at checking the level and the solidity of
The teams have to cooperate using a forum to their knowledge.
negotiate the exchange of clues and information. Finally, there are some elements which are
The teacher has access to the forum, and can related to organization which are possibly less
participate in the discussions. She or he can also explicit. The most evident one is to set up the two
add new clues to either of the expert interviews. teams. To be carried out, the planet game requires
When she or he decides, the exchanges are stopped. this step. It also requires the teacher to prepare
Then, each learner fills in a questionnaire about some instructions intended for learners, to put them
the planet classification. The winner is the first at the learners’ disposal, together with the useful
who gives the right associations (the planets in resources (interviews, clues, shared whiteboard,
order from the sun). The activity finishes when a chat room, etc.), to organize the course of the
winner is nominated. activities in time, etc.
These activities are represented graphically
Step 2-Part 1: Identifying in Figure 26, together with the learning flow be-
the Planet Game Activities tween them (the schedule and the synchronization
and their Relationships points). Note that the learning activity appears
twice, once for each team: they correspond to
When analyzing the informal scenario above, we the same scenario.
notice that the four kinds of activity mentioned The description of the relationships between
in the methodology section (organization, learn- activities has to be supplemented by the definition
ing, observation, assessment) actually exist in of the shared objects: arenas and position. The
the planet game. For the learning activity, it is ALearn1 and ALearn2 learning activities share
obvious. The informal scenario explicitly includes the forum which supports the negotiation of the
a lot of information about this activity.The learn- exchange of clues. This arena is also shared with
ing objectives are listed, together with the way the AObs observation activity, as the teacher in-
to reach these objectives (analysis of the clues, volved in the observation activity has to be able
discussion in the chat room, negotiation with the to at least observe what happens in it (see Figure
other team, etc.). The aim is clearly for learners 27).
to acquire knowledge about the organization of Furthermore, the two learning activities and
the solar system. the observation one share the “end of the learning
The informal scenario also mentions the inter- activities” position. This position is a decision of
ventions of the teacher in relation with the learning the teacher to be made explicitly in the AObs
activity. Indeed, the teacher has to observe the activity. Indeed, the teacher observes the two
teams while the learning activity proceeds. She ongoing learning activities and chooses the time
or he may observe the team members’ exchanges, to stop them, when the learners have worked
their productions, the way they use the clues, etc. enough and have acquired enough clues and
This is an activity per se, during which the teacher knowledge. Thus the AObs activity has to share
may identify the difficulties encountered by the this position with the two learning ones. As a
learners, may put new clues at their disposal, etc. consequence, these two activities will be aware
This is the observation activity. of it and will be able to end. Note that it is also
The assessment activity is also clearly men- shared with the AAssess activity, as the end of
tioned. It consists in a summative assessment

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 26. Activities, roles and relations between activities are identified

Figure 27. ALearn1 and AObs activities share the “clue negotiation” forum

ALearn1 and ALearn2 coincides with the begin- The Structures and the Interactions
ning of AAssess.
The main structure is a sequential one which
Step2-Part 2: Modeling Each combines four interactions:
Activity of the Planet Game
• Read the instructions, called
We have chosen to describe the organizational one I_ReadInstructions
(though only part of it). It is easy to imagine the • Choose a group, I_ChooseAGroup
design of the others, in the same way. The first • Distribute clues, I_DistributedClues
step is the identification of the “Learning Flow,” • Start the learning activity, I_StartLearning.
represented by the structures and the interactions.

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LDL for Collaborative Activities

Figure 28. The main structure with the interactions

position of each learner. Its action part starts the
distribution activity.

Positions

For each rule defined, there are related positions.

The ones associated to R_distrib_start is a declared
one. It is specified in Table 3.

Observables
This is noted as shown in Figure 28.
This identification leads to the determination The P_Group-Chosen position is an observed
of roles. one. It is associated to an observable: the response
provided by the learner in the questionnaire.
The Roles

Table 2 places the AOrg activity’s roles in relation FIRST RESULTS AND CONCLUSION
to the interactions that define them. It also provides
the place of the role within the interaction: being As mentioned in Botturi et al. (2006), each de-
an addresser or an addressee. sign language was developed with a specific use
framework in mind. For LDL, the use framework
The Arenas is the modeling of learning activities and the
execution of the produced models (i.e., the sce-
Now, the places where the activity takes place narios) on existing VLE. As computer scientists,
have to be identified. They can be more or less we have taken an engineering approach, moving
abstract. To find them, the instructional designer toward the constant refinement of the language.
has to answer the following question: Where the We have made the deliberate choice of focusing
interaction from role X to role Y takes place? on the expressiveness of the language and on the
What is the support of the interaction? In which development of software tools enabling one to
space does the interaction take place? easily transform the models into actual activities
In the example, the arenas are: running on VLE. Indeed, we think that it is of
paramount importance that instructional design-
• I_ReadInstructions is done into the
Instructions,
• I_ChooseAGroup is done in a questionnaire, Table 2. The roles in AOrg and the associated
• I_DistributeClues is done in a group space, interactions.
• I_StartLearning is done in an activity.
as an as an
The Role is involved in
Rules addresser addressee
Learner I_ReadInstructions, Yes Yes
I_ChooseAGroup Yes Yes
The distribution of clues can start when the I_DistributeClues Yes
learners have chosen their group. A rule has to I_StartLearning Yes

be defined. Let us call this rule R_distrib_start. Teacher I_DistributeClues Yes

I_StartLearning Yes
The conditional part of R_distrib_start checks the

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

Table 3. Specification of the P_Group-Chosen position

Position Id Title Value type shared with taken by on

P_Group-Chosen I have chosen a True or false observed - learner The questionnaire
group

ers and teachers are able “to see” what happens robustness of the infrastructure, with 40 users
when a scenario is executed. So they can give playing simultaneously.
some feedback. And this also enables learners to
be involved in the evaluation process. The Project “Shared Virtual
This has an important impact on the results Laboratory” (SVL) of the Kaleidoscope
we can present here. We provide results about European Network of Excellence
the modeling capacity of the language and related
to the experiments which were conducted with The objective of this project was to provide re-
learners. But results related to the actual use of the searchers in ICT in Education with an integrated
language by instructional designers or teachers are environment to collect and share experimental
still missing to date. This is commented on below. trails. This environment, developed by Pentila
corporation, includes:
Experiments Conducted
• Workspaces in which experiments can take
LDL’s maturity can be evaluated by taking into place,
consideration experiments already carried out: the • The LDI infrastructure and the associated
three main ones are described here. They enabled player,
us to improve the expressiveness of the language • A trails repository.
and to make the infrastructure more robust.
TPELEC (French acronym for “practical work
A Famous Scenario of the in the domain of electricity”) was one of the ex-
Internet: The Treasure Hunt periments conducted to improve the developed
environment. It concerns learning in the domain
A first experiment took place which brought to- of electricity. The learning scenario’s goal was on
gether 40 participants at a workshop held during the one hand to destabilize the misconceptions and
the 2005 occurrence of the annual summer school incorrect reasoning of learners, on the other hand
of the French “Technology Enhanced Learning” to use the detected misconceptions for remediation,
research community (Lejeune et al., 2005). The progression and building of new knowledge. To
chosen activity was an example of a treasure carry out the TPELEC experiment, LDL was used
hunt. This type of activity is very widespread and to create the scenario and its possible adaptations
numerous examples can be found on the Internet. when misconceptions are detected. LDI was the
We used LDL to build the scenario and LDI operationalization, execution and observation
and its associated player to operationalize, ex- infrastructure.
ecute, play and follow the resulting activity. This The TPELEC scenario was experimented with
experiment enabled us to validate the concepts in classrooms in 2005-2006 (six experiments in
of the model. It also allowed us to improve the three schools, with a total of 120 learners aged 14

426
LDL for Collaborative Activities

to 16). As the teachers were involved in the ex- Simplicity

periments and could see the scenarios as they run,
they gave some interesting feedback. In particular, LDL comprises a small number of concepts, which
they became aware of the modeling capacities of facilitates its appropriation. This meets Harrer’s
LDL. This stimulated their imagination and led “familiarity / intuitive intelligibility” desired
them to produce new, richer scenarios. These property. One may object that “arena,” “position”
scenarios will be formalized, operationalized and or even “interaction” are not that familiar to in-
experimented within a new project that has been structional designers or teachers. That is probably
recently funded by the Kaleidoscope Network true. But the questions corresponding to the LDL
of Excellence. For a more in-depth description concepts (who? where? what? how? etc.) should
of the TPELEC experiment and its results, you compensate for the relative unfamiliarity. And
can read the corresponding Kaleidoscope report the number of questions should be small, as the
(Kaleidoscope D7.8.1, 2006). number of concepts is. We are currently exploring
From a learning design point of view, the ways of dealing with this problem through the
purpose of this work was to test the observation development of an authoring online tool dedi-
points: from their specification in LDL to their cated to instructional designers and teachers. In
implantation and use in LDI. particular, we are considering the possibility of
using metaphors to translate LDL concepts into
The Planet Game corresponding concepts available in these meta-
phors. For example, in the “classroom” metaphor,
The previously presented planet game was tested the arenas could be the blackboard, the lesson, the
by researchers during the ICALT 2006 confer- poster, the video projector, the story book, etc., i.e.
ence. It allowed us to improve the capacity of the any resources or objects available in a classroom
language to model different kinds of activities which are quite familiar to instructional designers
and led to the development of the methodology. and teachers. This should facilitate the use of LDL.

Qualities of LDL Expressiveness

We here want to highlight what constitutes, in our The experiments conducted have improved LDL
opinion, the main strengths of LDL. To do that, expressiveness. We were able to model different
we will refer in particular to some of the “desired learning situations and activities of various kinds
properties” proposed by Harrer in Chapter XIV. (learning, observation, assessment, organization).
We also provide some limitations of the language. This is probably due to the neutrality of the un-
derlying metaphor. Indeed conversation perfectly
A Theory-Based Language corresponds to activity and has the same inherent
properties.
LDL is activity-centered. It was conceived to
model collaborative activities. It is grounded on Support of Different Granularity
social theories which explain what is inherent
in these activities. It thus integrates concepts LDL also meets Harrer’s “support of different
which enable to take these inherent features into granularity” desired property thanks to the activity-
account, mainly their unforeseeable, situated and centered point of view and to the “arena” concept.
interactional nature. Arenas are places where activities take place. An

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 LDL for Collaborative Activities

activity occurring in an arena can be described by process and the translation of the diagrams pro-
means of a single interaction (for example, the duced into LDL code. This tool has to be simple
interaction “to discuss about the lecture” taking and intuitive enough to be used by end-users, as
place in a “forum” arena). But it could also be de- the learning activity management system (LAMS,
scribed by a more complex specification defining Dalziel, 2003) authoring tool for instance. It has
what may happen in the arena (for example in the to support the graphical notation that we have
forum, there may be a moderator; contributors may proposed and the methodology. We have specified
add new discussion subjects; a contributor may such a tool. It is currently under development and
post something new; etc.). And this is a complete should be operational by summer 2007. This will
scenario (Martel &Vignollet, 2007). The grain of allow us to start a validation phase, which will
the activity to model has changed. be supported by learning scientists, instructional
designers and/or teachers.
Future Works

LDL’s expressiveness has been improved dur- ACKNOWLEDGMENT

ing the conducted experiments. Nevertheless we
cannot claim that LDL can be used to model any We would like to thank the engineers of the Pentila
kind of learning. And this is true for all design Corporation for their work on the LDL project.
languages. To try to obtain evidence to support
that claim, it is necessary to continue the improve-
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Chapter 2.15
Development of Game-
Based Training Systems:
Lessons Learned in an Inter-
Disciplinary Field in the Making

Talib Hussain Kerry Moffitt

BBN Technologies, USA BBN Technologies, USA

Wallace Feurzeig Curtiss Murphy

BBN Technologies, USA Alion Science and Technology, AMSTO
Operation, USA
Jan Cannon-Bowers
University of Central Florida, USA Kelly Pounds
i.d.e.a.s. Learning, USA
Susan Coleman
Intelligent Decision Systems, Inc., USA Bruce Roberts
BBN Technologies, USA
Alan Koenig
National Center for Research on Evaluation, Jason Seip
Standards and Student Testing (CRESST), USA Firewater Games LLC, USA

John Lee Vance Souders

National Center for Research on Evaluation, Firewater Games LLC, USA
Standards and Student Testing (CRESST), USA
Richard Wainess
Ellen Menaker National Center for Research on Evaluation,
Intelligent Decision Systems, Inc., USA Standards and Student Testing (CRESST), USA

ABSTRACT there have been a number of game-based training

systems developed in recent years. However, the
Modern computer gaming technology offers a field is still in its infancy. Improved understand-
rich potential as a platform for the creation of ing is needed on how to best embed instruction
compelling immersive training systems, and in a game and how to best use gaming features
to support different types of instruction. Further,
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch215 the field is inherently inter-disciplinary, requir-

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

ing instructional system designers, software training system since the players don’t enjoy it.
developers, game designers and more, yet there The latter may be a great game, but doesn’t pass
are no established development methodologies muster as a training system since it does not pro-
to ensure effective coordination and integration duce the desired learning outcomes. Developers
across these disciplines. The authors introduce of game-based training systems know this, but
a collaborative effort that is investigating how achieving this synergy between instruction and
to improve the craft and science of game-based engagement is a poorly understood art.
training. They present their experiences in creat- The challenges facing us as a discipline are:
ing a flooding control training system for the U.S.
Navy Recruit Training Command, and discuss 1) An enhanced understanding of the elements
the inter-disciplinary development issues that of game design and pedagogical design that
they encountered. They present the lessons they are crucial to game-based training and how
learned and their views on how to advance current to balance those elements effectively,
methods to support the consistent production of 2) An enhanced understanding of how to as-
effective game-based training. sess the success of a game-based training
application, and
3) The creation of development methodologies
INTRODUCTION that lead to repeatable successes, especially
for non-commercial training programs that
Computer games of various kinds have been used are limited in the scale of effort that can be
for education and training purposes for over two supported.
decades with varying degrees of success (O’Neil
et al., 2005; O’Neil & Perez, 2008). As computer We introduce the initial results of a multi-
gaming technology has matured and increased disciplinary effort sponsored by the Office of
in capability, the opportunities available for Naval Research to directly address the issue of
delivering immersive learning experiences have how to best create effective educational immersive
increased (Bonk & Dennen, 2005; Hill et al., computer games. The team for our project included
2006; Hussain et al., 2008; Johnson et al., 2007; researchers and content developers from the fields
Roberts et al., 2006), and so has the challenge of of instructional design, story-based training and
creating experiences that are pedagogically ef- entertainment, movie production, human perfor-
fective (Diller et al., 2004; Hussain & Ferguson, mance assessment, game engines, commercial
2005). A training game is imbued with a purpose games, game-based training systems, simula-
- to provide experiences which lead to specifics tion and modeling, intelligent tutoring systems,
gains in the student’s knowledge and/or skills. A graphic design and modeling, system integration
good training game will consistently balance the and educational science. As professionals in our
instructional goals with the goal of motivating the respective fields, we each brought different per-
player. However, a poorly designed training game spectives on the interactions of different aspects
will sacrifice one or more fundamental elements of gaming and pedagogy to the table.
of the gaming experience in order to attempt to Our effort had two mandates. The first was to
satisfy the training goals, or will sacrifice effective conduct applied and empirical research on tools
pedagogy in order to attempt to keep the game and methods for enhancing the art and science
compelling. The former may be a great training of educational games. In particular, our initial
system, and even a great simulation-based training focus was on identifying extensible design and
system, but doesn’t pass muster as a game-based development methods that support efficient cre-

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

ation of training games with strong pedagogy and Glaser, 1989) and anchored instruction
embedded assessment. The second mandate was (e.g., Bransford et al., 1990; CGTV, 1992;
to create prototype training systems for the Navy CGTV, 1997; CGTV, 2000). The game
that met real training needs and embodied sound world provides a context in which appro-
pedagogy. The customer for our first training priate mental models are developed and
prototype was the U.S. Naval Service Training refined through repeated exposure to im-
Command. The goal of this prototype effort was portant cue patterns.
to provide training on how to perform effective • Games provide an excellent model-based
flooding control aboard a simulated naval ship. world to foster reasoning. Students are able
The Flooding Control Trainer that we developed to manipulate variables, view phenomena
is intended for use at the Navy’s boot camp to from multiple perspectives, observe sys-
augment the classroom-based and hands-on in- tem behavior over time, draw and test hy-
struction that is currently provided to over 40,000 potheses and compare their mental models
recruits per year. with representations in the external word.
In a seven month period, our team members These features are consistent with the mod-
worked closely together, with subject matter el-based reasoning concepts advocated by
experts and with our Navy customer to produce learning researchers (Cartier & Stewart,
a prototype that met our customer’s needs and 2000; Gentner, 1983; Leher & Schauble,
was effective. We present here a description of 2000; Raghavan et al., 1997; Raghavan et
the process that we followed, the tensions we al., 1998; Stewart et al., 2005; Zimmerman
encountered during the effort, and the lessons we et al., 2003).
learned on how to work in an interdisciplinary • Game-based tasks are expressly designed
manner to achieve an instructionally strong and to help players progress toward goals.
enjoyable outcome. We discuss our next steps in Moreover, the goals are concrete, specific,
the project to refine and formalize our process, and timely. The vast literature on goal set-
as well as our thoughts on where the field needs ting in instruction suggests that this char-
to focus going forward to ensure longevity and acteristic property of games should en-
success as a discipline. hance learning (Locke et al., 1981; Locke
& Latham, 1990; Schunk & Ertmer, 1999).
• Interaction frequency is very high in
BACKGROUND games. These often require decisions and
inputs by players several times a minute.
From a theoretical perspective, games hold prom- Thus, games provide a highly active learn-
ise as effective teaching devices because they can ing environment, the kind of environment
provide instructional environments that embody associated with effective instructional
key principles derived from learning science. system design (Chi, 2000; Mayer, 2001;
For instance: Rothman, 1999; Vogel et al., in press).
• Well-designed games provide the player
• Interactions that facilitate player engage- with constant successes. Many small tasks
ment in a compelling task environment are embodied along the way in the pur-
should facilitate learning. Practicing in this suit of a greater goal. The result is that the
type of environment is consistent with no- game generates a feeling of constant ac-
tions about the development of expertise complishment, a feature likely to enhance
(Bransford et al.,1999; Chi et al., 1988; self-efficacy, which has been consistently

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

shown to improve learning and motivation Despite this promise, however, many game-
(Bandura, 1977; 1986; Gist et al., 1989; based training applications suffer key deficiencies
Gist et al., 1991). leading to poor learning outcomes, such a poor
• Games provide a continuous source of feed- instructional design, poor (or no) performance
back so that players know where they stand assessment, limited training scope, low levels of
with respect to their goal accomplishment. reusability, and lack of appeal to students (Hussain
This is crucial since feedback improves et al., 2008; O’Neil & Perez, 2008). These prob-
learning through both its informational and lems are due in part to the limitations of current
motivational qualities (Bransford et al., gaming technology - for example, commercial
1999; Salas & Cannon-Bowers, 2000). games typically do not provide the ability to cap-
• Game play tends to be self-regulating, ture the relevant performance data at the right level
an important feature of effective learn- of detail for tracking and assessment of trainee
ing. Players are motivated to accomplish performance. However, they are also due in large
the next challenge and they know where part to the fact that there are no clearly proven
they stand relative to their goals (Kanfer methods for the development of effective training
& Ackerman, 1989; Kanfer & McCombs, games. Further, most organizations and companies
2000; Pintrich & Zusho, 2000; Schunk developing game-based training systems have
& Ertmer, 1999; Schunk & Zimmerman, only a few years of experience doing so and their
2003). experience is usually limited to work on one or
• Engagement and immersion are high in two systems. Generally, designers and developers
well-designed games. Literature is be- apply methods that have been appropriated from
ginning to investigate these concepts other fields, such as general software develop-
as psychological states associated with ment, simulation-based training, computer-based
effective performance and learning training, commercial game development, and
(Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Gerhard et al., intelligent tutoring systems. The lessons learned
2004) and to examine what contributes to from these ad-hoc approaches to game-based
them (Baylor, 2001; Gerhard et al., 2004; training development are rarely shared. Hence,
Moreno & Mayer, 2004). insights are lost, pitfalls are re-encountered, and
• Challenge and competition are hallmarks useful community-wide guidelines are not formed.
of good games. These features have been Further, different development teams contain
found to be motivational under certain expertise in different fields, and hence some ele-
conditions (Epstein & Harackiewicz, 1992; ments of game-based training design tend to be
Reeve & Deci, 1996), and may be useful to emphasized at the cost of others.
motivate learning. Our project team was a highly multi-disciplin-
• Perhaps due to factors listed above, time ary set of experts, each with varying degrees of
on task is very high for games. It is not expertise with game-based training, but all with
uncommon for players to spend hours a deep knowledge within their core disciplines. The
day on engaging games, and to continue development team included members from seven
interacting with a single game for years. different organizations that together provided
From a strictly time-on-task perspective, expertise in game-based training, educational
we would expect that learning would be science, commercial game development, instruc-
enhanced when trainees engage quality tional design, human performance assessment,
learning content for longer periods of time. story-based training, simulation-based training,

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

computer-based training, military training sys- • Agile development methods work very ef-
tems, graphic design and modeling, animated fectively in fast-paced game-based train-
movie development, entertainment and media ing development efforts.
production, intelligent tutoring systems, game • Early involvement of all stakeholders in
engine development, agile software development design and ongoing involvement during
methods, and systems integration. design and development iterations leads to
Collectively, these experts brought to bear a a more robust product and helps avoid sig-
rich subset of the practices currently used for de- nificant pitfalls.
veloping game-based training. The key practices • Keep the customer involved throughout
that we chose to start with based on preliminary to ensure the product meets stated and un-
discussions included: stated requirements (and adapts to meet
changing requirements).
• The manner in which the system will be
used impacts instructional design choic-
es, so pay close attention to requirements DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
gathering.
• Remain focused upon learning objec- In March 2008, our team began the development
tives throughout system design and of a game-based training prototype. Over the
development. course of seven months, we followed an agile
• Develop the story outline early on, base development methodology to iteratively create
it on the learning objectives, and iterate and refine our instructional design, and develop
as system design proceeds. Taken to an and refine our initial product prototype, which we
extreme, one of the teammates believed delivered successfully at the end of September.
that “It all starts with story.” According to During our effort, we encountered a number of
Jerome Bruner (1990), plots are a creation issues, many of them due to tensions caused by
of “transactional relationships” between differing perspectives of the project stakeholders
reality, memory, and imaginary/narrative based on their backgrounds and relative priorities.
worlds. Transactional connections help All key issues were resolved, practically-speaking,
learners use what they know in order to to result in a product that met our customers’ needs
contextualize what is unknown, meaning and satisfied the immediate goals of the project.
that since the human brain needs story to However, a number of the tensions remained
provide context. An effective story pro- as background issues and recurring discussion
vides a basis for addressing requirements themes. In this section, we summarize the key tasks
and framing all content development in or- of the project in a roughly chronological manner,
der to produce a consistent and compelling and identify the key tensions that occurred along
product. the way. Figure 1 illustrates the project milestones
• Incorporate assessment needs as early as that are discussed in more detail in this section.
possible during system design and devel- The following section expands upon these tensions
opment. Post-development efforts to graft and identifies the methods used to address them
assessment on a system not designed for and/or the lessons learned from our experience.
it lead to significant problems in capturing Our project, a three-year effort that started in
the type, quality, and quantity of data re- February 2008, had two mandates - to conduct
quired for effective assessment. applied and empirical research into tools and

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Figure 1. Timeline of project milestones

methods for enhancing the state of the art and in developing the training system product and
science of educational games, and to ensure that our lessons learned from that effort. We describe
these developments would have long-term value certain interim and final elements of the product
to the Navy. In order to achieve the latter mandate, to support our discussion. However, a complete
we created a prototype training system for the description of the final product is not given.
Naval Service Training Command (NSTC) to
enhance the Navy’s Recruit Training Command Selection of Training Requirements,
(RTC) curriculum. Our NSTC customer has a Domain, and Gaming Platform
background in educational science and deep
knowledge regarding the training needs and cul- In developing our training product for RTC, our
ture at RTC. From RTC, we drew upon the train- initial step was to identify the specific training
ing staff as subject matter experts (SMEs). Thus, needs. At RTC, recruits currently undergo six
the stakeholders of our effort included our transi- weeks of intensive training on fundamental navy
tion customer (NSTC), our program manager skills and end their training with an intense exercise
(ONR), the subject matter experts and the mem- called Battle Stations 21 (BS21). BS21 is a real-
bers of our team. life simulation environment in which recruits are
To support the first mandate, we identified a exposed to seventeen simulation scenarios during
need for a game-based training test bed allowing a single night. The facility is a building designed
the explicit control of diverse variables in order to give recruits the experience of being aboard a
to empirically study the impact of gaming and in- ship, and contains a simulated dock, a simulated
structional features upon learning outcomes. This exterior of a destroyer, and several floors that
test bed capability formed an additional require- simulate different decks of a ship.
ment for the initial training system we created. The goal of our effort was to provide supple-
The focus of the paper is the process we followed mentary training to augment the current classroom-

436
Development of Game-Based Training Systems

based and hands-on instruction in order to produce game-based simulation prototype developed for
better prepared sailors. While overall performance the same customer. That application was based
of recruits in BS21 is excellent, students frequently on the game engine Delta3D and contained a
exhibit key errors in several of the BS21 scenarios high fidelity representation of the ship interior of
due to training gaps on those skills. Our require- BS21 with a first-person perspective (see Figure
ment was to provide a compelling virtual training 2). The drawback to the application was that
system to address some of those gaps. it had minimal pedagogical infrastructure and
At this earliest stage of product development, minimal gaming elements. The advantage of the
past experience has shown that it is critical to application was that it would avoid the need for
fully involve the customer. With any training an intensive graphics development process, and,
system, the focus of the training must be driven since it was open-source, would allow us to add
by customer requirements, and the requirements the pedagogical elements we needed. One of our
must have a direct relationship to the learning team members had been the software developer
outcomes desired. With any training application, for that application, which also provided us with
it is important to choose a training domain that is immediate expertise. From the customer’s per-
suitable for the type of training possible with the spective, reusing the application would justify
technology used, or, alternatively, to choose the earlier investments. Further, the customer already
right type of training technology for the type of knew its strengths and weaknesses and was able
training desired. In our case, the customer desired to give us specific feedback on what he wanted
an initial product delivery as soon as possible and improved for our product. The earlier applica-
wanted the product to provide immersive train- tion did not, however, contain virtual characters.
ing geared toward single players. The customer Preliminary task analysis determined that it would
desired that the training address a domain that be pedagogically appropriate to provide flooding
would have high payoff in terms of improving control training without virtual characters since
recruit performance in BS21, but also wanted the those skills can be performed by a single individual
application to provide familiarization with operat- alone in real-life situations. Bridge watch, in con-
ing within a (virtual) ship environment. Within trast, inherently involves a team of people and thus
those constraints, we had a fair amount of leeway. the application would require augmentation with
In initial discussions with our customer and simulated characters to provide effective training.
with SMEs, four key training domains were The bridge watch domain was deemed too risky
identified as high benefit: controlling a flooding to meet our aggressive development schedule.
situation, standing a bridge watch, handling rope The final choice of training domain for our
and navigating within a ship. Of these, it was initial product - flooding control - was made in
determined by all stakeholders that handling rope early April for practical reasons based on the
was the least appropriate for an immersive gam- nominal choice of training platform and the cus-
ing environment. Navigating within a ship was tomer’s view of which domain would have
determined to be of secondary importance in that higher product acceptance at RTC. The process
it could be embedded within training focused on of making this decision revealed one of the first
either of the other two domains. key tensions in the project:
In these early discussions with the customer,
it quickly became apparent that the high-level • The basis for technology decisions – peda-
goals of the customer and the project could be best gogical or technological
attained by leveraging an existing, open-source

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Figure 2. Available 3D simulation environment of BS-21 interior

Knowledge Acquisition decision-making, and leadership. The communi-

cation learning objectives, for example, included
Once the choice of the flooding control domain reporting a situation immediately, communicating
was made, we undertook the task of knowledge relevant information, and reporting when an action
acquisition for the flooding control domain. The is completed. Decision-making objectives includ-
knowledge acquisition methods we employed in- ed maintaining watertight conditions, requesting
cluded a traditional, formal cognitive task analysis permission before taking action as appropriate,
(CTA) as well as a subject matter analysis focused and performing proper containment procedures.
upon the potential elements for flooding control In addition, the CTA determined that there were
game scenarios, termed here a scenario element certain skills that the recruits were expected to
analysis. The analyses were based upon reviews of know based on the current curriculum, certain
training materials in use at RTC, observations of skills that it would be desirable for them to know
recruits performing the flooding control scenario if training could be enhanced, and certain skills
(and others) in BS21, and discussions with SMEs. that were very important in real-life, but that were
In mid-April, a SME session was conducted face- beyond what could be expected of a normal recruit.
to-face with six trainers from RTC. During this The second product was a breakdown of the
session, the questioning was led by our instruc- elements of the flooding control mission that
tional designers, but representatives of most team suggested the potential structure, actions, and
members were also present and contributed to the variations for a simulated flooding control sce-
discussions. This session, as well as a couple of nario. The scenario element analysis determined
follow-up face-to-face and teleconference ses- the typical timeline involved in a flooding control
sions, provided two initial products. mission and the specific elements of the different
The first was a traditional breakdown of learn- phases of the mission that suggested the potential
ing objectives and the identification of expected actions and variations to be included in a simulated
behaviors, common errors, and consequences. scenario. These phases were broadly captured as:
The CTA determined that there were four key the discovery phase (the actions surrounding the
categories of learning objectives—those related to event that identifies the need for flooding control),
communication, situation awareness, appropriate the preparation phase (actions in getting assigned

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

and ready to combat the flood), the transit phase control (DC) team leader or member, and damage
(actions taken en-route to performing flooding control central (DCC). The SMEs indicated that the
control), the casualty combat phase (the procedures recruits should be taught certain skills associated
and options available while trying to control the with certain roles, even if they would typically
flood), and the completion phase (what actions not be in those roles for some time.
are performed at the end of the situation). These The products of the CTA and scenario ele-
phases summarized the SMEs’ views of the typical ment analysis were then merged to form a third
way in which a flooding mission occurs and what product that mapped the learning objectives in
they felt needed to be reinforced with the recruits. context across the phases and roles (e.g., Figure
Within each phase, a number of activities, possible 3 shows one of 26 learning objectives mapped).
actions and scene variations were identified. For This product was prepared by May 1 and provided
instance, in the transit phase, additional hazards inputs to our story development process.
could be encountered, such as additional leaks, During the knowledge acquisition process,
additional flooding locations, unsecured items in several tensions arose, including:
hallway, injured personnel and watertight doors
not closed appropriately. During different phases, • Identifying all the learning objectives ver-
inappropriate setting of a watertight boundary sus selecting the objectives to be addressed
could lead to various complications, including in the first game prototype
allowing a flood to spread or trapping a shipmate. • Balancing cognitive elements with experi-
In addition to multiple phases of a mission, the ential elements
scenario element analysis identified multiple roles
involved in different phases of a flooding control
mission, including a first-on-scene sailor, a damage

Figure 3. Learning objectives and common errors in context of flooding mission phases and roles

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Story Development • We believed that the emotion of fear could

be used to engage the learner as a crisis en-
Great stories share at least six elements that set sued. We also believed that the Navy val-
them apart from “scenarios” or “case studies”. ues of “Honor, Courage, and Commitment”
They are: setting, characters, conflict/resolution, that were instilled in recruits during basic
plot, voice, and emotion. Compelling stories, training could be used to provide motiva-
and those experienced in game environments in tion to overcome the fear and lack of initial
particular, are often called “immersive.” However, skills, competence, and confidence to per-
immersion doesn’t just happen; it takes purposeful form the mission.
effort on the part of the storymakers or designers. • Voice, or who the “teller” would be, was
To achieve a great story, one must be intentional not established until later.
about combining the six elements in a way that
will draw the audience (in the case of a game, On May 6-7, we held a two day story confer-
the players) into the story so that they can see ence. We came together as a team of instructional
themselves as part of it. To do this, the story must designers, programmers, writers, and artists to
be easy for them to relate to. To be successful as begin to create the metastory for the game. Our
a learning environment, it must also create an customer participated and provided subject matter
“envelope” that will carry the learning tasks so expertise as well as general guidance. The instruc-
that the learner literally “embodies” them. tional designers kicked off day one by reviewing
Generally, fodder for narrative development the learning objectives with the group so that we
in a learning product can be gathered in early would stay focused on those throughout the day.
conversations with the customer. In our effort, The group was led by experienced story develop-
during the knowledge acquisition process, we ment facilitators through activities chosen to help
determined through discussions that the basic us experiment and “play” with character devel-
objective of our initial product would be to teach opment, setting, and plot points that would drive
recruits the steps required to stop (or mitigate the the learning objectives involved with a flooding
flow of) a leak on board a ship. We were thus scenario. It was important to develop a metastory
able to begin to zero in on some of the key story that would be believable and that a new recruit
elements from the beginning. For instance, from would identify with as well as one that would set
these early discussions, we knew the following us up for the kind of conflict or crisis that could
about the eventual story: incorporate other possible disaster prevention/
recovery scenarios (e.g., fire fighting) over time.
• The story setting would be on (some type During the discussions, our customer empha-
of) a ship. sized the need to reinforce the pattern of “look-
• At least one of the characters would need report-do” when training recruits. This led us to
to be a sailor on board that ship. focus upon the situation awareness, communica-
• The conflict to resolve would be a leaky tion, and decision-making learning objectives,
pipe or breach in the ship’s hull that the and to de-emphasize leadership. To further focus
sailor would need to fix or at least mitigate the story, our customer in particular and the team
the effects of. in general prioritized all the enabling learning
• The plot would need to include some sort objectives based on training requirements and
of potential flooding scenario. perceived utility.

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

After the story conference, the story develop- the game. This is a standard mechanism used in
ers used the notes from the two-day event and commercial games to bring players up to speed.
developed a draft of the metastory which included The instructional designers deemed it important
several possible game levels. During the first pass that this tutorial level would introduce the basic
at the story, we decided that the background story instructional mechanisms to lay the foundation
(“backstory”) would be told in the third person by for how the game would deliver its training.
a narrator that was not a part of the story itself. The game designers emphasized that the tutorial
This backstory eventually became the introductory level should reinforce the mission metaphor to
movie or “intro cut scene” of the game. introduce the gaming strategy and to set student
During story development, a key tension was: expectations. The story developers encouraged
the incremental introduction of story elements
• Story first versus design first throughout all levels, including the tutorial level.
We converged on a tutorial level design that met
Game Design all these goals.
Using the multiple levels of expertise identified
On May 29-30, we held a two-day team meeting in the CTA and our earlier rankings of the rela-
to flesh out the specific training scenarios for tive priorities of different learning objectives, we
our product. A representative from the customer fleshed out the basic enabling learning objectives
attended, but no SMEs did. Using the learning for the initial game levels. By the second day, we
objectives and story construct as a basis, the had designed the outline of tutorial level and three
team brainstormed on how we wanted to provide training levels of increasing difficulty. For each
training within the game. We made the decision to level, we identified which behaviors we wanted
couple a guided discovery instructional strategy to assess, the key story developments, potential
with an adventure-style gaming strategy. Follow- instructional scaffolding, desired immersive ele-
ing a common gaming approach, we decided to ments (such as sounds, lighting and game objects
create a game with multiple levels of increasing and effects), and the general flow of the gameplay.
difficulty. Based on the scenario element analysis, At this point we captured and prioritized all
we decided to structure each level as a single mis- the desired instructional and gaming capabilities.
sion, possibly with some “twists” to add to the We determined that the initial prototype would
sense of adventure. To support our instructional focus on the tutorial mission and the first training
and gaming objectives, we identified a general mission (“Mission 1”). This provided the basis
mechanism for using dialog and messages from for the software requirements and the launching
game characters to provide mission objectives, point for further instructional design.
story and adventure elements, and instructional The tension revealed here was:
guidance and feedback. To avoid the need for
animating the non-player characters, we designed • Gaming strategy versus instructional
the game in such a way that these characters would strategy
be elsewhere in the ship, out of view. Further, we
incorporated the capability to provide students Initial Instructional Design
with opportunities to fail, possibly catastrophi-
cally, depending upon their errors. Following our May 29-30 meeting, the instruc-
Early on, we realized that we would need a tional design process began in earnest. Our
tutorial level to train students on how to play instructional designers, assessment experts, and

441
 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Figure 4. Potential game levels produced during game design session

game developers worked iteratively to identify The instructional approach was a holistic
the specific instructional elements of the proposed design for providing part-task training within
“Mission 1” game level based on our cognitive the context of the whole task. It specified mul-
task analysis and our guided discovery instruc- tiple forms of feedback for alerting players to
tional strategy. deficiencies and providing opportunities for
An initial instructional design was developed players to demonstrate skills again in similar but
by mid-June that elaborated on the learning ob- not necessarily identical situations. It attempted
jectives associated with each level and suggested to carefully control variations to ensure that the
the general instructional approaches to be used in player did not just learn the game mechanics, but
the product. The guiding principles of this initial also understood the underlying facts, concepts,
design were to: or principles.
The initial design also identified a general ap-
• Address objectives in story, rules, proach for assessment within the game. The types
consequences of assessment envisioned included completion of
• Design consequences to dispel tasks, accuracy, time taken and steps taken. The
misconceptions intent was to assess learning objectives throughout
• Provide feedback to promote learning the game by the actions the player would take.
• Use scaffolding to guide players and allow These assessments were also expected to affect
them to experience actions beyond their play. The player’s actions could be limited until
level to reinforce learning objectives he or she demonstrated a predetermined level of
• Use gaming technologies to facilitate the mastery. A final performance assessment would
development of mental models be given at the end of the game that would detail
strengths and weaknesses. In this final assess-
ment, the player would be informed of how well

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

he or she did on each of the game performance • Natural consequences would be used,
criteria and how to improve performance in the when possible, to indicate the effects of the
future. Drawing upon the CTA, the scenario player’s action. The player would be made
event analysis, and the basic game level design, aware of the relationship between their ac-
the initial instructional design identified a series tion and the consequence (e.g., the player
of key scenario events, the associated learning must know that turning the valve cuts off
objectives and the associated assessment require- the water supply for fighting a fire).
ments (see Table 1). • Hints would be given to reinforce or cor-
The design specified several different types of rect declarative knowledge, for example
feedback to be used in the game, such as:

Table 1. Mission 1 level scenario constraints and learning objectives

EVENT ENVIRONMENTAL LEARNING OBJECTIVES ASSESSMENT

REQUIREMENTS REQUIREMENTS
Readiness Set • Alarm sound Decision-Making Learner immediately leaves for
Readiness condition is set • Lighting effect • Respond to readiness condition general quarters assignment
as a result of ship-wide • Announcement over the Situation Awareness
“event” sound system • Report to proper location
–General Quarters
Navigate Ship (recurs • Circle X, Y, & Z doors to Decision-Making • Used phone to ask permission for
throughout game) open/close • Comply with restrictions on doors opening doors
Learner navigates within • Limit space to task area – Situation Awareness • Opened/closed correctly
the ship Control where they can go. • Identify location • Path taken
• Phone on wall in destination Communication • Used phonetic alpha/num
compartment or passageway • Ask permission before opening • Repeated back instructions
door • Located the proper compartment,
as ordered
• Reported location
Detect Flooding Situ- • Pipe w/ slow, obvious water Situation Awareness • Asked permission to open door
ation leak • Conduct assessment • Did not enter the compartment
Learner encounters • Other pipes not leaking • Recognize flooding cues without permission.
flooding situation in a • Identifier for compartment • Identify location
compartment location • Identify type of pipe leaking
Communication
• Ask permission before opening
door, entering compartment;
Report to DCC (recurs • Phone to use Communication • Reported correct pipe/liquid type
throughout game) • Way to conduct two-way • Communicate relevant information • Reported correct location
Learner reports to DCC communication. Phonetic • Listen and repeat back instructions • Corrected errors from DCC
alpha/num • Listen and acknowledge or correct • Repeated back
• CCOL that can be read. repeat back • Look at CCOL and used CCOL
Situation Awareness information correctly
• Locate CCOL • Reported contents of the room
• Recognize equipment and material
settings in CCOL
Minimize/Contain Leak • Repair locker (to select & Situation Awareness • Located repair locker (path
Learner is ordered to open) • Find repair locker taken)
repair/contain the leak • Containment equipment Decision-Making • Opened locker
(jubilee, shoring equip) to • Perform proper containment • Selected correct equipment (# of
select from procedures attempts, order of selection)
• Select appropriate equipment • Placed patch and & tightened
• Use proper technique for attaching with wrench
patch

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

by telling the player the general rule or • Directive instruction versus guided
protocol. discovery
• Catastrophic failures that immediately stop • Feedback for learning versus feedback for
the game would be used to emphasize criti- motivating gameplay
cal errors made by the player.
• Game scores would be used to provide Assessment Strategy
feedback on the key behaviors to be devel-
oped and to reward the attainment of de- To accomplish the task of embedding effective
sired learning outcomes assessment in our game, our design process
dictated that we begin by examining the dam-
Finally, the design specified several possible age control domain - a broad class of activities
types of scaffolding to consider, including: of which flooding control is a part. Working
closely with the instructional design team, the
• Limiting the play space and/or choices of- assessment experts identified the key constructs
fered to avoid cognitive overload and focus and relationships that formed the sub-domain of
attention on key cues in the environment flooding within the damage control domain and
• Providing hints that focus on the facts, mapped these constructs and relationships into
rules, and or steps in a procedure a Flooding Ontology (a visual representation
• Providing just-in-time information, par- of the constructs and that make up flooding and
ticularly at novice levels, when the player how those constructs are linked). The ontology
is not expected to know that information was divided into three broad constructs –Situa-
or when that information is not critical to tion Awareness, Communications, and Decision
achieving the learning objective Making—as these encapsulated the cognitive
• Modeling or demonstrating procedures and behavioral elements relevant to addressing a
using gaming techniques or incorporating damage control situation aboard a ship. The goals
embedded videos and objectives of the training, along with the as-
• Providing advance organizers, such as a sessments, would be designed around these core
schematic of the ship to aid navigation concepts and relationships. Given this general
• Providing characters to guide the player in Flooding Ontology, the specific elements relevant
decision making when a player has been to the Mission 1 level were identified based on
unsuccessful after several attempts the initial instructional design (e.g., see Figure 5).
• Providing access to “mini-games” as need- With this ontology completed, we drafted a
ed to increase proficiency in basic skills preliminary set of functional game requirements
necessary for player performance to be suffi-
Following a traditional game technique, the ciently assessed. These requirements were spe-
notion of a “score” was initially suggested as a cific features that needed to be represented in the
form of implicit feedback, and the use of specific game to serve as indicators of performance. They
warning messages in response to student errors included elements the player could use to com-
was suggested as a form of explicit feedback and municate with Damage Control Central (to assess
guidance. communication skills), opportunities for the
During this initial instructional design process, player to choose from a variety of apparatus the
two key tensions were revealed: appropriate one to contain the leak (to assess
content knowledge and decision making), and

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Figure 5. Partial flooding ontology with mission 1 related elements (in gray)

opportunities for the player to interact with dif- a demerit that interrupted gameplay to provide
ferent types of doors under various material important feedback. Table 2 provides an example
readiness conditions (to assess the player’s un- of the assessment strategy for a single learning
derstanding of readiness conditions and adherence objective (i.e., Follow safety protocol), showing
to permission protocols). implicit feedback in response to accurate behavior
Based on the initial instructional design and via a change to the game score, as well as explicit
the general approach to gameplay, we proceeded “demerit” feedback in response to errors. Many
to flesh out the detailed automated assessment of the details of the assessment strategy changed
strategy to be applied. The key learning objectives during subsequent refinements.
were mapped to key assessment requirements. As the detailed assessment strategy was being
We then identified, for each assessment require- developed, preliminary instructional logic was
ment, the specific metrics that were possible to also created to identify when to capture data for
determine automatically in the game. These were assessment of player performance, as well as to
tied as appropriate to specific scoring computa- identify possible situations for performance-based
tions or feedback actions. The final assessment feedback opportunities. The logic for several of
strategy incorporated the pedagogical objectives the behaviors involved in a flooding control mis-
while respecting the need to have assessment fit sion was captured by mid-July using flowcharts
in naturally with gameplay. The game score was such as that in Figure 6. The motivation behind
defined to be monotonically increasing (i.e., total these initial flowcharts was to capture an “ideal”
score could only increase in value, and would not trainer by working forward from the ontology and
decrease due to errors). The second iteration of recommended functional assessment requirements
instructional design, incorporating an assessment to produce a guided discovery instructional strat-
and feedback strategy for all learning objectives, egy that would also support effective assessment.
was completed in mid-July. Consideration of gaming strategy, story and mis-
In our assessment strategy, we attempted to sion flow were left as future integration exer-
identify behaviors that could lead to a failure of cises. The logic allowed for multiple attempts to
the mission. These serious errors would produce accomplish tasks while providing different guid-

445
446
Table 2. Sample specification of assessment and feedback for a learning objective

Skill Area Learning Assessment Metrics Positive indicator Negative Game Score Numerical/ Aggregate Scoring/ Feedback
Objective Requirements indicator Feedback Effect Metric Effect - Negative
- Success
Decision- Follow safety Did not enter the Intent Asked for permis- Never ask for 0
Making protocol flooding compart- sion to enter a permission to
ment without room in which enter a room
permission. student had (incor-
rectly) reported
flooding
Accuracy Asked for permis- Enter flooding 10 points if 1 count per flooding Demerit: A demerit is is-
sion to enter the compartment student enters compartment; 1 count sued if the student enters
actual flooding without asking the room after per “first” entry into the flooded compart-
room permission requesting and flooding compartment; ment without receiving
receiving permis- 1 count per correct permission.
sion request to enter flooding
compartment
Multiple in- N/A - only one
stances (flooding flooding compart-
compartment) ment in this level
Multiple occur- Only keep track Accuracy percentage:
rences (Over of requests prior Total correct request /
time) to the first entry Total flooding compart-
into the flooding ment
compartment
Development of Game-Based Training Systems
Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Figure 6. Preliminary guided-discovery instructional logic for obtaining appropriate permission before
opening doors (light gray = direct instruction, dark gray = implied instruction, black = goal achieved)

ance and constraining user actions depending gray) should be given. These flowcharts inte-
upon the errors made (and amount of error rep- grated the assessment strategy and basic charac-
etition). ter interactions to identify the instruction, scoring,
After mid-July, a collective effort was made and dialog to be implemented in the game. New
to resolve the different representation formats flowcharts covering all key situations in Mission
preferred by the instructional designers, assess- 1 were completed in mid-August. During this
ment experts and game designers and to integrate revision, a second score mechanism was added
the various aspects of the product design. The to keep track of penalties associated with errors.
most commonly agreed-upon format was the use Specifically, when a negative feedback message
of flowcharts. Using the preliminary instruc- was given in response to an error by the student,
tional logic flowcharts (e.g., Figure 6) as a start- a negative demerit score value was decreased by
ing point, new flowcharts were defined for the some amount. The demerit score (trapezoid) and
key learning objectives of the mission 1 level. positive score (hexagon) were separate values.
Figure 7 illustrates a flowchart specifying the The possibility of mission failure due to a high
instructional logic for “Following safety proto- total demerit score (e.g., −1.0) was also introduced.
cols”, as determined by donning the appropriate During the development of the assessment
personal protective equipment (PPE). Each flow- strategy and the associated instructional design
chart provided a specific set of rules indicating revisions, two key tensions arose:
under which circumstances specific guidance
messages (dashed border, light-gray), positive • Developing an objective versus develop-
reinforcement messages (dotted border, light gray) ing methods for assessing attainment of
or negative feedback messages (solid border, light that objective

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Figure 7. Complete instructional logic for learning objective of “following safety protocols: Don ap-
propriate personal protective equipment (PPE)”

• The right documents for sharing knowledge our final product at the end of September. The
first deliverable would incorporate a basic mis-
Software Development sion flow (incorporating a briefing screen and a
debriefing screen) and include some preliminary
By mid-June, a software requirements document user interface elements (such as feedback and
and an initial software design document were information windows). The second deliverable
completed that identified the key changes needed would provide an end-to-end walkthrough that
to the existing simulation in order to support our exercised basic missions and basic forms of all
desired training game design. In addition to sup- interface elements. The third deliverable would
porting the instructional levels we had designed, include the data-driven infrastructure and all key
we adopted an additional requirement to adapt graphics and animations needed to support the
the gaming infrastructure so that pedagogical ele- tutorial and main mission. The final deliverable
ments of the training would be specified as much would have a fully functional tutorial and the
as possible using a data-driven approach rather main mission.
than implementing a hard-coded game. The goal In particular, the data-driven design adopted
of a data-driven approach was to facilitate rapid was as follows. A mission would be comprised
changes to instructional content. of multiple tasks. For each task, specific trigger
An aggressive agile development schedule events would initiate it, and completion of the
was determined with four end-of-month deliver- task would in turn initiate one or more other tasks.
ables: the first at the end of June and the last for The specific tasks in a scenario and all details

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

concerning each task, such as its triggers and its • Orient the student’s approach to playing
description, were specified in the scenario data the game
file. Further, a mission could contain multiple
“score” objects, each maintaining a distinct value The introductory movie design was captured
representing user performance. A score object in a table that divided the script into small one- or
could be triggered by direct player actions, such two-sentence segments to facilitate the association
as dialog choices or entering a room, as well as of dialog with the appropriate on-screen visual. The
by indirect actions, such as completing a task. The team met via phone conference to discuss what
score object would contain specific feedback mes- should be seen while the narration was spoken.
sages to provide to the user upon being triggered In order to hasten development and save money
(e.g., via a “demerit” message or an instructional it was decided that characters would only be seen
guidance message), and would maintain internal when absolutely necessary to the story. Likewise,
state reflecting the number of times triggered. The we decided that in order to allow the learner to
message could vary depending upon the number of relate to the game character, the player would not
times triggered. The specific score objects and all be identified as male or female and that any time
details concerning them, such as their triggers and the learner had to “speak” it would be via text
messages, were specified in the scenario data file. only. This meant that the learner would not ever
The key tension of the software development see or hear himself or herself as a character in the
were game. This kept the player “generic” and allowed
the learner’s imagination to fill in the gaps. Thus,
• Hard-coded versus data-driven a player could be immersed in the game without
implementation the necessity of choices of character art or voicing.
An artist then created storyboards (sketches)
Introductory Movie for the intro movie. The sketches were scanned
and placed into the draft of the script. This docu-
In late June, as we iteratively refined our story, ment was shared with the larger team (including
we realized that our product would be particularly the subject matter experts) and feedback was
enhanced by the incorporation of an introductory incorporated into successive drafts. To stay true
movie scene that would present the backstory and to story and reality, we decided it was necessary
lay the foundation for motivating the student. to have one non-player character (the officer of
The use of introductory movies and cut-scenes the deck who welcomed the learner aboard). Once
within and between game levels is a powerful the storyboard and script were approved by the
method used in commercial games to enhance development team and SMEs, the artists began to
the player’s sense of immersion in the game. For create the art and animations for the movie. For
our product, we determined that the introductory maximum effect, a 3D modeling approach with
movie needed to: realistic ships and naval scenes was used. After a
number of iterations with frequent SME feedback
• Motivate the desire to play on the accuracy and suitability of our models, the
• Motivate the desire to serve in the Navy graphic rendering of the movie was completed.
• Introduce the backstory In parallel, a narration and sound script for
• Promote the Navy core values of Honor, the scene was finalized with inputs from several
Courage, and Commitment team members and from our SMEs. This process
• Introduce the ultimate game objective also involved the creation of a “scratch track” of

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the narration of the introductory movie that was tives, assessment methods, dialog content, and
reviewed by our customer. Once the intro video mission debriefing.
was created, it was passed to our sound produc- On-going refinement of the instructional objec-
tion team. Professional voice talent was used to tives of Mission 1 led to the following final set
record the narration for the movie, and the audio of objectives being approved by the customer on
for the movie was finalized and enhanced with September 15 (see Figure 8). For each broad skill
sound effects and music to add to the drama. The category (Situation Awareness, Communication,
introductory movie was then incorporated into Decision Making), several terminal objectives
the game to be played before the tutorial mission. were defined. For each terminal objective at least
There were minimal tensions raised during one enabling objective was defined.
the development of the introductory movie. How- In the final implementation, the student’s
ever, since the development of the movie was a performance against every terminal objective was
substantial task, it was important to ensure that it assessed automatically via the student’s actions
was general enough to accommodate further story in the game and choices in dialogs. Dialog inter-
refinements in the game itself. During develop- actions formed a key method for assessing user
ment, the specific wording used in the narration performance against a variety of communication
was varied slightly several times to reflect changes and situation awareness learning objectives. These
in the specific missions (particularly in the mis- assessments were context-sensitive (i.e., the same
sion briefings). dialog choice may be correct or incorrect depend-
ing upon prior user actions). As shown in Table
Iterative Review, Refinement, 3, a single dialog interaction could result in errors
and Testing against different objectives (e.g., reporting ap-
propriate versus accurate information), and dif-
The instructional design, game level design, in- ferent types of feedback (e.g., dialog responses
troductory movie, and software design were all versus demerits).
refined in an iterative manner after the end of July. The mission was comprised of multiple tasks,
Efforts were conducted in parallel and discussions and the student’s actions were interpreted in the
on one aspect of the product often involved team context of the current sub-task(s). At the end of
members working on other aspects. Customer the mission, the student was provided a debrief
design and product reviews were held bi-weekly that summarized their performance against every
(on August 4, August 17, September 4, September terminal objective on a three-point traffic light
17, and October 8). Three rounds of product testing scale (green, yellow, red). An analogous design
with test subjects were held both before and after was adopted for the tutorial mission, though with
the initial product release. A pilot usability test a much reduced set of terminal and learning ob-
was held on September 18, an end-user usability jectives.
study on October 22-23, and a pilot validation Tensions that arose during the iterative refine-
study on November 17. Following each review ment process included:
and test, desired improvements were identified
based on feedback and observations. These were • Designing for the novice while keeping the
then prioritized based on the importance of the gamer happy
changes and time/resource constraints. • Balancing revisions to instructional design
In particular, four instructional elements were with meeting software deadlines
iterated upon and refined right up until the beta • Gaming strategy versus instructional
release in mid-September: instructional objec- strategy

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

Figure 8. Final instructional objectives: skill areas - terminal objectives - learning objectives

MULTIDISCIPLINARY TENSIONS the weight that should be given to pedagogical

AND LESSONS LEARNED or technological factors when making decisions
about which training technology to use. In our
The Basis for Technology Decisions case, the decision was made primarily for tech-
- Pedagogical or Technological nological reasons, and not for pedagogical ones.
For instance, the view of the instructional design-
The tension revealed by the intertwined choice of ers and assessment experts was that the domain
training domain and gaming platform concerns should have been chosen first, the cognitive task

Table 3. Assessment and feedback based on students’ dialog choices

Dialog choice Assessment Feedback

“DCC, this is Seaman Incorrect Dialog response from DCC: “Seaman Taylor, DCC. I asked you to go to
Taylor. I’m dressed out and compartment 1-80-1-Q and report when ready to enter. Get on it!”
ready to help.”
“DCC. I am at space 1-80- Error against ‘Report Appro- Dialog response from DCC: “Sailor, this is DCC. Who is this?” and
1-Q. Request permission to priate Information to DCC’ Demerit (e.g., “A proper report should include your name and all relevant
enter and inspect.” learning objective information about a situation.” and 0.1 demerit score change)
“DCC, this is Seaman Correct if student is actually “Seaman Taylor, DCC. Aye. Permission to enter and inspect 1-80-1-Q granted.
Taylor. I am dressed out reporting from a phone near Report situation as soon as possible.”
and ready to enter 1-80-1-Q. 1-80-1-Q.
Request permission to enter
If reporting from wrong loca- Dialog response from DCC: “I am not showing you near that
and inspect compartment.”
tion, then error against ‘Report space. Go find 1-80-1-Q and call me from the nearby phone.”
accurate information to DCC’ and
learning objective Demerit (e.g., “You made a bad report. The DCC trusts you to be the eyes
on the scene. Reassess the situation and give the DCC a better report.” and
0.3 demerit score change)

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

analysis performed next, and then, based on the to build a foundation to ensure that players had a
key learning objectives identified, the technology basic understanding of what happens in a flooding
choice should have been made that would best situation, and to reinforce all the key process steps
suit those objectives. Thus, choices such as 3D in all the levels. The story developers encouraged
immersive versus 2D interactive environments, the idea that not all information about the situation
single-player versus multi-player, simulated needed to be provided at the beginning, and that
characters versus no characters, and so on should, an incremental introduction of new story elements
in principle, have been driven by pedagogy. The to provide context for new learning objectives
lesson learned is that the practical considerations over successive levels would be effective. The
of customer preferences, schedule, and available game designers wanted to keep the early levels
resources can significantly impact these choices. simple and slowly build up the complexity of the
gaming skills needed over multiple levels. Unlike
Identifying All the Learning the instructional designers, they did not feel that
Objectives versus Selecting all aspects of the process needed to be present in
the Objectives to be Addressed every level (i.e., certain levels could focus upon
in Level 1 of the Game certain elements of the process). The assessment
experts were concerned primarily with cognitive
The multi-disciplinary approach to instructional overload and wanted to ensure that new skills and
design had a clear effect upon the decisions information were introduced in an incremental
made on how to sequence training in the game. fashion over successive levels.
The instructional designers, assessment experts, The decisions regarding which learning objec-
game designers and story developers all agreed tives to focus on in the first level were made with
upon a layered approach in which the training was the intent of satisfying these goals as much as pos-
broken up into multiple levels of increasing dif- sible, and multiple refinements were needed over
ficulty. The challenge was determining what was time to reach consensus. For example, there were
meant by “increasing difficulty.” Everyone had a several potential learning objectives pertaining
slightly different understanding of how the learn- to the rules for opening and closing doors under
ing objectives might be linked to form a beginning various readiness conditions. In our developed
level scenario that would be both engaging and ontology all possible types of doors and hatches
prepare the target audience for a live simulation and appropriate entry rules were presented. In a
of the entire flooding process. Many interesting, classroom, these rules would likely be learned
collaborative discussions occurred in refining and tested with a paper and pencil test. An embed-
exactly what would occur in the earliest missions. ded tutorial addressing these rules was possible;
The instructional designers envisioned a lay- however, we did not want this to be our primary
ered approach focusing on the key steps in the instructional target for the beginning level of the
flooding control process in all levels, but varying game. To do so would burden the learner with
the complexity of the skills expected. In order to information overload and require many permu-
allow the students to experience the entire process tations for mastering the distinctions governing
in earliest levels, instructional designers advocated the handling of different types of doors when in
that some of the smaller steps in the process be reality, given the readiness condition already set
provided to the learner or that the environment by the collision, most doors would require the
be structured in such a way that the player would same treatment. We resolved the issue by limit-
not have to demonstrate more specific skills until ing the kinds of doors visible to the player so
higher levels of the game. Their primary goal was that the correct procedure would be technically

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

correct while presenting limited cognitive load. process, the instructional designers gravitated
Thereby, the learner could focus on the larger towards a focus upon the cognitive elements of
steps required to identify, report, and combat the the domain (via a CTA) while the game design-
flood. This solution managed the cognitive load ers gravitated towards a focus upon the context
appropriately, maintained cognitive and physical in which learning would occur in the domain
fidelity, kept the learner engaged in the story and (via a scenario element analysis). The goals of
prevented negative training. a CTA and a scenario element analysis are dif-
A lesson learned from this key tension is to ferent. The former is focused on performance
maintain communication and seek mechanisms and associated knowledge states. The latter is
for closer collaboration. Presenting the learning focused on identifying the environmental contexts
objectives and developing an ontology are criti- in which simulated activities occur, the steps of
cal to developing the appropriate story, rules, and and interactions among those activities, and the
consequences in the game. Instructional design- possible variations in the details of those activities
ers are accustomed to look at the relationships or contexts. Both analyses were conducted with
among objectives in terms of the development collaborative discussions among team members.
of student knowledge and skills and designing However, there were frequent misunderstandings
for a scaffolded progression based on skill level. of how to characterize the domain. Eventually,
Further research is needed to determine whether it became apparent that the two analyses were
and when, for game-based training: every skill capturing complementary information. The ex-
must be taught from the bottom up in level 1; ercise of merging them (e.g., Figure 3) resulted
levels should provide part-task training; or hybrid in several interesting discussions in which some
solutions will be effective. There is more than one previous misunderstandings were resolved. One
way to develop skills, and gaming technology of- benefit was that additional enabling objectives
fers unique opportunities to develop skills that are were identified. For example, in the context of the
not available through the use of other instructional transit phase, an enabling objective for reporting
media. We can select skills on which to focus in a situation immediately is reporting any hazards
a specific scenario and manipulate the physical encountered en route to the flooding area. On the
fidelity of the environment to meet the instructional downside, the merged document was difficult to
design. In a game, this can mean restricting the follow for team members who had not directly
environment or game space or sequence of events been part of the knowledge acquisition process.
or having other characters perform tasks that are The lesson learned is that both the cognitive
beyond the expectations for the level 1 player. and context aspects of a domain are critical for
There is a fine line between selecting tasks that game-based training and each leads to different
would be fun but not expected to challenge the ideas on how to structure the learning experi-
learner, and selecting tasks that would confuse or ence in a game. More investigation into effective
distract the learner at level 1. methods for characterizing and refining the two
domain aspects is needed.
Balancing Cognitive Elements
with Experiential Elements Story First versus Design First

A difference in perspective between the instruc- In our effort, a lot happened very quickly. There
tional designers and the game designers was the was a general feeling that the story development
basis for understanding and characterizing about (i.e., the StoryJam™ held on May 6-7) occurred
the domain. During the knowledge acquisition too early in the process since the learning objec-

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 Development of Game-Based Training Systems

tives from the CTA were not fully understood and particular suite of instructional interactions with
had not yet been prioritized. However, without the the student and a particular organization to those
forcing function of trying to develop a focused interactions.
story to support the training, the necessary type of A general methodology for determining how
filtering and prioritization of the objectives may to provide game-based instruction for a particu-
not have occurred in a timely manner. Throughout lar domain is to map the enabling objectives to
the successive refinements of the instructional specific game mechanics and specific encounters
design and game design, the basic story elements within each level to ensure that the game player is
established at the early meeting provided positive learning what the designer has set out to instruct.
guidance that encouraged convergence of ideas During the knowledge acquisition process of our
and consensus on decisions. The story decisions effort, we discussed a variety of possible game
were also remarkably stable. For example, the mechanics for various enabling objectives. In fact,
supporting backstory and story elements used in the SMEs would occasionally proactively sug-
making decisions in the May 29-30 game design gest a means for how they would “teach this in a
meeting were largely present in the final design game.” In our case, these initial characterizations
several months later. The participation of SMEs of the instruction led to an early choice of two
as well as the customer in the StoryJam was in- “complementary” strategies - guided discovery
strumental in establishment of a credible story. instruction using adventure style gaming. Guided
Further research is needed to identify the discovery instruction uses implicit and explicit
best way to time and use the story development interventions to encourage and focus a student’s
process to positive effect in game-based training exploration of the training domain to achieve
development. However, a clear lesson learned is the learning goals. Adventure style gaming uses
that a collaboratively developed story facilitates carefully placed hints and clues to encourage the
collaborative decision-making during subsequent player to continue to explore the game world and
development. achieve the adventure’s goals.
This choice led to a lot of synergy at the begin-
Gaming Strategy versus ning of the design process. Instructional designers
Instructional Strategy would suggest a need for an intervention, and the
game developers could easily map this into an
The key area of difficulty reflecting the multidis- event furthering the adventure. However, as the
ciplinary conflicts in the team was the relative instructional design process progressed, issues of
emphasis of instructional elements and gaming how to embed new instructional elements often
elements. There are many different types of com- turned into discussions of how the “gameplay”
puter games and there are many different ways to might be adversely affected. Issues that caused
structure instruction. In developing game-based the greatest tension were the instructional design-
training, open questions include what type of game ers’ and assessment experts’ desires for increased
is best suited to a particular instructional strategy guidance and feedback explaining all the student’s
as well as what type of instructional strategy is mistakes as they were made, explicit didactic
best for a particular type of game. When choosing information on every element of relevance in the
a gaming strategy, one is typically choosing a par- scenario (e.g., a help lookup facility), and increased
ticular suite of game mechanics (interactions the scaffolding, such as the use of a compass-like aid
player may have within the game) and a particular to assist in navigating around the ship. Their goal
type of event flow. Likewise, when choosing an was to reduce the student’s cognitive load and to
instructional strategy, one is typically choosing a ensure that the student formed good mental models

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as early as possible during training. Countering they were on. Once these tasks were mastered
this, the game designers wanted to minimize the the additional elements could be addressed. In
amount of non-embedded information (i.e., not the game, however, how long should the player
delivered as a natural part of interacting with wander before being guided to information that
the environment and other characters) to reduce will help him or her reach the intended destination?
negative impacts on the player’s immersion and The lesson learned is to use the cognitive
to maintain the sense of adventure. After many task analysis to focus on identifying the actions
discussions and necessary compromises on every- a student must make to carry out a task as well
one’s part, we succeeded in resolving most issues as the typical wrong paths a student can take. In
to produce a final instructional design and game experiential learning, we include these actions in
design that supported one another. the environment and make some of them options
Hence, the two related lessons learned are that – deliberately selecting these to promote success-
linking gaming strategy to instructional strategy ful task development while not overwhelming
can lead to good synergy of design and a com- the student.
pelling experience, but that an early choice of
gaming strategy can lead to difficulties in trying Feedback for Learning versus
to incorporate incompatible instructional elements Feedback for Motivating Gameplay
later on.
Games offer opportunities for players to see the
Directive Instruction versus consequences of their actions in ways other instruc-
Guided Discovery tional methods do not. Feedback in the form of
natural consequences of actions can be powerful;
Expectations for the design of directive instruction the trick is to ensure that the feedback is driven by
and discovery learning are not the same. Our task the learning objectives and emphasizes the cause
was to pull the best elements of each into an en- and effect relationship between learners’ actions
gaging game that fosters learning through guided and the consequences so they understand what has
discovery. Just how much guidance is required in happened and why. Consequences of actions in
guided discovery? Which are the elements that games often provide the “wow” effect garnering
must be more closely guided? When is there no the player’s attention but not always making clear
harm in letting learners play until they get it right exactly what the player did to give rise to them.
versus when must one guide them so they are not For example, one of the early feedback responses
bogged down by details that are insignificant and considered was to have a Chief non-player char-
detract from learning (i.e., avoiding situations in acter yell at the player’s character when certain
which the learner becomes overwhelmed with key mistakes were made. This kind of feedback
less important details and misses the key learning was not necessarily appropriate from a chain of
opportunity)? A prime example was in reading the command perspective and did not support the
compartment identifiers, or “Bull’s Eyes”, which learning objective. However, from a gaming/story
indicate the location and type of compartments. perspective, it added some emotional stress and
We purposefully focused the player’s attention made the experience more exciting. Providing the
on two of the elements in the four element series player with appropriate consequences resulting
of number and letters that defines a compartment from his or her actions had to be carefully con-
identifier. The goal was for the player to learn to sidered as part of the entire gaming/instructional
use the two elements well enough to navigate fore strategy. The experiential aspect of the game en-
and aft and to recognize which side of the ship vironment opens possibilities that should continue

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to be explored while maintaining the instructional also has implications for the type of feedback
focus. Decisions about which type of corrective provided. Van Merrienboer and Kirschner (2007)
feedback to provide immediately within the game for example make the following recommendations
and which to provide in the post-game debrief for assessing intent and accuracy:
remain important questions for research.
The lesson learned is that finding innovative • If the learner makes an error that conveys
ways to provide feedback that promotes reflection an incorrect goal, the feedback should ex-
requires concerted effort, ongoing discussion, plain why the action leads to an incorrect
and continued research. The game design must goal and should provide a hint or sugges-
examine the intended outcomes and the paths tion as how to reach the correct goal. .
people take that compromise those outcomes. We • If the learner makes an error that conveys
can then devise strategies to promote awareness a correct goal, the feedback should only
and reflection, such as by setting up distractions provide a hint for the correct step or action
to entice players into making common errors to be taken and not simply give away the
and providing feedback to help them refine their correct step.
thinking.
The lesson learned is that objectives and
Developing an Objective versus assessments must be linked at the outset of the
Developing Methods for Assessing development process.
Attainment of That Objective
The Right Documents for
A game story line must be developed so as to create Sharing Knowledge
situations that challenge learners with respect to the
learning objectives and that provide opportunities A key challenge throughout the effort was con-
for learners to react and receive feedback on their veying our thoughts and ideas to each other in an
actions. Therefore, the objectives as well as the effective manner. Most stakeholders in the effort
assessment strategy need to be developed first in tended to think and operate at a different level
the development of the game. In formal school- of abstraction or with a different focus. Further,
ing, assessments often occur after a learning event different stakeholders entered with different
(e.g., end of module test). As a team with such a preconceptions about the motivations of other
short development cycle, it was easy to slip into stakeholders. Exacerbating this quintessential
this way of thinking. Also, team members had inter-disciplinary communication issue was the
differing expectations about the role of assessment fact that our team was widely distributed geo-
and even about the meaning associated with it. graphically. Despite roughly monthly face-to-face
Assessment is another area where gaming meetings and frequent discussions by telephone,
technology offers new possibilities for learning. numerous misunderstandings would arise and
Using both time to complete and path taken are persist.
possible options in addition to “correct” actions. The knowledge sharing issue was particularly
One promising discussion focused on assessing revealing in the documents that we generated to
intent and accuracy as one way to understand share our instructional design ideas. Every single
reasons for a player’s actions and to tailor future performer had a different preferred format for
trigger events so as to hone skills appropriate capturing their ideas, even if the general type
to that player’s needs. This kind of assessment of document was similar. For instance, each of

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Development of Game-Based Training Systems

us had a different view about what a storyboard task mechanism, several data-driven feedback
entailed. This confusion led to various persistent mechanisms were implemented.
misconceptions. For instance, the game designers The software development iterations during
tended to conclude that the instructional designers July and August were focused on implementing
were seeking to provide learning that was linear a data-driven infrastructure and basic support
in nature due to the list or table formats they used for the game mechanics we wanted in our initial
to capture instructional events. prototype. By the end of August, a preliminary
At several points during the effort, attempts implementation of the tutorial and Mission 1
were made to integrate the different perspectives levels had been implemented. However, further
and create a single format that met the needs of revisions to the instructional content continued
all performers. During knowledge acquisition, a right up the end of September. These revisions
table format merging the key CTA information were easy to incorporate into the system, and
and the scenario element analysis was created (see we made numerous revisions to the instructional
Figure 3). During development of instructional content without slipping our software deadlines.
and assessment logic, a rich flowchart format A key lesson learned was that the focus on a
was used to draw together inputs from several data-driven approach to specifying the instruc-
sources (see Figure 7). During the specification of tional logic in the game greatly reduced the stress
the dialog, three different formats were explored of making changes to the game and avoided the
(a dialog tree, a storyboard with optional paths, need for any significant re-factoring of the code.
and a linear list with linked dialog fragments), but
ultimately the actual dialog implemented in the Designing for the Novice While
game prevailed as our means of discussing and Keeping the Gamer Happy
reviewing dialog content.
There is a strong need for effective col- Aside from age, Navy recruits are the very em-
laboration mechanisms in a diverse game-based bodiment of diversity – 40,000 recruits each year
training development team. While we identified who come from every conceivable background.
some collaborative document formats, further It was essential that our training system be acces-
research and refinement is needed to find those sible to everyone from super users to computer
communication means that are most effective for neophytes and be effective with everyone from
game-based training design. expert gamers to non gamers. However, since our
target population truly are novices in the domain
Hard-Coded Versus Data- of Navy skills, it was critical that the instruction
Driven Implementation be delivered at an appropriate level and not be
overly challenging. In making our instructional
In the field of game-based training, there is always design and game design decisions, there was an
a tension between implementing exactly what is ongoing tension between designing for the novice
needed for the specific instruction and imple- and ensuring that the game was usable and ap-
menting general game mechanics which can be pealing to a very broad population. This tension
used to support a variety of instruction. In many revealed several lessons learned.
cases, the former approach is used, leading to a The interface of the game needed to be simple
system that requires significant effort to adapt. to accommodate the broad range of users. Further,
Due to our broader project goals, we adopted a simple interface is a common trait of many good
the latter approach. In addition to a data-driven games. However, in our effort, being simple was

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often at odds with being comprehensive. The more message would be somewhat general. If the er-
instruction, data, feedback, interventions, and ror was repeated, subsequent messages would be
details we added, the more complex the interface more detailed.
became and consequently, the less usable. In the These decisions were borne out by results
end, we decided to postpone some instructional of product testing across all a variety of users.
interventions in order to maintain a simple, clean For instance, a student’s first demerit stops mere
interface. button-clicking behavior and leads quickly to in-
Dynamic interaction is the most obvious creased attention by both gamers and non-gamers.
quality of games. After all, if one can’t interact, a
game reduces to a spectator experience. However, Balancing Revisions to
what types of interactions are appropriate for Instructional Design with
novice game players, while retaining appeal for Meeting Software Deadlines
the experienced gamer? In our game, the player
assumed the role of a Seaman recently assigned In addition to our data-driven approach, another
to his or her first ship. By making the role in key contributor to our success was the use of
the game reflect the near future for all recruits, an agile software development methodology. A
issues of experience in gaming were partially particularly relevant aspect of agile development
avoided (e.g., all the recruits are new to being is frequent deliveries. One of the key tenants of
aboard a Navy ship, so navigating around a ship agile development is getting working iterations
effectively requires diligent attention to details of the software into the hands of stakeholders as
in the environment). Further, we made actions in early and as often as possible. With six geographi-
the game reflect real-world actions. Since these cally distributed groups, frequent releases helped
actions (e.g., navigating within a ship, repairing mitigate communication issues and maintain a
a leak using correct procedures, communicating cohesive vision for the product.
properly with a superior officer) are not typical As in many software products, the requirements
of a commercial game, both the inexperienced provided by the customer may change over time.
and experienced gamer still needed substantial In our case, there was an increasing emphasis
learning in order to do it right. placed upon the depth of training to deliver. Initial
Each mistake made by a player creates a brief requirements were for a skill practice environ-
teachable moment where corrective guidance can ment with limited guidance. Later requirements
make a huge difference. However, the right level were for a training environment with limited
of guidance to give to a novice can conflict with assessment that could produce some validated
the degree of freedom expert gamers expect. Our learning outcomes of certain skills. The final
approach was to provide both non-interruptive and requirements, determined several months into the
interruptive feedback of varying detail depending project, were for a training system with focused
on the nature of the mistake made while keeping guidance, general assessment on all key skills,
the player immersed in the story as much as pos- comprehensive feedback in response to errors,
sible. Minor errors would result in some guidance no negative training, and no irrelevant elements
provided in a small pop-up window that was not that would produce validated learning outcomes
intrusive. Conversely, when the student made a across most skills taught. Our agile approach to
critical error, a demerit would interrupt gameplay software development, iterative approach to in-
visually and aurally with a specific message about structional design and frequent interactions with
the error. For both hints and demerits, the initial

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the customer enabled us to accommodate these The field of game-based training is at an

changes in requirements. interesting crossroads as it moves from a poorly
Although key to our success, the agile method understood cottage industry to a well-founded
was not without issues. In fact, it caused some in- discipline of its own. The multifaceted nature
teresting tensions and challenges among the team. of game-based training is both its strength and
In order to produce frequent releases, software de- its weakness - no other medium can provide as
velopment moves extremely quickly. Yesterday’s rich and varied learning experiences, but few
ideas become tomorrow’s implementation. This other instructional mediums are as difficult to
put an extra burden on quick turn arounds and get right. There is a need for increased commu-
the rapid iteration of ideas and forced the team to nication across practitioners to share processes,
focus on what’s important. Ideas that fell into the mechanisms, and lessons learned. We believe
“could-be” or “might be nice” categories quickly our continuing efforts in this project will provide
got pushed aside by “must have” and “critical” seminal contributions towards formalizing game-
requirements. Whenever an idea cropped up, it based development methodology.
was immediately weighted for its instructional or
gameplay value and then balanced against the rest
of the to-do items. The most important items al- CONCLUSION
ways got done and the rest got set aside for another
day. The result was a game that was delivered on Conducting research on instructional games begs
time and within budget, met all customer needs, the question, “How can games be made instruc-
and passed the usability tests with flying colors. tional and engaging?” A critical battleground for
this debate is the learning objectives and how they
are used during design and development of the
FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS game. Respecting the role of learning objectives
was an easy point of agreement for the team in
In the next two years of our project, our plan is to the abstract. However, it was difficult to reach
investigate further issues related to the develop- a common understanding of what that meant in
ment of game-based training and to build upon terms of game play, story, actions, dialog choices,
the lessons learned so far to identify design and feedback, guidance, and the game environment.
development methods that support consistent and Instructional design based on learning objectives
effective outcomes. We plan to create additional can limit distractions that overload the player with
refinements of the flooding control training sys- extraneous information that interferes with learn-
tem, as well as to create additional training systems ing. However, the objectives alone do not guar-
in other domains for the same customer. These antee focus on relevant information. Structuring
development efforts will inform and be supported the story must work in concert with treating the
by efforts to create better authoring and assessment consequences of errors to help the player develop
tools for game-based training (e.g., of which our a mental model of what actions lead to the desired
data-driven infrastructure was an early step). To outcomes. The interactions between the player
ensure that our advances are well-founded, we and the game must maintain the player’s sense of
will conduct a variety of empirical investigations immersion while also ensuring that the experience
into the effectiveness of different gaming features remains focused on the skills being taught. Find-
for training, and the interaction between different ing the balance between adhering to the learning
gaming and instructional approaches. objectives while maintaining the characteristics

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associated with a game was a persistent challenge It is important to clearly articulate each team
that revealed itself in a variety of ways. member’s priorities as early as possible and work
A second key battleground for this debate together to devise methods for sharing and inte-
concerns the processes followed in producing grating information that will accommodate any
an appropriately instructional and fun game. In competing priorities. From this, specific critical
general, the agile approach adopted in this effort paths and components must be identified that, if
resulted in ongoing priority conflicts between the organized and prioritized correctly, can inform
instructional, gaming and story mindsets. The the overall design and development approach.
instructional designers by nature preferred a more Since the process of combining the craft of game
traditional waterfall approach in which all key design and the science of learning has yet to be
decisions regarding learning goals, content selec- established, the lessons learned from this project
tion, and specification of instructional methods may serve to inform the process and lead to an
and strategies would be made prior to involving efficient and effective model for the development
considerations about the story, the technology, and of games for learning.
the gaming style. Their concern was that that key
components, affordances, and experiences in the
training system necessary from a pedagogical and ACKNOWLEDGMENT
assessment standpoint would be undermined or in-
adequately represented if instruction came second. The research reported in this paper was conducted
The gaming developers by nature preferred clear under the management of Dr. Ray Perez under
direction on the basic interaction modes desired the Office of Naval Research contract number
for instruction and the basic structure of a game N00014-08-C-0030. We would like to thank our
level so that the associated software interfaces customer Dr. Rodney Chapman, Chief Learning
and graphics could be created in a timely manner, Officer of the Naval Service Training Command,
and were content to leave easy-to-change data and his staff for their active participation in refin-
details (e.g., the specific dialog and instructional ing and guiding our product design, and Lt. Greg
messages, or sequencing of activities within a Page from the Recruit Training Command for his
level) as part of an iterative refinement process assistance in providing subject matter expertise.
led by the instructional designers. Finally, the We would like to thank Dr. Ray Perez and Mr.
story developers by nature preferred a strong early Paul Chatelier of the Potomac Institute of Policy
investment in coming to agreement on the basic Studies for identifying opportunities for putting
story in order to ensure that successive iterative our research efforts in context of the Navy’s current
refinements of the instructional design or technol- needs. We would like to thank Steve Greenlaw of
ogy could be shaped to maintain a powerful story. Intelligent Decision Systems, Inc. for providing
From their vantage point, powerful stories create subject matter expertise. Finally, we would like to
powerful experiences that invite participation thank the software designers and engineers who
while information and data, on the contrary, invite contributed to the development and testing of the
critique. The danger of ignoring the story aspect product: Chris Rodgers and Brad Anderegg from
of a learning game at any stage of the process is Alion Science and Technology, Rachel Joyce and
that achieving a powerful story becomes difficult. Julian Orrego of UCF, and Erin Panttaja, Todd
Of the many lessons learned in this effort, most Wright and John Ostwald of BBN Technologies.
involve the challenge of effective communication
among professionals from diverse backgrounds.

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This work was previously published in Serious Game Design and Development: Technologies for Training and Learning, edited by
Jan Cannon-Bowers and Clint Bowers, pp. 47-80, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.16
Bridging Game Development
and Instructional Design
James Belanich
U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA

Karin A. Orvis
Old Dominion University, USA

Daniel B. Horn
U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA

Jennifer L. Solberg
U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral Social Sciences, USA

ABSTRACT fer with respect to prioritizing goals and design/

development processes. However, the creation of
Instructional video game development is occur- an effective instructional video game—one that
ring in both the commercial game development both motivates and teaches—is dependent on
and the instructional design/development com- the successful partnering of these communities.
munities, but regularly in isolation from one Accordingly, this chapter elucidates the com-
another. While many proclaim that game-based monalities and differences in the development
learning offers an instructional revolution, the goals and approaches of these communities and
empirical results on instructional effectiveness discusses how best practices of each community
have been mixed. These mixed findings may be should be blended for optimal instructional video
due to the contrasting approaches utilized within game design. This chapter also includes relevant
these two communities. These communities dif- experiences from an instructional PC-video game
development project, illustrating challenges faced
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch216

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Bridging Game Development and Instructional Design

and new opportunities afforded via a collaborative have mastered the development of video games
development effort. for entertainment purposes. Video games designed
specifically for instructional purposes represent
a gray area, with training game development oc-
INTRODUCTION curring in both communities but many times in
isolation from one another.
With traditional instructional methods, such as It is possible that the demonstrated mixed
formal classroom instruction, one fundamental effectiveness of instructional video games (e.g.,
challenge can be motivating students to fully en- Beal, 2005; Hays, 2005) can be attributed to the
gage in the instructional content. PC-based instruc- contrasting approaches utilized within these two
tional video games have become an increasingly communities. Many believe that the commercial
popular instructional medium, as many proclaim game development and instructional design/train-
that video games engage and motivate learners in ing development communities differ greatly with
ways that traditional instruction hasn’t in the past respect to their fundamental goals (i.e., entertain-
(Gee, 2003; Herz & Macedonia, 2002; Prensky, ment versus learning) and processes involved
2001). Further, some proponents of instructional in design/development (i.e., game development
video games suggest that today’s learners (and versus instructional design processes).
game-players) are wired differently than learners The creation of an effective instructional video
of the past, and that game-based learning lever- game—a game that motivates and also success-
ages this difference, capturing their motivation to fully teaches the intended instructional objec-
learn (e.g., Prensky, 2001). tives—is dependent on the successful partnering of
While many assert that game-based learn- these two communities. While these communities
ing offers a new revolution in instruction (Gee, may hold different goals or definitions of a suc-
2003; Herz & Macedonia, 2002; Prensky, 2001), cessful development initiative, these goals are not
the empirical results concerning its effectiveness incompatible. Further, while on the surface these
with respect to student knowledge acquisition and communities may appear to utilize unique design/
retention have been mixed to date (Hays, 2005). development approaches, these two communities
Thus, utilizing this engaging medium may help actually embrace complementary approaches.
alleviate the concern of low student motivation; Accordingly, the purpose of this chapter is to
however, motivation alone is not a sufficient condi- elucidate the commonalities and differences in the
tion for learning. This suggests that the important development goals and approaches of these two
question for instructional game developers is not communities, and discuss how the best practices
whether a learner is fully engaged in game play; of each community should be blended for optimal
rather, is the “engaged” learner actually learning instructional video game design.
the instructional objectives embedded in the video The remainder of the chapter is organized as
game or merely playing the game? In short, both follows. First, the overarching development goals
student motivation and pedagogical structure are of both game developers and instructional design-
necessary determinants of the effectiveness of ers are described. This includes how these goals
instructional video games. differ, as well as overlap. Next, is a description of
The development of instructional video games the different developmental processes that game
represents new territory. Experts in the instruc- developers and instructional designers are likely
tional design/training development community to follow in product development. Again, differ-
have typically developed tools used for instruc- ences and similarities in the product development
tion, while commercial game development experts processes of both communities are highlighted.

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Further, to illustrate the challenges faced meeting with the local police chief. The choices
and new opportunities afforded when these two of available actions (for the learner) are selected
communities partner in the development of an from the menu at the lower left corner of the screen,
instructional game, examples from experiences and the computer-generated character verbally
during the development of a training game called responds to the learner’s choice. In the lower right
ELECT BiLAT are provided. This game-based window, there is an on-going printed transcript
training tool was designed to provide U.S. Army of the interaction, along with hints and coaching
officers instruction on preparing for and conduct- from an intelligent tutor built into the game.
ing bi-lateral, cross-cultural negotiation meetings. The ELECT BiLAT project described here has
Specifically, in ELECT BiLAT, learners are been sponsored and managed by the U.S. Army
confronted with a series of scenarios that involve Research, Development, and Engineering Com-
meetings with leaders in an Iraqi village. In order mand’s Simulation and Training Technology
to successfully accomplish their mission, learners Center (STTC). The development of ELECT
must correctly plan and execute these meetings, BiLAT was a collaboration between the Univer-
thereby demonstrating proper cultural, negotia- sity of Southern California’s Institute for Creative
tion, and decision-making skills. Technologies and three U.S. Army research agen-
ELECT BiLAT is based on a commercial cies (STTC, the Army Research Institute for the
game engine and includes interactive computer- Behavioral and Social Sciences, and the Army
generated characters and automated instructional Research Laboratory—Human Research Engi-
feedback/coaching. Although ELECT BiLAT uses neering Directorate). In order to maximize the
a 3D game engine, it is not a first-person-shooter potential success of both the development and
game; in fact, there is no shooting in the system, implementation of this instructional game, this
and most user interaction is accomplished through collaborative effort brought together multiple
a menu system. Figure 1 displays a sample screen researchers and practitioners in the fields of game
shot from ELECT BiLAT. In this portion of the design, human factors, and instructional design,
game, the learner is engaged in a negotiation along with U.S. Army trainers and students. Ad-

Figure 1. Screenshot of ELECT BiLAT, depicting a negotiation meeting with the police chief (©2007
University of Southern California. Used with permission)

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ditional details about ELECT BiLAT can be found Both the primary goal of the game developer
in Hill et al. (2006). and of the instructional designer are critical to
the success of an instructional video game, in
that a successful instructional game must maxi-
DEVELOPMENT GOALS mize player motivation/engagement, as well as
knowledge acquisition and retention (see Figure
Commercial game developers and instructional 2). Further, to ensure that both goals are optimally
designers do not have incompatible goals for achieved, the utilization of a multi-disciplinary
product development (e.g., instructional video team, consisting of both game developers and
game development); however, their priorities may instructional designers (as well as team members
be a bit different. At a general level, both game with other qualities like training domain subject
developers and instructional designers want to matter expertise, graphic artists, and product
develop a successful product; however, the stan- management) is critical. Game developers are
dards with which these groups measure success skilled at designing games that are engaging
differs. For game developers, if the game results and have motivating and intriguing story lines
in a high sales volume and users want to play it, (Dickey, 2005); whereas, instructional designers
they are successful. Thus, the primary goal of a are skilled at structuring information within a
commercial game developer is to maximize player learning environment so that learning will take
enjoyment and motivation to continue playing the place (Branson, 1978; Dick & Carey, 1990).
game. For instructional designers, they are only Both skill sets are required for development of
successful if the students learn the instructional an instructional video game.
content. It doesn’t matter how much the learners A multi-disciplinary team may initially strug-
enjoy the game and want to continue playing if gle in the process of instructional game develop-
they are not learning as a result of game play. ment because of their varied world view of
Accordingly, the primary goal of an instructional product development. The initial struggle can be
designer is to assure that the student has achieved minimized through clarifying each others’ objec-
mastery over the learning objectives. tives, common terminology, and processes for
meeting their overarching goals (i.e., motivation

Figure 2. A depiction of the overlapping goals of commercial game developers and instructional design-
ers when they work together to build an effective training game

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or learning). During the development of ELECT ing objectives. Conversely, if a game developer
BiLAT, there was a realization that the two com- observes that the training game appears to be a
munities possessed different operational defini- little boring, then the team can work together on
tions for the same term. For example, on the in- alternative ways to engage the learner and maintain
structional design side, the term “content” relates learner attention.
to the information/domain to be trained (e.g., Just because the primary goals and objectives
negotiations and cultural norms). On the game of game developers and instructional designers
development side, “content” relates to objects that are not identical, does not mean that they are
appear on the screen (e.g., buttons, characters, incompatible. By working together during the
and background items). Another example of a development process, they can achieve both
term that needed clarification was training support goals—a training game that is motivating to play
material. The instructional design view was that and maximizes acquisition and retention of the
background information on the training domain instructional content. Each group must be aware
was the primary component of supporting mate- of the other’s perspective (likely through extensive
rial, while the game development view was that communication) and respect the other’s position
supporting material consisted of mainly instruc- while working toward the common goal of de-
tions on how to use the game. To assist in mini- veloping an effective training game.
mizing such misunderstandings of “common”
terminology used, a list of shared vocabulary was
developed—a comprehensive list of terms and DEVELOPMENT PROCESSES
definitions that the different partners used. Dis-
cussing and clarifying the differences provided a In this section, the general approaches that the
means to communicate more clearly across spe- two groups take toward product development are
cialties and to better understand each community’s described (see Table 2). The terminology used for
goals and objectives for the project. This also the various steps of design/development across
helped to mitigate some of the challenges of the gaming and instructional design communities
bringing together individuals from fields that have are explained, followed by a discussion of how
distinct cultures (Finholt & Birnholtz, 2006). the operational definitions of some of the terms
While the fundamental goal of game developers vary between these groups. The goal is to illus-
and instructional designers may not be identical, trate that while these two groups have distinctly
they do share the desire to avoid the same obstacles
to success (see Table 1). No game developer or
instructional designer wants an uninteresting and Table 1. Examples of goals and obstacles for
confusing product that is easily forgotten. Thus, commercial game and instructional designers
one way to help circumvent this initial difficulty
in collaborating is to shift the focus of the team   Primary Objectives Obstacles
Goal
to minimizing obstacles to training game suc-
Engaging Lack of Interest
cess. For example, if during the development
Games Motivation Playability Confusion
process the instructional designers realize that the
Challenge Boring
game, as currently conceptualized, fails to teach
Skill Acquisi- Skill Degrada-
all aspects of the intended set of competencies, tion tion
then the game developer (and team) should take Instruction Learning Mastery Confusion
that as an opportunity to modify properties of the   Attention Lack of Interest
game to more effectively link it with the learn-

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Table 2. A comparison of the five steps in the development processes of instructional designers and
commercial video game developers

→→ → Development Process → → →
Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 Step 5
Instructional Design - Analysis - Design - Development - Implementation - Evaluation
Computer Game - Choose goal/topic - Design - Program - Deliver - Post mortem
Design - Research - Storyboard - Playtest

different design/development steps, they share include potential users playing paper-based and
many similarities. software-based prototypes, with feedback being
The instructional design approach tends to be used to make modifications to the design. Also,
structured rather linearly with respect to product the first “working” version is not thought to be the
(instructional system) development. While the final version, but a work in progress. There tends
specific processes used by instructional designers to be a good deal of testing, continued modifica-
may vary to some extent (e.g., Branson, 1978; tion, and retesting until the developers are ready
Dick & Carey, 1990; van Merriënboer, Clark, & to “go gold” (i.e., have a final version ready to
de Croock, 2002; Winston, 1968), with some deliver to users).
processes involving an iterative component, for The steps and processes used by game devel-
the most part, the linear approach seems to be the opers share many features with those used in the
norm when applied. For instance, a commonly instructional design approach, in that they both
used approach for instructional systems design is have analysis, design, development, implemen-
captured by the acronym ADDIE, which stands tation, and evaluation phases. The remainder of
for the steps of: analysis, design, development, this section describes in detail the similarities and
implementation, and evaluation. These steps are differences between the processes used by these
well known by instructional designers and fre- two communities, and provides examples of how
quently utilized to guide their development of game developers and instructional designers can
instructional software. effectively combine their efforts throughout the
In the commercial game industry, there is development of an instructional video game.
also a fairly standard process for developing a Step One. For an instructional designer, the
product. Many game developers have previous “analysis” phase involves identifying what needs
experience with software development; this is to be learned (Branson, 1978). The primary aspect
why the computer game development processes of this is to specify explicit learning objectives.
often share many similarities with well-known This also includes determining the current knowl-
software development processes (Boehm, 1988; edge base of the intended learners, as well as the
Royce, 1970). Generally, the first step is to gaps in their knowledge, skills, and abilities that
choose a goal/topic/theme for the game, followed need to be addressed by the training to be devel-
by the steps of research, design (preprogram & oped. For a game developer, the first step involves
storyboard), program/playtest, delivery, and post making decisions about: (a) the type/genre of game
mortem (Crawford, 1997). For commercial game they plan to build (e.g., first-person-perspective,
development, many of these processes tend to be multi-player), (b) the development and delivery
very fluid, with multiple steps being worked on at platform to utilize (e.g., licensing an existing
any one point in time and with continual revisit- game engine versus creating a new one), and (c)
ing of any given step. This iterative process may who will be their target audience. In the design

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of an instructional video game neither of these game-training content match, and (b) learners’
“analysis” decisions needs to supersede the other; prior video game experience. With respect to
and it is suggested that all of these decisions are the former, the training content of a game can
valuable and should be explicitly considered. be intrinsic or extrinsic to the game genre. An
One clear parallel between the worlds of intrinsically instructive game is one in which
game developers and instructional designers is the training content is a fundamental aspect of
the analysis/research of the intended audience. the game mechanic—for example, using a flight
Game developers may ask questions about their simulator to train pilots. Research suggests that
target audience, the complexity of the set of rules by selecting a game with similar attributes to the
governing game play, and the game’s story line. training domain, less effort will be required for the
Whereas, instructional designers may ask ques- learner to transfer what is learned in the game to
tions about the intended trainees, such as their the real-world context where they must apply those
current level of understanding of the topic of lessons (Auffrey, Mirabella, & Siebold, 2001).
instruction (as well as the intended mastery level An extrinsic training game is one for which
post-training), the ability of the students to use the the training content is not directly related to the
training technology, and how this fits into their underlying game mechanic, but instead uses
broader curriculum. Both sets of questions address the game as a way to deliver unrelated content.
who the targeted end user will be. Understanding Prenksy’s Straight Shooter!, a first-person-shooter
the characteristics of this user in turn will facilitate game designed to teach bankers about derivatives
the development of the most effective training policies and practices, is a good example (see
game—one that meets the needs of the learner. Prensky, 2001, pp. 248-253). If the training content
The choice of game genre is another important is particularly well suited for a particular game
decision for both commercial game developers genre (e.g., a flight simulator for some basic flying
and instructional designers intent on creating a concepts and skills), it is often advantageous to
training game. From the commercial game per- use that game-training content match. However,
spective, the choice of game genre is often driven even when there is a clear game-training content
by factors such as the expertise and experience match, the decision to develop that particular
of the design team, with teams playing to their type of game is not necessarily warranted. As
strengths. Marketing and sales concerns also play an example, consider attempting to train infan-
a role in this decision. As an example, not only try squad leaders. While it may seem natural to
is a company with a history of producing sports use a first-person-shooter, if the goal is to train
games likely to be better at producing sports decision-making and strategy it may be better to
games than other types of games, this company is rely on a more strategic (perhaps even turn-based)
also more likely to have a greater understanding game-style in order to encourage more deliberative
of the sports gaming market. If such a company thought. In short, one needs to seriously consider
were to decide to create a strategic war game, the knowledge and skills to be trained before se-
they would face a number of challenges—both lecting the game genre of the instructional game.
in the development and sale of a new title. With In selecting the genre of a training game, it is
the exception of a few highly popular franchises also useful to consider the prior video game experi-
(e.g., Star Wars), game purchasing behaviors are ence of potential learners; as aforementioned, the
more likely to remain within genre than between analysis of who will be using the training game
genre (Horn, 2006). is critical. If the users are not familiar with a par-
For the instructional designer, there are two ticular game genre, then there may be time wasted
key aspects to the decision of game genre: (a) trying to teach the learner how to use the game

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interface, sacrificing time devoted toward learning Step Two. For both instructional designers and
the training domain. Further, research suggests commercial game developers, the design phase
that learners who have previous experience with includes developing a plan that will accomplish the
video game genres similar to the training game goal of making a successful product. Instructional
are more likely to demonstrate positive training designers frequently accomplish their overarching
outcomes, such as enhanced training performance, goal of maximizing student learning by breaking
training satisfaction, and time spent engaging in down what needs to be taught into small chunks
the training game (Orvis, Horn, & Belanich, 2006; and then organizing these instructional chunks in
Orvis, Orvis, Belanich, & Mullin, 2007). a structured, sequenced way (i.e., an organization
For ELECT BiLAT, on the instructional de- scheme that leads a learner toward mastering
sign side, the analysis step/phase started with the learning objectives) (Bransford, Brown, &
interviews of Army instructors and other subject Cocking, 1999; Branson, 1978; Moreno & Mayer,
matter experts (SMEs) to understand the targeted 2002). Typically, commercial game developers
training domain and typical gaps in trainees’ would work toward accomplishing their over-
knowledge, skills, and abilities (Hill et al., 2006). arching goal of maximizing player motivation/
A set of learning objectives was developed to engagement by creating a general story or path
clearly identify what should be learned by the that they want the player to experience as part of
students. There was also a discussion about the the game, filling in details as they proceed. This
game technology that would be most appropriate process would end with the development of paper-
for the target group of learners. Since the target based storyboards which include the sequence of
learners were Army officers with considerable events that are likely to occur during the game
years of military experience (typically in their experience and what the different game screens
40s), it was noted that these individuals were not would look like to the user.
typical gamers (Belanich, Orvis, Moore, Horn, & In short, instructional designers tend to take a
Solberg, 2007). Thus, a training game involving bottom-up approach, starting with small chunks
complex movements through a 3D world would and organizing them into a whole. Conversely,
likely be foreign to many of them and require game developers tend to adopt a top-down ap-
a good deal of up-front training on the game proach, working from a general story idea/theme
technology, with little added value to training the and progressively adding detail. These processes
instructional domain. Accordingly, the decision do not need to be incompatible; in fact, they can
was made to simplify the game mechanics and be integrated. For example, instructional designers
interactions with computer-generated characters can first develop their learning chunks/nuggets.
as negotiation meeting partners. There was a focus Then, the game developers can utilize this infor-
on more familiar types of buttons and menus in mation to develop a general story line that will
the user interface to best meet the needs of this include all of the learning chunks. Both groups
group of learners. On the game development side, can then work together to fill in the gaps so that
the choice was made to use the rendering capabili- there is a meaningful organization of chunks
ties of a 3D game engine to provide an engaging within the story line.
environment for the training that would immerse In fact, it can be argued that the story line and the
the students in the training scenarios. All of this teaching points must be fully integrated; building
minimized the time needed to learn how to use the instructional content into a story line is key for
the training game, allowing more time to be spent an instructional game (Dickey, 2006). Research
learning while engaging in the game. has shown that learners are more likely to learn

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information in an instructional video game when scenarios, direct questions were asked to the SMEs,
it is integrated into the story line or progression of such as “When you are engaging in Task A, what
the game versus information that is superfluous are the most important aspects to be aware of?”
to the overall flow of the game (Belanich, Sibley, In addition, some examples of critical incidents
& Orvis, 2004). There are several techniques for pertaining to this task were requested (i.e., real-
aligning instructional content with the game story world situations of when they had effectively/
line (see Dickey, 2006). The practical take home ineffectively engaged in the task) (Anderson
point is that story development and training do- & Wilson, 1997). These “important aspects to
main development should not occur in isolation. consider” and SME-provided critical incidents
The instructional content must be fully integrated were then woven into the story line, paired with
into the overall story line of the game to maximize the identified skills and concepts to be trained.
effectiveness. Another important variable to consider in the
One caution when developing a story line is design phase is the level of challenge that will
that even if it shares an overall theme with the be most appropriate for the training game. This
training domain, it may not match up well with is important on an instructional level, in that you
the specific teaching points/learning objectives want to push learners to gain new knowledge and
that are required. For example, playing a game skills; however, you also do not want to overwhelm
like Rollercoaster TycoonTM may make a player the learners by asking them to perform tasks
aware of some of the aspects of building and that are well beyond their current mastery level
maintaining a theme park that the player wasn’t (Bowman, 1982; Garris, Ahlers, & Driskell, 2002;
aware of before. However, it won’t teach a per- Rieber, 1996). The appropriate level of challenge
son the engineering skills of building an actual is also important on a motivational level, in that
rollercoaster or the accounting/business practices to maintain high levels of motivation, the task
of running an actual theme park. being performed should be neither too easy as
To avoid this issue during the development to become boring, or too hard to be frustrating
of ELECT BiLAT, active collaboration between (Belanich, Sibley, & Orvis, 2004; Crawford, 1997;
the instructional designers and game developers Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Malone & Lepper, 1987).
was critical, as well as seeking input from train- With ELECT BiLAT, we knew it was possible
ing domain content experts. First, instructional that some of the target learners might possess
designers identified the tasks and learning objec- limited prior experience with the training domain;
tives that were to be trained, and made sure that therefore, starting the game at a high challenge
they were integral parts of the immersive story level would have been problematic. However, it
line (Hill et al., 2006). This involved performing was also critical to include scenarios that would
a detailed task analysis, identifying the skills and challenge those with greater levels of prior experi-
behaviors necessary for planning and engaging in ence, as well as learners that had improved their
bi-lateral meetings. This task analysis was based knowledge and skills over the course of using the
on interviews with Army instructors and other game. Accordingly, a series of progressively more
SMEs, a review of Army doctrine, and a review difficult negotiation scenarios were developed and
of the published literature on culture and negotia- used in the game (Hill et al., 2006).
tions. Results from the task analysis were later The design phase is critical for instructional
fed back to the SMEs and instructors to ensure video game development success, and will require
that it accurately represented the training domain. game developers and instructional designers to
Further, in order for the game developers to build communicate their wants and needs. Because the
an engaging but realistic story line for the training product is in the conceptual stage at this point, it

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is not that easy to clearly explain what is required of learners (e.g., whether through cooperative
and why it is important across the two communi- agreements with instructors intending to use the
ties. Simple prototypes or examples from products instructional tool or through individuals recruited
that share similar features can help in this inter- to participate in a focus group).
change of ideas. With ELECT BiLAT, the game Game developers typically involve people from
developers created a paper-based prototype to the actual target audience to play-test alpha and
show instructional designers (and later potential beta versions of the game. The game developers
users and Army instructors) how the training game observe the play-testers using the game and ask
would work. From these “show and tell” sessions for their opinions about different aspects of the
with users and instructors, the game developers game (e.g., Is it fun? Is it challenging enough?
and instructional designers gathered extensive Did they find the storyline interesting? What
feedback (in terms of engagement of the story, worked and what didn’t?). Play-testing is very
ease of use, and if the game adequately captured important because the best way to determine if
the instruction domain). This feedback was used intended users will enjoy the game is to have them
to improve the design and update the prototype. play it and then capture their feedback (Salen &
Over time, the prototype was iteratively refined Zimmerman, 2004). In addition to using such
and tested until the major game-play elements and a pilot group of play-testers, commercial game
instructional components were deemed sufficient developers are often able to glean feedback from
and fully integrated. the player community through alpha and beta
Step Three. During the development/program- versions which have been released to the public.
ming step, the plan (created during the previous This feedback, while valuable, typically focuses
step) is used to produce the actual video game. on issues that are of concern to experienced, highly
This is where the programmers start typing out motivated players—making it a bit more difficult
computer code, working to implement the plan. In to predict the types of problems that novice game
order to minimize any misunderstandings as the players may face.
paper plan is being translated to software code, Commercial game developers attempt to get as
it is important that the plan is clear, both in terms much feedback as they can at this point in the prod-
of instructional content and motivational game uct development process because they typically
features (e.g., realism of graphics, usability of do not have the opportunity to make significant
interface, challenge level presented). revisions once they go to the delivery phase. (It
As with any plan, once it is put in motion there should be noted that while game patches have be-
are often modifications that need to be made. While come relatively common among computer games,
both instructional designers and game developers they have been historically difficult or impossible
tend to use iterative development models (to some with console games. This is starting to change as
capacity), there are some differences in the kind the newest generation of consoles typically have
of feedback that loops back into the development Internet access.) Conversely, instructional design-
process. For instructional designers, feedback is ers are expecting to also get feedback at a later
typically provided by someone in the role of an stage (i.e., Step 5—Evaluation) and this informa-
instructor. This feedback entails the aspects of tion is frequently used to make further revisions.
the instructional tool that they think would be In short, game developers have a tendency for
effective for teaching their students, as well as a shorter feedback loop for each iteration of the
what components need modification. Ideally, game. Further, they will develop segments of the
instructional designers are able to obtain some game and get feedback on their development all
level of in-class evaluation using a pilot group within this step. In contrast, instructional design-

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ers have a tendency for a longer feedback loop in necessarily expected to utilize the tool indepen-
that they will develop the training tool (Step 3), dently. In contrast, with entertainment games, the
formally evaluate how well the training worked term delivery is used because it is expected that the
(Step 5), and use the results of this evaluation to system will stand on its own. Game directions are
update/revamp the training tool. important and needed to guide users. However, if
With ELECT BiLAT, an iterative development users have questions that go beyond the provided
process with both short (within step) and long directions, gamers are usually more than willing
(across Steps 3-5) feedback loops was used (Hill to search around for answers. For example, users
et al., 2006). Examples of short feedback loops may go to gaming Web sites or read other material
include when the game developers/programmers that may provide the answers they seek.
would demonstrate their work for the team and It is important to note that in both the instruc-
make quick modifications based on feedback tional and entertainment domains, there is a need
received. Also, when the software was at a stage to provide sufficient guidance regarding how to
to be play-tested, a pilot group—representing the use the game. Further, the guidance provided
population of instructors and students in which the may need to be expanded with an instructional
training was intended—were asked to try out the game. For example, there typically is a need to
instructional game and give extensive feedback provide support to not only the learner, but also
both in terms of instructional content and playabil- the instructor, who may not have expertise with
ity/engagement. An example of a long feedback computers or video games. This “train-the-trainer”
loop includes the iterative delivery of versions of effort plays an integral role in the success or failure
the game to individuals in the U.S. Army course of an instructional video game, as an otherwise
where the game was to be implemented. During excellent training game can fail if it is not effec-
this roll out, multiple versions (based on the sug- tively implemented in a course (Belanich, Mullin,
gested feedback) were delivered and formally & Dressel, 2004).
evaluated for instructional impact (i.e., did they Several pitfalls can lead to poor implementa-
learn?), usability, and motivational factors. The tion/delivery of training games. Belanich, Mullin,
cooperation and patience of Army instructors and Dressel (2004) described various obstacles to
during this process was critical. The detailed, successful training game implementation. One of
expert assessment that instructors, students, the main reasons for ineffective implementation
and other SMEs were able to provide enabled is that the game is not clearly integrated into the
both incremental and significant improvements curriculum of the course. For instance, learners are
relatively quickly. Had this tool been created by never explicitly told the purpose of this instruc-
a team without direct access to the target group tional tool or what they should seek to achieve
of learners/instructors, this type of user feedback by engaging in the game. Without a reason as to
(across Steps 3-5) would likely not be available. why the learners are devoting effort to play the
Step Four. In Step 4, the end user gets to game, students may wonder, “What’s the point?” It
actually use the game. For instructional design- should be clear to students what they are expected
ers, the term implementation is used because the to gain from playing the training game (i.e., the
instructional tool is often part of a course or some learning objectives to master and/or competencies
larger curriculum. When used as part of a course/ to be developed). Also, if the instructor does not
curriculum, there is the possibility that guidance know how to use the training game (e.g., maneuver
on the instructional tool will be provided to the through the user interface), this can lead to wasted
learner by an instructor or someone else who time as the students have to learn how to use the
provides this support function. Learners are not game on their own. Furthermore, the students may

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gain the impression that the instructor doesn’t Web sites. If the game is successful, there might
really know the instructional material. Clearly, be a second version—only “bigger and better,”
proper implementation is critical for a training with new features. If the game is not successful,
game to be fully effective. they may chalk it up as experience and develop a
With ELECT BiLAT, the intended implemen- completely different game. The market response
tation was for the game to be used as an in-class to entertainment games is relatively quick—if
exercise (to take only a few hours) as part of a two- gamers are not satisfied, a game will not sell well.
week course. First, the instructor would highlight Additionally, the gaming community has evolved
some of the topics to be addressed within ELECT to a point where there is a good deal of feedback
BiLAT. The instructor would also go through some provided via online forums, magazines, and so
of the procedures that the students would have to forth. With instructional games, sales often rely
complete as they were progressing through the on slower procurement processes, with decisions
game. Then as the students used ELECT BiLAT, often being made not only by instructors, but by
the instructor would be available for assistance. other administrators.
Fortunately, the lead instructor had been involved The challenge of evaluating the effectiveness
in early discussions and demonstrations of the of an instructional game, both in terms of accuracy
game and was motivated to provide feedback, and time, may not enable the development team
which were critical to making the implementation to assess market satisfaction quickly. This can
of the game successful. There has been discussion significantly delay the feedback loop. A combina-
regarding the best way to ensure that this knowl- tion of the aforementioned methods to evaluate
edge is available to students in other contexts the effectiveness of an instructional game might
(e.g., contexts with less active/knowledgeable be most appropriate. This evaluation should ad-
facilitators or no facilitator), and future versions dress both instructional (did learning occur) and
of ELECT BiLAT will include additional support motivational (was it engaging to the learner)
information. Among the solutions being discussed aspects of the instructional game.
is the inclusion of a video introduction to the game The evaluation of ELECT BiLAT has been
and its interface. This is a key area which must be ongoing, and has relied on measures of learning,
considered if gaming savvy instructors will not performance data logs, student feedback/satisfac-
be available at the implementation site. tion, and instructor feedback. Again, because of
Step Five. For instructional designers, the a close relationship with the course instructors,
evaluation phase is not necessarily the end. Based detailed feedback was provided which influenced
on the results of the evaluation, they are likely to subsequent updates. The initial results indicate that
revamp the design and may go through another the students are learning due to this implemen-
cycle of development. Because there is often an tation. There is always room for improvement,
instructor overseeing the use of the training tool, and based on the initial evaluation, additional
the instructional designers might get feedback modifications are currently being made.
from the instructor’s perspective. If there is a
formal evaluation conducted, which is not always
the case (Hays, 2005), student feedback may also CONCLUSION
be available.
With game development, there are different Instructional designers and game developers may
avenues to gather feedback on the success/failure be quite different, and their experiences and priori-
of an effort. The evaluation of a commercial game ties might, at times, appear to be at odds with one
may rely on sales data and player critiques on game another. However, when developing instructional

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games, they do share a similar overarching goal— several processes used by instructional design-
to build a successful product, and in this case, a ers (Bransford et al., 1999; Dick & Carey, 1990;
successful instructional game. Remaining focused Moreno & Mayer, 2002). Likewise, instructional
on this common goal as the priority should assist designers may benefit from understanding and
these two communities in bridging their diverse incorporating several processes used by game
perspectives and expertise in order to develop the developers (Bethke, 2003; Crawford, 1997; Salen
optimal instructional video game. & Zimmerman, 2004; Squire, 2005). In short, com-
Throughout this chapter, it has been argued municating and understanding the commonalities
that the critical determinant of the success of and differences of the expectations and processes
video games as instructional tools lies in the of their partnering community should facilitate
willingness of commercial game developers and their successful collaboration. Further, the unique
instructional designers to work with one another, as elements of each community’s approach should
well as their ability to successfully integrate their be blended for optimal instructional video game
central goals and design/development processes. design—an instructional video game which is both
The primary implication of this work suggests intrinsically motivating and pedagogically sound.
that a collaborative team with members of differ-
ent specialties working together is essential for
achieving the goal of building a game that is both ACKNOWLEDGMENT
instructional and motivating to use. Unfortunately,
according to Squire (2005), who conducted a Statements and opinions expressed in this chapter
series of case studies of video game-based learn- do not necessarily reflect the position or the policy
ing product development, organizations may use of the United States Government, and no official
interdisciplinary game development teams, but endorsement should be inferred. The ELECT
they do not include instructional designers as project described here has been sponsored and
part of the team. A typical team includes program managed by the U.S. Army Research, Develop-
managers, graphic artists, and programmers—no ment, and Engineering Command’s Simulation
instructional designers. Without specialists who and Training Technology Center. The chapter
understand how to provide instruction, it isn’t authors (from the Army Research Institute) would
surprising that many instructional games do not like to express their appreciation to the partners
effectively teach the intended instructional objec- who collaborated on ELECT BiLAT (i.e., STTC,
tives (Hays, 2005). the Army Research Laboratory—Human Research
To provide insight into how a successful merg- Engineering Directorate, and the Institute for
ing of these two communities can be accomplished, Creative Technologies).
relevant research in both game development and
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including education, psychology, information SME typically may not have an expertise in train-
technology, graphic design, and others. ing or instructional design, he or she can play an
Iterative Development: A model of system integral role in the design of instructional games.
development in which the ability to rework and Spiral Development: An iterative model of
revise aspects of the software is scheduled. In this system development in which software is built
approach, the developer benefits from prototype in progressive phases. In each phase, a prototype
evaluation during the development process. of the software is reviewed by the customer and
Learning Objective: A specific, measurable evaluated prior to further development. Follow-
task (or class of tasks/actions) a learner should ing the review, another prototype is built and
be able to perform as the result of training. It evaluated. This process continues until the final
should include the conditions under which the product is delivered.
task should be performed as well as the criteria Storyboard: A graphic means of presenting
by which performance will be judged. the story line of a video game, movie, or cartoon.
Subject Matter Expert (SME): An individual In serious games, this depicts the plot of the video
with a high level of knowledge in a particular game in which learning objectives are embedded.
domain—subject matter to be taught. Although an

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education, edited by Richard
E. Ferdig, pp. 1088-1103, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 2.17
Lessons Learned about
Designing Augmented Realities
Patrick O’Shea
Harvard University, USA

Rebecca Mitchell
Harvard University, USA

Catherine Johnston
Harvard University, USA

Chris Dede
Harvard University, USA

ABSTRACT of determining why the aliens have come to earth.

This study describes the design heuristics used
While utilizing GPS-enabled handheld computing during the initial development and deployment
units, we have developed and studied augmented of Alien Contact!, the results of two formative
reality (AR) curricula to help middle school evaluations of this curriculum, and the impact
students learn literacy and math. In AR, students these findings have had on revising our design
move around an outdoor physical environment, heuristics for a subsequent AR curriculum about
interacting with virtual characters and artifacts beached whales, called Gray Anatomy.
on their handheld computer. These invisible ob-
jects and characters provide clues to help solve a
mystery, guiding the students through a process INTRODUCTION
of inquiry and evidence building. The first AR
curriculum we developed, Alien Contact! is based Researchers are starting to study how AR mo-
on a scenario where aliens have crash landed near dalities for learning aid students’ engagement and
the students’ middle school. Students, working in understanding (Dunleavy, Dede, & Mitchell, in
teams, learn math and literacy skills in the course press; Klopfer & Squire, 2008; Klopfer, Yoon, &
Perry, 2005; Klopfer, Yoon, & Rivas, 2004). This
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch217 article explores the background of AR, describes

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities

the Handheld Augmented Reality Project (HARP) technology to facilitate situated learning environ-
at Harvard University, explains the results from ments—particularly through the use of handheld
formative evaluations of the first AR curriculum and wearable computing devices. Through the
created through HARP, and delineates how the use of participatory simulations they found that
lessons learned from this evaluation impacted students were more motivated, engaged, and ex-
the development of a subsequent AR curriculum. cited by the process of participatory learning than
they are by more traditional means of learning.
Motivation concerns the selective direction,
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK energizing, and regulating of behavior patterns
(Ford, 1992). It is central to persistence in learning
The theory that learning occurs most effectively and to producing positive outcomes (Ryan & Deci,
in authentic setting is not new. Hendricks (2001) 2000). Vygotsky (1978) found that, even before
stated that complex social interactions are at the behavior sets in, through motivation we decide
heart of learning. Brown, Collins, and Duguid where we direct attention. There are different types
(1989) more precisely defined this thinking of motivation, and they have different impacts on
through their belief that individuals’ interactions learning and sustaining learning (Ryan & Deci).
with their social teams lead to their adoption Extrinsic motivation ranges from, at one end, a
of learned behaviors. This phenomenon, which sense that our behavior is controlled by others who
Hendricks called situated cognition, is different do things to regulate our behavior, to the other end,
from practices in traditional educational settings. where we have a sense that we are in control of our
There is ample research to substantiate that social own actions and get support from outside actors
interactions are important for accomplishing chal- but little direct regulation of our behavior (Ryan &
lenging learning tasks. Bandura (1977), Vygotsky Deci). Most of the incentives to succeed academi-
(1978), and Scaife and Bruner (1975) found that cally in postsecondary education are designed to
observation of and assistance from others at stimulate various forms of extrinsic motivation.
times precedes and always interacts with human For example, in a competitive classroom, some
cognitive development. Bandura (p.12) highlights students’ suboptimal performance, made explicit
the importance of “symbolic, vicarious, and self- through student rankings and bell curves, serve as
regulatory” processes in social learning. As com- extrinsic motivators for other students to achieve.
pared to a psychological view where learning is a There is strong evidence that cooperative
matter of an individual “performing responses and learning is better for stimulating intrinsic motiva-
experiencing their effects.” Bandura elaborates tion than competitive learning (Gehlbach, 2007).
on his theory that learning is a social process, Classrooms that focus on cooperative learning
explaining that we learn everything vicariously make students responsible for one another’s out-
before we learn it directly because it is the only comes (Gehlbach). Social learning approaches
way we can “acquire large, integrated patterns of may be more likely to foster intrinsic motivation,
behavior without having to form them tediously by the form of motivation most likely to positively
trial and error. The harder the task to be learned, influence persistence, because it is the most self-
the more we must learn it through observation first. directed form of behavior regulation and taps into
Hendricks (2001) found evidence to support our innate desire and capacity to seek out challenge
the idea that practices based on situated cognitive and explore (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Later research
theory can have significant impacts on immediate by Klopfer et al. (2005) substantiated these earlier
learning. Klopfer et al. (2004) focused on the use of findings as to the impacts of simulations. More

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 Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities

recently, Rosenbaum, Klopfer, and Perry (2007) possibly touching a feature of the memorial itself
placed their participatory simulations within the while seeing that feature explained up close on
context of augmented reality. their handheld device). Unique capabilities of AR
include the amplification of real world environ-
ments, the ability of team members to talk face-
AUGMENTED REALITY to-face while interacting simultaneously in the
virtual environment, and the capacity to promote
Squire and Jan (2007) define augmented reality as kinesthetic learning through physical movement
“games played in the real world with the support through sensory spatial contexts.
of digital devices (PDAs, cellphones) that create In addition, the current software developed
a fictional layer on top of the real world context” to facilitate the delivery of AR curricula allows
(p. 6). Squire and Jan focus on place-dependent authentic team interactions and collaboration.
AR games, which require participants to come This is due to the fact that the technology provides
to specific locations to work through the game. individuals within a team of students the ability
Alternatively, place-independent AR games are to take on different roles within the augmented
designed to overlay game elements on a map of reality environment, thus allowing each individual
any physical location. to interact with the virtual elements in different
In AR environments, students interact with ways than their teammates. While students may
virtual and physical objects, people, and envi- arrive at the same physical location as their group,
ronments. Unique capabilities of AR include a different artifact, interview, or task will appear
the amplification of real world environments, on their handheld device than on their teammates
the ability of team members to talk face-to-face who holds a different role. This is more authentic
while interacting simultaneously in the virtual as a collaborative tool due to the fact that indi-
environment, and the capacity to promote kin- vidual students within a team must collaborate and
esthetic learning through physical movement share information in order to progress through the
through sensory spatial contexts. In the form of game. The frequently seen suboptimal practice that
AR that we studied, students utilize GPS-enabled team work is turned over to an individual student
wireless devices that allow them to engage with within the team to complete is not possible with
virtual information superimposed on the physi- this pedagogical approach; each individual must
cal world. For example, a student may be guided participate for the team to be successful.
by a map of Washington DC on their handheld
to walk to the Lincoln Memorial. When they ar-
rive, an image may appear of the memorial itself THE HANDHELD AUGMENTED
containing architectural specifications, or a movie REALITY PROJECT
may become accessible that talks about famous
events in history that have occurred at this loca- HARP is part of a three-year federal grant through
tion, or they will be asked to perform a particular the U.S. Department of Education Star Schools
task. By infusing digital resources throughout the Initiative. HARP is a collaborative effort between
real world, augmenting students’ experiences, Harvard University, the University of Wisconsin,
improving their recognition of patterns, critical and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to
features, background information, and reinforcing study the efficacy of AR technology and curricula
what they are learning through multiple sensory for the instruction of math and language arts at
experiences (i.e., hearing about the memorial from the middle-school level.
an expert, seeing it with their own eyes, and even

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Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities

This project has as its primary objective to de- Axim X51 handheld computer and uses GPS
sign and study engaging and effective augmented technology to correlate the students’ real world
reality learning environments using wireless hand- location to their virtual location in the simulation’s
held computers equipped with GPS receivers. In digital world (Figure 1).
order to do this, HARP personnel have developed As the students move around a physical loca-
an AR curriculum called Alien Contact! and a tion, such as their school playground or sports
subsequent curriculum called Gray Anatomy that fields (Figure 2), a map on their handheld displays
incorporates many of the lessons learned from digital objects and virtual people who exist in an
formative evaluations of the earlier curriculum. AR world superimposed on real space (Figure 3).
When students come within approximately 30
feet of these digital artifacts, the AR and GPS
ALIEN CONTACT! CURRICULUM software triggers video, audio, and text files, which
provide narrative, navigation, and collaboration
We designed Alien Contact! to teach math and cues as well as academic challenges.
literacy skills to middle and high school students In Alien Contact! the students are presented
(Dunleavy et al., in press). This narrative-driven, with the following scenario: Aliens have landed
inquiry-based AR simulation is played on a Dell on Earth and seem to be preparing for a number

Figure 1. Dell Axim & GPS receiver Figure 2. Students exploring school grounds

Figure 3. Handheld display of digital objects on school grounds

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 Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities

of actions, including peaceful contact, invasion, character or object with which the students inter-
plundering, or simply returning to their home act activates the next character or object to appear
planet, among other possibilities. Working in in the progression and deactivates the previous
teams (four pupils per team), the students must character or object.
explore the augmented reality world, interviewing In its full form, Alien Contact! is a six-day,
virtual characters, collecting digital items, and multidisciplinary curriculum that includes two
solving mathematics and literacy puzzles to de- days dedicated to playing the game, and four days
termine why the aliens have landed. Each team interspersed to introduce concepts, allow for analy-
has four roles: chemist, cryptologist, computer sis and synthesis of data gathered during the game
hacker, and FBI agent. Depending upon his or her days, and enable students to develop and present
role, each student will see different pieces of their hypothesis for why the aliens have come to
evidence. In order to successfully navigate the Earth. This curriculum is based on Massachusetts
augmented reality environment and solve various state standards and fosters multiple higher-order
puzzles, the students must share information and thinking skills. In designing this unit, HARP
collaborate with the other members of their team. personnel targeted concepts in math and literacy
As students collect this data, they will discover typically difficult for middle school students to
different possibilities for why the aliens may have master. Using the spring 2005 8th grade MCAS
landed. It is up to the students to form hypotheses test as a reference to determine high-need areas,
based upon the data collected. At the end of the project personnel focused primarily on aspects
unit, the students orally present their findings as of ratio, proportion, and indirect measurement
a team to the class and support their hypothesis (Math Standard 6.M.3, 8.M.4, 8.N.3) in com-
with data collected in the field (Figure 4). bination with how English vocabulary has been
In order to keep the game space uncluttered, influenced by Latin and Greek languages (ELA
only the current and next interactions are shown Standard 4.18, 4.21, 4.24). However, other Math
on the map at any one time. This reduces confu- and ELA standards are embedded within the unit,
sion pertaining to the order of the game, and such as reading graphs (Math 6.P.6, 8.D.2) and
clarifies where the students should progress to conducting team discussions and presentations
next. This is done through a triggering mechanism (ELA 2.4, 3.8, 3.9, 3.11, 3.13).
built into the game development editor. Each This game also aligns with other standards.
The Partnership for 21st Century Skills, a state-
level, public-private partnership geared at making
Figure 4. Students presenting their hypothesis U.S. public education relevant in the 21st century,
has recognized education’s role in building social
capital through education and how challenging this
will be. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills
believes key skills students need include: global
awareness and civic literacy; communication and
contextual learning; and leadership, ethics, and
social responsibility (Hardy, 2007). The Organi-
zation for Economic Cooperation and Develop-
ment (OECD) has included new measures in its
Programme for International Student Assessment
(PISA), a 42 country comparative study conducted
every three years on the skills that 15-year-olds

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Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities

are developing in school. In 2003, PISA added a wreckage to measure or a unique clue as to how
problem-solving section to its international as- to measure it. If the students do not collaborate,
sessment designed to assess cross-disciplinary, they will not be able to solve the problem and
problem-solving skills. In future iterations of advance to the next stage of the game (Figure 5).
the problem-solving skills section, PISA plans to The master goal of the curriculum unit is to
include an assessment of collaborative problem discover why the aliens have landed. However,
solving skills (OECD, 2008). in order to collect sufficient evidence to form a
In addition, the game content and structure hypothesis, the students must successfully com-
are designed to allow for multiple entry points on plete multiple subtasks requiring math and liter-
which teachers may build in future iterations (Dun- acy skills. Throughout the scenario, the students
leavy et al., in press). The design allows teachers interact with virtual characters, digital items, and
the flexibility to emphasize: (1) different academic each other to navigate the game space. Choice
standards; (2) different content areas (math, ELA, and collaboration are embedded within the entire
science, social studies/history); and (3) different unit. Finally, the entire scenario is open ended,
current events (energy crisis, oil shortage, global with multiple possible explanations for why the
nuclear threat, cultural differences). aliens have landed.
This design rationale is three-fold: (1) build
in multiple entry points for teachers; (2) build in
mathematical and linguistic patterns that, when FORMATIVE EVALUATION
recognized, reveal the ubiquity and mystery of
mathematics and language; and (3) build in mul- During the fall of 2006 and the spring of 2007
tiple layers of complexity that will engage and early iterations of the Alien Contact! curriculum
challenge students regardless of ability and will were implemented for the purposes of conducting
provide teachers opportunities for differentiation. formative evaluation of the format. As there was
As students engage in the mathematics and literacy no existing design for developing in-practice AR
of the content, the curriculum attempts to capital- curriculum, much of this formative evaluation was
ize on some of the inherent properties of these intended to develop the heuristics for develop-
fields that are fascinating (e.g., mapping latitude ing appropriate and effective AR curricula. The
and longitude, ancient languages, and cultures) methodology and results of this pilot formative
regardless of the standards that are targeted. evaluation are described in depth by Dunleavy
AR in general and Alien Contact! specifically et al. (in press); however, for clarity purposes,
incorporates several elements from popular video
games that increase learning and engagement:
(1) narrative and setting; (2) differentiated role Figure 5. Students collaborating to measure a
playing; (3) master goal divided into subtasks; physical object used in the AR gamespace
(4) interactivity; (5) choice; and (6) collaboration.
In Alien Contact! the narrative and setting is the
unfolding saga of the aliens’ interactions with
Earth. To infuse this situation with challenge and
invite curiosity, each student’s differentiated role
is presented with an alternate, incomplete view
of the game space. For example, when presented
with a piece of alien spacecraft debris, each team
member is given a different dimension of the

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the methodology and findings of this study are on how the AR curriculum engaged previously
described here. disengaged students (Figure 6).
Utilizing a multiple case studies design, a series However, in addition to the increased motiva-
of data collection techniques were implemented tion, Dunleavy et al. (in press) also found sig-
at three sites (selected through convenience sam- nificant logistical limitations in implementing AR
pling) in order to gather in-depth information on curricula. In particular, hardware and software
how students and teachers perceived the AR cur- issues, particularly due to GPS errors, interfered
riculum. These data sources (including observa- with the seamless integration of this technology.
tions, formal interviews, informal interviews, and Another issue dealt with the substantial manage-
Web site postings) provide rich, contextual data ment and technical support required to maintain
that allowed for triangulation of results. the instructional process and the technology—a
These data were qualitatively analyzed within problem deemed to be prohibitive in any effort at
each site using a structured-coding scheme that scalability. Also of concern were findings of
followed an initial open-coding process. The ini- substantial cognitive overload on the part of stu-
tial open coding resulted in 30 descriptive codes, dents involved with the AR curriculum. Students
which were then analyzed iteratively using pattern and teachers indicated that learning the technol-
matching analysis. The analysis from each case ogy while also trying to work relatively complex
study was then used for cross-case analysis to content problems caused confusion and led to
determine if there were similarities across imple- some students giving up before completing tasks.
mentations in usage and perceptions. Another result from the research was the
discovery of unanticipated competition between
teams. Due to the linear nature of the learning
RESULTS path (that is, all students moved from one char-
acter to another in an identical and predictable
Through the analysis of case study data from the progression), student teams were able to visually
initial formative evaluation, Dunleavy et al. (in see where other teams were within the progres-
press) documented high student engagement dur- sion. Therefore, each team had the sense that they
ing the implementations of the Alien Contact! AR were either ahead or behind other teams in the
curriculum. According to Dunleavy et al. “high game space. This led to student teams hurrying
motivation and engagement seems logical and through the activities in order either keep pace or
almost a given during an activity that has students pass other students, whom they viewed as their
go outside with handheld computers and search
for clues about aliens, it was nonetheless a critical Figure 6. Students engaged in the AR game
threshold that needed to be reached during this
first year of the AR design development.”
Students and teachers reported several factors
that played a role in motivating them throughout
the curriculum implementation. Among the most
common factors mentioned by both teachers
and students were the use of the GPS-enabled
handhelds themselves, the ability to collect data
outside, and the interdependence of the roles within
the team dynamic. In addition, teachers focused

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competition. As would be expected, this resulted MODIFICATIONS BASED ON

in students missing valuable information within FORMATIVE EVALUATION
the game space.
An additional unanticipated finding was a HARP personnel responded to the results from the
desire on the part of the students to know the formative evaluations to better design a subsequent
right answer. As would be expected with stu- AR curriculum called Gray Anatomy. This sec-
dents at the middle-school level, especially with tion will describe the initial version of this new
those accustomed to commercially available curriculum and the changes that were made to
games designed to provide closure, participants our AR design template based on the findings of
expressed a strong desire to know why the aliens the formative evaluations discussed previously.
were actually here at the end of the game (this
was usually articulated through the focus group Gray Anatomy
interactions). In most cases, the ambiguity of the
game’s multi-hypothesis nature was difficult for Gray Anatomy, just as is the case with Alien
these students to accept. Contact!, is a scenario-based AR curriculum. As
It is important to note that current imple- the game begins, students are presented with a
mentations of the Alien Contact! curriculum are scenario in which a gray whale has beached itself.
validating the findings from the formative evalu- Working in teams, the students must interview
ation—particularly where the issues of technical virtual characters, inspect virtual objects, and
and logistical support are concerned. Students work through mathematics and language arts
appear to be motivated by the AR curriculum; problems to determine what occurred and why
however, competition between student groups the whale beached.
is present in nearly every implementation, and Similarly to Alien Contact!, this curriculum
the issue of having the right answer continues also focuses on middle-school, Massachusetts state
to persist. math and language arts standards. In this case,
the math standards revolve around data analysis,
statistics, and probability (MCAS standards 6.D.1
FURTHER EVALUATION and 8.D.3) and the ELA standards include thematic

Building upon the formative evaluation conducted

Figure 7. Students playing the boardgame control
by Dunleavy et al. (in press), further research is
curriculum
being conducted to study the impact that Alien
Contact! has on academic achievement and af-
fect. Through a pre-test/post-test, control-group
design, it will be possible to draw preliminary
conclusions about how effective this version of an
AR curriculum can be in an educational setting.
Data for this analysis is being collected dur-
ing the spring of 2008. The control curriculum
is identical to the Alien Contact! AR curriculum
in terms of content, however, it is played inside
using a board game rather than outside using the
handheld computers (Figure 7).

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identification and support (MCAS standards 11.3 game days involved with Gray Anatomy include
and 11.4), understanding a text (MCAS standard a maximum of six interactions.
8.19), and support hypotheses with evidence from In addition in attempting to limit the scope of
text (MCAS standard 8.24). Additional standards the interactions that any individual student might
that are touched upon are numbers and number have, we also made efforts to limit the opportuni-
sense (MCAS math standards 8.N.10 and 8.N.11), ties to misunderstand directions for given tasks.
vocabulary and concept development (MCAS The Alien Contact! curriculum depends to a great
ELA standard 4.17), formal and informal English extent on providing written textual directions to
(MCAS ELA standard 6.6), questioning, listen- students. In many of these cases, the content re-
ing, and contributing (MCAS ELA standard 2.4), quired at least one scroll to complete the reading of
and oral presentation (MCAS ELA standards 3.9, the directions. Following several of the principles
3.11, and 3.12). of game design for effective learning laid out by
As with Alien Contact!, this curriculum in- Gee (2003), it was decided to focus on using mul-
corporates the previously mentioned video game timedia for the delivery of directions and content
characteristics that increase learning and engage- though the game. According to the work of Gee,
ment. However, several substantial changes have by leveraging the technological capabilities of the
been made to the game play in response to the handheld computers themselves, the AR games
results from evaluating Alien Contact!’s design. pace can effectively provide multimodal meaning
(i.e., use materials other than text to provide mean-
Cognitive Overload ing). In addition, by providing materials in other
formats than simply through text, the curriculum
The most difficult of the concerns identified by can address semiotic principles (i.e., identify-
evaluations of Alien Contact! was the issue of cog- ing and appreciating the interrelations between
nitive overload. Due to the fact that the overload multimedia elements in a complex system) (De
was caused by difficulties synthesizing several Oliveira & Baranauskas, 2000).
tasks, each of which was relatively complex in More tangentially, in response to a perceived
and of itself and was dependent on the individual need for greater clarity throughout the game, a
student, it was difficult to develop solutions to new design paradigm was implemented for Gray
address the problem. For this reason, several Anatomy. As HARP staff did not have any previ-
steps were taken to mitigate complexity of the ous experience designing AR curricula, this first
tasks required in the Gray Anatomy curriculum. effort was done without a roadmap. In essence,
The first step taken was to limit the number project staff designed the process for developing
of characters or objects that any student would an AR curriculum through the process of devel-
interact with during a given time period. Initially, oping the AR curriculum itself. Based on lessons
the Alien Contact! curriculum incorporated far learned from this bootstrapping design strategy,
too many characters and objects. Through the a more structured development process utilizing
formative evaluation conducted by Dunleavy et a storyboarding approach was implemented for
al. (in press) as well as lessons learned through the development of Gray Anatomy. This process
subsequent implementations of the AR curriculum, involved multiple meetings among HARP staff
we determined that between five and six items or during which the broad strokes of the story
characters per AR session is optimal for progress- involved with the curriculum were outlined. In
ing through the game in a timely, efficient, and these meetings, we decided that there would be
effective manner. For this reason, each of the two various possible theories to why the whale would

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have beached, one of which would be a correct Modifications Based on

response. Documents were developed to guide Other Considerations
the formulation of these different theories, and
each member of the HARP team designed one set In addition to the modifications that were made
of evidence that can confirm or deny individual based on our evaluation findings, there were also
theories using these guides to assure consistency several modifications that came about due to in-
across the different answers. formal analysis of the Alien Contact! curriculum
and implementations that took place after the
Competition formative evaluation was conducted.

The other major unanticipated issue seen through- Flexible Roles

out our evaluations of Alien Contact! was the
competitive interactions among the student teams The first change occurred due to difficulties that
when playing the game. As was discussed earlier, were caused by the hard coding of four roles within
this was generally due to the fact that all students the Alien Contact! curriculum. As was mentioned
followed the same path of characters and objects, previously, students were placed into teams of
and thus each team could see which other teams four, with each of the students within a team tak-
were ahead or behind them in that progression. On ing on one of four roles (chemist, cryptologist,
its face, competition is not necessarily a negative computer hacker, and FBI agent). However, the
thing to build into a game; however, in this in- relative inflexibility of this system caused diffi-
stance, it did have negative repercussions. Because culty when there were a number of students that
of the competition, students who wished to win was not divisible by four. What would be done
would rush through the individual interactions with any excess students? In implementations of
that make up the game and would miss important Alien Contact! these additional students would be
information that they needed to progress through allocated to teams and would duplicate one of the
subsequent characters or to identify possible sup- four roles (thus a team might have two chemists).
port data for individual hypotheses. Obviously, this is not optimal due to the fact that
In order to undercut this competition across the content was developed to assure that each of
teams, the HARP staff developed a nonlinear path the students within a team would receive unique
through the game. Instead of each character/ob- information that would need to be shared with
ject triggering the next character to appear along other members of the team in order for the team
a proscribed path, an entry-point character will to be successful. Having two students playing
trigger all of the other characters in the game. one role, although expedient, created a situation
This entry-point character will direct the students where the additional student was not necessary
on the scope and sequence of the game playing to the team’s success.
experience and will inform them that each team In order to combat this situation, Gray Anatomy
must visit all of the other characters within the was designed with a flexible role structure. The
game space during the course of the AR event. AR editing software and the needs of the curricu-
The path through which the students progress can lum design still dictated the hard coding of roles
be determined by them, thus making it less likely within the game space. However, HARP personnel
that student teams will see other teams as ahead decided that two different versions of the game
or behind them. would be created. The first version would have
three students in each team. Each of these three

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students would take on one of the following roles: This, however, presented its own unique chal-
marine biologist, oceanographer, and reporter. lenge, as there is no explanation widely accepted in
The second version of the game would entail two the scientific community as to why whales beach
students pairing together to play the game. These themselves. In a game based on having students
two students would play the game as the marine answer this question, it is not appropriate to offer
biologist and oceanographer. a solution as correct if the wider scientific com-
In keeping with the design paradigm used munity cannot support such an assertion. Such
within Alien Contact!, the reporter would receive an act would provide students a false sense of
unique information within the three-person ver- the real world and would be impossible to sup-
sion of the game. The fact that this information port ethically.
would be necessary to progress through the game The solution that the HARP staff decided on
effectively created the problem of how to allocate was to have a series of “crackpot theories” that
the reporter’s information to the participants within were viable sounding, but which each had a “fatal
the two-person version of the game. The solution flaw” that made them impossible to have actually
for this was to have the reporter incorporated as a caused the beaching. Thus, whichever theory was
character the paired students would interact with not fatally flawed could be seen as the correct
within the game space itself. Thus, each of the answer to the simulation. HARP staff developed
two students would still be receiving all of the three theories, two of which are fatally flawed.
information that any student working within the These theories, along with the corresponding
three-person version would see, while allowing characters used to support or debunk them, make
the flexibility to accommodate any number of up the suite of interactions that each team of stu-
students without the need of duplication of roles. dents has over the course of two days of outdoor
AR interactions.
Correct Answer
Redesigned Control
Another issue that was present within most of the
implementations of the Alien Contact! AR game In order to do rigorous research into the efficacy
was a desire on the part of the students to know of both AR curricula as an instructional strategy,
the correct answer to the question of why the we use a pre-test/post-test control group research
aliens had come to earth. Manifesting itself within design. As such, a board game version of the AR
the focus team interviews that followed the full game is developed to act as the control curriculum
implementation of the curriculum, students asking to determine what value, if any, the technology
for the right answer lead to discussions of the need adds. All content was the same as would be found
to use data to support hypotheses in ambiguous in the AR curriculum, and the team dynamics
situations. Although this is a valuable lessons remained the same. This board game consists
for students to learn, and one that Alien Contact! of an 8x8 checkerboard, around which student
attempts to convey, one of the strengths of many teams move game pieces. Each of the 64 squares
commercially available games is that they build on the checkerboard corresponds to an envelope
to a climax and then offer closure (whether this is on a tri-fold poster demonstration board. Accord-
on a small scale based on individual tasks within ing to where they were in the game, the team is
a game or on a larger scale as the structure of the directed to open a particular envelope, which holds
entire game). For this purpose, HARP personnel cards that deliver the role-based content for that
decided that Gray Anatomy would include such interaction. In addition, the teams are directed to
a correct answer.

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Lessons Learned about Designing Augmented Realities

move their game pieces to the corresponding next two straight game days. It is postulated that this
square on the checkerboard. change will have dual benefits. The first benefit
Using the version of the board game initially is to create a schedule that works within a single
developed for Alien Contact!, HARP staff deter- academic week. The second benefit is to create a
mined that the design of the board game made it more focused analysis opportunity.
unnecessary to interact with the actual checker-
board for all but the most ancillary activities. In Curriculum Focus
order to make the interface more interactive and
engaging, the board game portion of this control Another issue that has been addressed for Gray
curriculum was redesigned. The new version of Anatomy was the focus on integrating the different
the board game includes a foam board image of content areas more meaningfully. Alien Contact!
a neighborhood with puzzle-piece shaped, yellow can be implemented as a math curriculum, an ELA
spaces interspersed throughout the image. As stu- curriculum, or a combination of math and ELA.
dents move through the game, they receive puzzle The decision to split the combined curriculum
pieces that show them with whom or what they and only implement that math or ELA content
were interacting with next and in which envelope areas was made in order to facilitate the ability
that character’s or object’s information would be to recruit individual teachers for the project. If a
found. This redesign dramatically improved the math teacher wished to implement Alien Contact!,
feel of the board game and has created a situation however, there was no corresponding ELA teacher
where the students need to interact with the board, to conduct those sections of the curriculum, so it
making the control curriculum more similar in its would be more difficult to recruit teachers. The
format to the AR curriculum. focus for Gray will be on an integrated math and
ELA curriculum rather than on separate math and
Shorter Curriculum ELA. This is in line with skills that students need
in their future work, which is interdisciplinary. It
Another modification made to the curriculum also significantly reduces logistical problems or
template for Gray Anatomy was to switch from a need for so much technical support of setting up
six-day to a five-day schedule. The Alien Contact! two different games.
curriculum follows a staggered indoor/outdoor
pacing. As was discussed earlier, four of the six Teacher Involvement
days within the Alien Contact! curriculum are dedi-
cated to work in a traditional classroom setting. Finally, there is discussion about how to get
Each day immediately following the two game the teachers themselves more involved in the
days are dedicated to analyzing and synthesizing delivery of the curriculum rather than having it
the data that were gathered during the gameplay. be something that the research team comes in
This had the consequence of creating an awkward and does. It was never intended that the research
schedule that required more than one academic team would teach the content itself, as the future
week for completion. of AR lies in its ability to be a seamless part of
This awkwardness of the schedule led to a the learning environment run by the in-service
switch to a five-day curriculum plan for Gray teachers. With implementations of Alien Contact!
Anatomy. Rather than having an analysis and it has been necessary for the research team to
synthesis day following each of the two game play a relatively large role in managing the con-
days, there is only one analysis day following tent. In order to mitigate this for Gray Anatomy

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implementations, the game will be played fully ricula, but also may lead to improvements in
with teachers before the students play so they the technology itself, particularly as AR moves
themselves are engaged in situated learning and to its eventual target device, the cell phone. By
learn the process involved. This has the indirect migrating this emerging interactive medium from
benefit of getting buy-in from the teachers both custom, school-supported PDA/GPS technologies
for the technology and for the process of situated to standardized, commercial-provider-supported,
learning. Second, the HARP team is considering cell phone technologies, educators can realize
ways (both technological and non-technological) the advantages of using ubiquitous, powerful
to have teachers gather feedback from students devices students could bring from their homes
after the first outdoor day so they can more closely to classroom settings.
track individual student’s progress and give them AR can reach its full potential only when this
formative feedback to improve their experience leveraging of student-owned technologies is re-
for the second outdoor day. alized. Any instructional design that depends on
school-based personnel maintaining and managing
complex, custom sets of equipment has inherent
CONCLUSION weaknesses. Maintenance and management is
time consuming, and the equipment is prone to
The development and deployment of AR technolo- obsolescence; the total cost of ownership by the
gies is still in its early stages. Since these types of school system is substantial when this includes
curricula incorporate nascent technology, taking initial purchase, maintenance, technical personnel,
the long view about their potential for student and replacement costs. Beyond those issues, if
learning is appropriate. As Dede (2005) asks educators are responsible for equipment evolu-
when discussing the learning styles associated tion, this will dramatically slow the advance of
with “Millennial” students, “What new forms AR technologies. Compared to large telecom-
of neomillennial learning styles might emerging munications companies rapidly enhancing their
media enable?” (p. 8). We know that students will equipment to gain market share in the lucrative
increasingly bring learning strengths and prefer- cell phone market, educators have neither the
ences to the classroom derived from the ever more technical capacity nor the competitive incentives
sophisticated and pervasive use of cell phones. to rapidly improve AR devices.
This trend implies that instructional designs merg- We estimate that, within a year or two, the next
ing physical and virtual environments hold great generation of cell phones can deliver the types of
promise for building on learners’ emerging skills AR developed in our studies. Such a migration
and inclinations. Our early research is promising in AR infrastructure will require a substantial
in demonstrating AR can enhance student mo- shift in how teachers and administrators treat cell
tivation, involvement, and excitement; and our phone usage in school settings. At present, many
current studies are examining the extent to which educators see cell phones as a barrier to effective
learning outcomes are enhanced over comparable instruction because of their potential to distract
control curricula. students’ attention and to facilitate cheating.
As a field, instructional designers are at the Once schools go beyond banning cell phones,
beginning of identifying best practices for de- or reluctantly accepting smart phone technology
veloping effective AR curricula. Systematically as a necessary evil, to instead developing ways
building on findings from early studies such as to incorporate these powerful devices for the
our work will not only improve later AR cur- improvement of student learning, then educators

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will have a commercially supported learning Hardy, L. (2007). Children at risk: Graduation
infrastructure with which students are already day. The American School Board Journal, 194(9),
familiar and fluent, paid for and maintained 18–20.
external to education, and available for learning
Hendricks, C. (2001). Teaching causal reason-
inside of classrooms and out. AR is a fulcrum for
ing through cognitive apprenticeship: What
leveraging this evolution.
are results from situated learning? The Jour-
nal of Educational Research, 94(5), 302–311.
doi:10.1080/00220670109598766
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Squire, K. D., & Jan, M. (2007). Mad city mys- Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society. The
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This work was previously published in International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations (IJGCMS) Volume
1, Issue 1, edited by Richard E. Ferdig, pp. 1-15, copyright 2009 by IGI Publishing (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 Section III
Tools and Technologies

This section presents an extensive treatment of various tools and technologies existing in the field of instructional
design that practitioners and academics alike must rely on to develop new techniques. These chapters enlighten
readers about fundamental research on the many methods used to facilitate and enhance the integration of this
worldwide phenomenon by exploring software and hardware developments and their applications—an increas-
ingly pertinent research arena. It is through these rigorously researched chapters that the reader is provided with
countless examples of the up-and-coming tools and technologies emerging from the field of instructional design.
496

Chapter 3.1
Cognitive Architecture and
Instructional Design in a
Multimedia Context
Renae Low
University of New South Wales, Australia

Putai Jin
University of New South Wales, Australia

John Sweller
University of New South Wales, Australia

ABSTRACT characterised as a natural information processing

system. The core of such systems can be described
Our knowledge of human cognitive architecture using 5 principles: (a) information store principle,
has advanced dramatically in the last few de- (b) borrowing principle and reorganizing principle,
cades. In turn, that knowledge has implications (c) randomness as genesis principle, (d) narrow
for instructional design in multimedia contexts. limits of change principle, and (e) environment
In this chapter, we will analyse human cognitive organizing and linking principle. These 5 prin-
architecture within an evolutionary framework. ciples lead directly to the instructional effects
That framework can be used as a base for cognitive generated by cognitive load theory. Some of these
load theory that uses human cognitive architecture effects are concerned with multimedia learning.
to provide testable hypotheses concerning instruc- The particular ones discussed in the chapter are
tional design issues. Human cognition can be the split-attention, modality, redundancy, element
interactivity, and expertise reversal effects.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch301

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Cognitive Architecture and Instructional Design in a Multimedia Context

INTRODUCTION of development of civilization. It has only been

required since the rise of civilisation and so we
Instructional design recommendations not based have not evolved to acquire specific examples
on our knowledge of human cognitive architecture of biologically secondary knowledge. We can
are likely to be limited in their effectiveness or acquire such knowledge using biologically
may even have negative consequences. In this primary knowledge but it is acquired relatively
chapter, we will use an evolutionary approach to slowly and with conscious effort. In contrast to
human cognition (see Sweller 2003; Sweller 2004; biologically primary knowledge, biologically
Sweller and Sweller 2006). Evolution by natural secondary knowledge requires explicit instruc-
selection can be used to determine categories of tion and conscious effort on the part of learners.
knowledge that humans are particularly adept at The bulk of knowledge acquired in educational
gaining because we have evolved to acquire that institutions such as schools consists of biologically
knowledge. Furthermore, the basic logic that secondary knowledge.
underlies evolutionary biology is shared by hu-
man cognition and so can be used to analyse our
cognitive processes. Those cognitive processes, HUMAN COGNITIVE
in turn, determine the effectiveness of particular ARCHITECTURE WHEN
instructional procedures. We will begin by dis- DEALING WITH BIOLOGICALLY
cussing two categories of knowledge from an SECONDARY KNOWLEDGE
evolutionary perspective.
There is a basic logic associated with the acquisi-
tion of biologically secondary knowledge and that
BIOLOGICALLY PRIMARY logic is identical to the logic that underlies the
AND BIOLOGICALLY processes of evolution by natural selection. Both
SECONDARY KNOWLEDGE are examples of natural information processing
systems (Sweller & Sweller, 2006). There are many
Geary (2007) divides knowledge into biologi- ways of describing that logic. In this chapter we
cally primary knowledge that we have evolved will use five basic principles.
to acquire easily and automatically and biologi-
cally secondary knowledge that relies on primary Information Store Principle
knowledge but that we have not evolved to acquire.
Examples of activities driven by primary knowl- In order to function, natural information process-
edge are listening and speaking our first language, ing systems require a massive store of informa-
recognising faces, using general problem solving tion used to govern activity. In the case of human
techniques and engaging in basic social relations. cognition, long-term memory provides that store.
We have evolved over millennia to acquire mas- The well-known work of De Groot (1965) and
sive amounts of knowledge associated with these Chase and Simon (1973) on the knowledge chess
activities easily, quickly and without conscious masters have for board configurations taken from
effort. We can acquire biologically primary real games provides evidence for the importance
knowledge simply by being immersed in a normal of long-term memory for most facets of cognition,
human society. Explicit instruction is unnecessary. including problem solving. A genome provides the
In contrast, biologically secondary knowledge same function for evolution by natural selection.
tends to be associated with a more advanced stage

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Borrowing and identified to generate moves other than random

Reorganising Principle generate and test. That process is the ultimate
source of all novel information we create just
Acquiring a massive store of information requires as random mutation is the ultimate source of all
an efficient acquisition procedure. In the case of the biological variation.
human cognitive system, that procedure involves
borrowing and reorganising information from the Narrow Limits of Change Principle
long-term store of other individuals by imitating
what they do, listening to what they say and read- Since the creation of novel information requires a
ing what they write. The information obtained is random generate and test procedure, mechanisms
combined with previous information resulting are required to ensure that randomly generated
in reorganisation. Findings based on cognitive information, most of which is dysfunctional, does
load theory provide evidence for the importance not destroy the functionality of the information
of the borrowing and reorganising principle (e.g. store. Our cognitive system achieves this end by
Sweller, 2003, 2004). How cognitive load theory ensuring that all changes to the store are small
suggests instruction should be organised to fa- and incremental by requiring information to first
cilitate the borrowing of information is discussed be processed by a limited capacity, limited dura-
below. During sexual reproduction, evolution by tion working memory. Evidence for the limited
natural selection uses the borrowing and reor- capacity of working memory comes from the
ganising principle to allow a genome to acquire well-known work of Miller (1956) while evidence
large amounts of information that is necessarily for its limited duration comes from Peterson and
reorganised during the process. Peterson (1959). It must be emphasised that the
limitations of working memory only apply to novel
Randomness as Genesis Principle information to which the randomness as genesis
principle applies. Changes to a genome require
While information is best acquired by using the random mutation, are governed by the epigenetic
borrowing and reorganising principle, that infor- system and also are slow and incremental.
mation must be created in the first instance. In
genetics, random mutation is the ultimate source Environmental Organising
of all biological variation and so is the genesis and Linking Principle
of all biological novelty. In human cognition,
information is created via the randomness as The limitations of working memory disappear
genesis principle during problem solving. In when it processes organised information from
order to generate a problem solving move, we long-term memory. When dealing with familiar
must use a combination of information held in information, working memory has neither capac-
long-term memory and a random generate and ity nor duration limits. Evidence for the altered
test for effectiveness procedure. If at any point characteristics of working memory when deal-
while solving a problem, two or more moves are ing with well-learned information comes from
available to us, and if we do not have informa- Ericsson and Kintsch’s (1995) work on long-term
tion in long-term memory indicating which move working memory. We can hold huge amounts
might be best, we must randomly generate one of familiar information in working memory for
of the moves and test to see what effect it has. To indefinite periods. That material can be used to
the extent to which information is not available in organise information from our environment and
long-term memory, no other procedure has been link our activities appropriately to the environ-

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ment. It provides the ultimate justification for our split-attention effect, the redundancy effect and
cognitive system. Similarly, the epigenetic system the modality effect.
determines how information stored in DNA is
used to govern biological activity. The Split-Attention Effect

Split-attention occurs when learners have to men-

INSTRUCTIONAL CONSEQUENCES tally integrate two or more sources of physically or
temporally disparate information and each source
There are instructional consequences that follow of information is essential for understanding the
from the manner in which our cognitive structures material. The working memory load imposed
are organised to process information. The first and by the need to mentally integrate the disparate
most obvious implication is that the purpose of sources of information interferes with learning.
instruction is to alter the information store – long- Consider a conventionally structured geometry
term memory. If nothing has changed in long-term worked example consisting of a diagram and its
memory, nothing has been learned. The second associated solution statements (see Figure 1). The
implication is that the best way to alter long-term diagram alone does not communicate the solu-
memory is via the borrowing and reorganising tion to the problem. The statements, in turn, are
principle. Wherever possible, we should present incomprehensible until they have been integrated
information to students rather than have them with the diagram. Learners must mentally integrate
search for the information themselves. The third the two sources of information (the diagram and
implication is that when presenting information the statements) in order to understand them. This
to learners, we should organise that information process can be cognitively demanding, especially
in a manner that takes into account the charac- for a novice learner, thus imposing a cognitive
teristics of human cognitive architecture. For load that is extraneous simply because of the
instruction to be effective, the narrow limits of particular format used.
change principle is paramount. Instruction has to Research into split-attention was initially
be designed in such a way that the limitations of conducted by Tarmizi and Sweller (1988) who
working memory are overcome by, for instance, looked into the effectiveness of worked examples
minimising extraneous cognitive load. By mi- on learning geometry. Previous research had
nimising unnecessary working memory load, demonstrated that worked examples were highly
essential information can be stored in long-term effective for learning algebra (Cooper & Sweller,
memory and in turn, that information will increase 1987; Sweller & Cooper, 1985) and in other
the effective capacity of working memory via the mathematical-related domains (Zhu & Simon,
environmental organising and linking principle. 1987). However, Tarmizi and Sweller found that
That principle permits humans to readily engage in comparison to conventional problem-solving
in very complex activities. strategies, worked examples did not enhance
Cognitive load theory has used this architecture performance in geometry. They argued that the
to devise a variety of instructional procedures. requirement due to the format of the worked
Some of those procedures are directly concerned examples to mentally integrate the two sources
with the presentation of information within a mul- of information (diagram and textual solutions)
timedia framework. In this chapter, we focus on must have imposed an increase in cognitive load
three cognitive load effects concerned with aspects that prevented cognitive resources to be used for
of multimedia presentation of information: the learning. In subsequent experiments, Tarmizi and

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Figure 1. Conventionally structured geometry

sages, by reducing cognitive load related to search
worked example consisting of a diagram and its
for meaning, improved reading compression for
associated solution statements
both fifth grade first language pupils and inexpe-
rienced learners of English as a second language
(ESL). Together, these findings in different do-
mains generate the expectation that training
conditions comparing split-attention and inte-
grated formats will yield results demonstrating
the superiority of the integrated format. This
phenomenon is known as the split-attention effect.
Various forms of different sources of informa-
tion can lead to split-attention: text and text, text
and mathematical equations, or different forms
of multimedia. Any instructional material that
contains more than one source of information is
potentially a context for integrating split-source
information. Split-attention will frequently occur
in a multimedia context as there will always be at
least two sources of information involved.
The split-attention studies mentioned so far
deal with sources that are physically separate and
Sweller demonstrated that learners who studied have engaged learners in the visual medium only.
integrated worked examples (see Figure 2) per- Whether the cause of split-attention is text and a
formed better than learners who followed a con- diagram, or computer and a manual, the different
ventional problem solving strategy during acqui- sources of information are physically separate
sition. in a manner that requires visual and cognitive
Subsequent research sought to test the hypoth- search that imposes an extraneous load. How-
esis that if multiple sources of information were ever, physical separation is not the only form of
integrated, the need for learners to engage in separation that generates unnecessary cognitive
mental integration would be obviated thus freeing
cognitive resources for learning. The Tarmizi and
Sweller findings were replicated by Sweller, Figure 2. Integrated worked example
Chandler, Tierney, and Cooper (1990) in the
domain of coordinate geometry, by Ward and
Sweller (1990) in the domain of physics, by
Chandler and Sweller (1991) using instructional
materials designed for electrical apprentices, and
by Sweller and Chandler (1994) and Chandler
and Sweller (1996) investigating learning in a
computer environment. This line of research has
been extended to language learning. In a series
of experiments designed to test the split attention
effect, Yeung, Jin and Sweller (1998) found that
explanatory notes integrated with reading pas-

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load. Multiple sources of information that must One condition under which integrated instruc-
be integrated before they can be understood can tions do not have positive effects on learning is
also be separated in time, resulting in temporal when the multiple sources of information are
separation. The consequences of temporal rather intelligible in isolation. For example, physically
than spatial versions of the split-attention effect integrating a diagram with statements that merely
have been largely carried out by Mayer and his redescribe the diagram has negative, not positive
colleagues who have extended the effect to include effects on learning due to the redundancy effect
sound (Mayer & Anderson, 1991, 1992; Mayer & (see next section). If all sources of information are
Sims, 1994; Moreno & Mayer, 1999). This body intelligible in isolation and redundant, elimination
of work demonstrates that learners who received of redundancy rather than physical integration
information simultaneously, that is integrated nar- should be undertaken. Thus, analysing the relation
ration and animation outperformed learners who between multiple sources of information prior to
received non-integrated instructions (narration physical integration is important.
and animation separated temporally). Another condition under which integrated in-
In summary, the split-attention effect has been structions are not beneficial is when the learning
demonstrated in many studies using a wide variety materials do not involve high element interactivity
of materials and participants under many condi- (e.g. Sweller 1994) where element interactivity
tions (see Ayres & Sweller, 2005 for a detailed refers to the number of elements that must be
review). The presence of this effect has implica- simultaneously processed in working memory
tions for instructional design in a multimedia because they interact. Low element interactivity
context where there will always be at least two material consists of elements that can be processed
sources of information. individually because they do not interact. Since
Split-attention effect and instructional design. the elements can be processed individually, they
The split-attention effect has both theoretical and impose a low load on working memory and such
practical implications. From a theoretical perspec- material is described as having a low intrinsic
tive, the results provide evidence that minimising cognitive load. In contrast, the elements of high
extraneous cognitive load benefits learning. From element interactivity material, because they inter-
a practical perspective, the results provide some act, must be processed simultaneously in working
instructional guidelines for dealing with multiple memory if the material is to be understood. Such
sources of information. One guideline is that material has a high intrinsic cognitive load. A
where instruction includes multiple sources of diagram and related text that have few interacting
information that must be integrated in order to elements and therefore are easily understood are
make sense, those sources of information should unlikely to impose an extraneous cognitive load
be both physically and temporally integrated in due to split-attention. There is no real benefit in
order to reduce extraneous cognitive load. This physically integrating the different sources of
guideline should have the potential to improve information as they can be easily learned even
multimedia instruction substantially. However, when presented in a split-source format.
considerable care must be taken when physically A further factor to consider when integrating
integrating disparate sources of information as different sources of information is learner charac-
there are conditions under which simply integrat- teristics that interact with material characteristics.
ing all text onto a diagram will have negative Material that is not intelligible in isolation and
rather than positive effects on learning (see Ayres high in element interactivity for low knowledge
& Sweller, 2005). learners may be intelligible in isolation and low

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in element interactivity for learners with more it will consist of a diagram of the heart, lungs,
knowledge. For high knowledge individuals, and body with arrows indicating the direction of
physical integration may be harmful because of the the blood flowing the veins and arteries. In addi-
redundancy effect (Yeung, Jin & Sweller, 1998). tion, text consisting of statements such as, “The
blood entering the aorta is pumped back into the
The Redundancy Effect body”, or “Blood from the lungs flows into the
left atrium.” In contrast to the geometry example
The redundancy effect occurs when additional in- given earlier, the diagram is self-contained and
formation presented to learners results in negative intelligible. It shows by means of arrows and
rather than positive effects on learning. It can be labelling, that blood entering the aorta is pumped
obtained in one of two ways. First, when identical back into the body and that blood from the lungs
information is presented in two or more different flows into the left atrium. The text in this case
forms or media, such as pictures and words, or is redundant since it merely repeats the same
words in both auditory and written form, if one information albeit in a different form. In addition,
of these forms is redundant then the elimination when such redundant text is integrated with the
of that form may result in enhanced learning re- diagram by being placed at appropriate locations
sulting in the redundancy effect. Second, when on the diagram, the text is not only redundant,
additional information is presented in an attempt to it is also unavoidable. Learners looking at the
enhance or elaborate information, if the additional diagram are very likely to read the text as well.
explanations or elaborations are redundant then In contrast, if the text is below or next to the dia-
the exclusion of that additional information may gram rather than integrated with the diagram, it is
enhance learning providing another example of the much easier to ignore. Using the biology material
effect. There is overlap between these two forms mentioned earlier, Chandler and Sweller (1991)
in that the same information presented in a dif- compared the performance of learners under the
ferent medium may be essentially an elaboration. conditions of integrated instruction, split-attention
Nevertheless, the distinction is real in that some instruction, and diagram without text instruction.
elaborations use the same medium while others The best condition was the diagram without text
use different media. In both instances, the effect instruction indicating that redundant instructional
is the same: redundant information can interfere material should be eliminated.
with learning. In contrast to inexperienced language learners,
The redundancy effect was probably first dem- senior undergraduate students and high-ability
onstrated by Miller (1937) and subsequently by ESL learners, when reading passages integrated
various researchers (e.g., Reder & Anderson, 1980, with vocabulary explanations, found that the in-
1982; Solman, Singh & Kehoe, 1992). However, formation about the meanings of many words was
these researchers did not explain the effect in terms redundant but hard to ignore (Yeung, Jin & Sweller,
of cognitive load theory. Cognitive load theory 1998). Consequently, for those experienced learn-
suggests that processing redundant information ers, explanatory notes with an integrated format
with essential information increases working led to lower scores of reading comprehension in
memory load, which interferes with the transfer comparison with the conventional text plus a sepa-
of information to long term memory. Removing rate vocabulary list. It appears that, although ex-
redundant information eliminates the require- planatory notes using an integrated format within
ment to process information that is not essential passages may be helpful for those learners with less
to learning. Consider instruction on the flow of expertise to reduce the split attention effect, this
blood in the heart, lungs, and body. Frequently, format may not be suitable for readers with high

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language proficiency because of the redundancy determine redundancy and hence what material is
effect. Diao and Sweller (2007) further examined likely to be redundant. For instance, in deciding
the redundancy effect in the context of educational whether text should be added to a diagram, the
multimedia designed for learners of English as a instructional designer needs to consider several
foreign language (EFL). In their study, Chinese factors. Is the diagram intelligible on its own?
EFL learners using simultaneous presentations of If so, the text may be redundant. Does the text
spoken and written text reported having a higher provide essential information? If so, it is not
mental load and produced lower scores in both likely to be redundant and should be retained. Is
word decoding and reading comprehension than there a high level of element interactivity within
did those using materials presented in written the text, that is, to understand one element, one
form only. The findings support an earlier study must consider many other elements at the same
of Japanese EFL learners (Hirai, 1999), which time? If so, as far as possible, diagrams should
claimed that the listening rate was far behind the not be presented with the text to avoid the risk of
reading rate for less proficient learners. When the overloading working memory. Another factor to
aim is to teach novice EFL learner to read, such consider is learner expertise. Whether informa-
poor audio-visual correspondence may cause a tion is high in element interactivity and whether
redundancy effect in the presentations comprising it is intelligible on its own depends largely on the
both identical auditory and written text. learner. Information that is intelligible for more
Since the Chandler and Sweller (1991) find- expert learners may not make sense to novices who
ings, the redundancy effect has been demonstrated require additional explanatory material. In short,
in a variety of contexts. It is not just the diagrams whether or not additional material is redundant
and redundant text that can be used to demonstrate can be determined by considering the cognitive
the redundancy effect. While diagrams are fre- load implications of that material in the context
quently more intelligible than the equivalent text, of learner expertise.
there are instances where any one of diagrams, the
presence of equipment, or auditory information The Modality Effect
have been found to be redundant (see Sweller 2005
for experimental evidence). In other words, what Studies documenting the split–attention and
is redundant depends on what is being taught. redundancy effects have provided evidence to
Redundancy effect and instructional design. indicate that the manner in which information
As is the case with the split-attention effect, the is presented will affect how well it is learnt and
redundancy effect has been demonstrated in many remembered. Another effect that has important
studies using a wide variety of materials and par- implications for instructional design, especially
ticipants under many conditions. In practical terms, in multi-media learning is the modality effect.
the redundancy effect provides a simple guideline The modality effect occurs when information
for instructional design: eliminate any redundant presented in a mixed mode (partly visual and partly
material in whatever form presented to learners auditory) is more effective than when the same
and any redundant activity that instruction may information is presented in a single mode (either
encourage learners to engage in. However, this visually or in auditory form alone). For example,
guideline alone does not indicate exactly what consider a typical geometry problem consisting
material may or may not be redundant. This guid- of a diagram and associated statements (Figure
ing principle needs to be considered in conjunction 1). Conventionally, the diagram and the associ-
with cognitive load theory. The theory can be used ated statements are visually presented. However,
to provide guidance concerning the conditions that although the diagram has to be presented visually,

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the associated statements can be presented visually loop process different types of information inde-
or orally. There is evidence to show that students pendently, at least to some extent. If the two sys-
learn better when the associated statements are tems are relatively independent, the total amount
narrated rather than presented visually. of information that can be processed by working
According to cognitive load theory, many memory may be determined by the mode (audi-
instructional materials and techniques may be tory or visual) of presentation. It may be possible
ineffective because they ignore the limitations to increase effective working memory capacity
of human working memory and impose a heavy by presenting information in a mixed visual and
cognitive load. This type of load is referred to as auditory mode rather than a single mode.
extraneous cognitive load and has been the main Low & Sweller (2005) provided a discussion
concern of cognitive theorists whose focus has of research evidence to support the notion that
been on devising alternatives to those conventional working memory can be subdivided into partially
instructional designs and procedures that were independent processors consisting of an auditory
developed without taking into consideration the working memory system to deal with verbal mate-
structure of human memory. rial and a visual working memory system to deal
Theoretically, there are two ways in which with diagrammatical/pictorial information. Since
extraneous cognitive load can be manipulated. the two processors deal with appropriate informa-
First, instructional procedures can alleviate extra- tion independently to some extent, it is plausible
neous cognitive load by formatting instructional that a mixed mode of presentation can increase
material in such a way that minimises cognitive the amount of information that can be processed
activities that are unnecessary to learning so that in working memory. In a detailed review of the
cognitive resources can be freed to concentrate on experimental literature, Penney (1989) provided
activities essential to learning. The split attention two different lines of evidence demonstrating an
and redundancy effects discussed above fall into appreciable increase in effective working memory
this category. capacity by employing both visual and auditory,
The consequences of extraneous cognitive rather than a single processor. One line of evidence
load can also be alleviated by increasing effective shows improved ability to perform two concurrent
working memory capacity. Working memory was tasks when information was presented in a partly
initially considered a single entity. More recent audio, partly visual format, rather than in either
research has indicated that working memory single format. The other line of evidence demon-
may consist of multiple processors rather than a strates improved memory when information was
single processor (Baddeley, 1992; Schneider & presented to two sensory modalities rather than
Detweiler, 1987). These multiple stores, proces- one. As previously indicated, the occurrence of
sors, channels, or streams (the terminology varies increased working memory capacity due to the
among researchers) are frequently associated with employment of a dual, rather than a single mode
the separate processing of visual-spatial and oral of presentation, is termed the modality effect. (See
material. For example, Baddeley’s model of work- Low & Sweller, 2005 for a discussion of research
ing memory (Baddeley, 1986, 1992, 1999) divides demonstrating the modality effect).
working memory into a visuo-spatial sketch pad If effective working memory can be increased
that processes visually based information such as by using dual-modality presentation techniques,
diagrams and pictures, and a phonological loop theoretically, this procedure may be just as effec-
that processes auditory information. tive in facilitating learning as physically integrat-
There is considerable evidence to suggest that ing two sources of visually presented information.
the visuo-spatial sketch pad and the phonological The instructional version of the modality effect

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can be considered to stem from the spilt-attention where visual working memory alone must be used
effect. It occurs under split-attention conditions to process all of the information. In a series of
when a written source of information that must experiments, Mousavi et al. obtained this result.
be integrated with another source of visually pre- Audio-visual instructions were consistently supe-
sented information such as a diagram, is instead rior to visual-visual instructions, demonstrating
presented in auditory rather than visual mode. The the modality effect. Furthermore, strong evidence
instructional modality effect is obtained when a was obtained indicating that the effect was due
dual mode presentation is superior to a visual to working memory considerations, not merely
only, split-attention presentation. due to the physical fact that auditory and visual
Modality effect and instructional design. signals can be received simultaneously while two
The instructional predictions that flow from the visual signals (e.g. from a diagram and separate
experimental work on the modality effect are text) cannot be perceived simultaneously but
straightforward. Assume instruction that includes must be attended to successively. The effect was
a diagram and text that are unintelligible unless retained even when the geometric diagram and its
they are mentally integrated. A geometry diagram associated text were presented successively rather
and associated text provide one of many examples. than simultaneously in both the audio-visual and
From a cognitive load theory perspective, the visual-visual conditions. Remembering and using
modality effect can be explained by assuming the a previously presented statement while looking at
memory load due to a diagram (or picture) with a diagram is easier when the statement is spoken
text presentation induces a high load in the visual rather than written.
working memory system because both sources Tindall-Ford, Chandler, and Sweller (1997)
of information are processed in this system. replicated the basic, modality effect finding in
In contrast, the diagram and narration version another series of experiments with electrical
induces a lower load in visual working memory engineering instructional materials. In addition,
because auditory and visual information are each these experiments differentiated between materi-
processed in their respective systems. Therefore, als that were low or high in element interactivity.
the total load induced by this version is spread Tindall-Ford et al. predicted that low element in-
between the visual and the auditory components teractivity material with its low intrinsic cognitive
in the working memory system. In other words, load would not demonstrate the modality effect
integration of the audio and visual information because increasing effective working memory
may not overload working memory if its capac- would be irrelevant under conditions where the
ity is effectively expanded by using a dual-mode information that had to be processed did not
presentation. strain working memory capacity. The modality
Using the cognitive load framework as a theo- effect was obtained with high but not low element
retical base, Mousavi, Low, and Sweller (1995) interactive materials. In addition, assessment of
tested for the modality effect using split-attention comparative cognitive load using subjective rat-
geometry materials consisting of a diagram and ings (see Paas & Van Merriënboer, 1993) indicated
its associated statements. It is obvious that a that cognitive load was higher under visual-visual
geometry diagram must be presented in visual than under audio-visual conditions, but only when
form. However, the textual information could be the instructional material was high in element
presented in either visual (written) or auditory interactivity. Jeung, Chandler & Sweller (1997)
form. A visually presented diagram and auditori- found that the modality effect was enhanced when
ally presented text may increase effective working visual indicators were used to indicate to learners
memory and so facilitate learning over conditions which parts of complex information were being

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referred to by the spoken text. Leahy, Chandler instruction is becoming increasingly popular
and Sweller (2003) demonstrated the modality and findings associated with the modality effect
principle but also found that the modality effect that can be interpreted within a cognitive load
could only be obtained under split-attention con- framework can provide a coherent theoretical
ditions where the information of both modalities base for multimedia investigations and applica-
was essential for understanding. The effect was tions. Indeed, in a number of web-based instruc-
not obtained under redundancy conditions where tional studies, Mayer and his colleagues have
one modality could be understood in isolation and demonstrated that students performed better on
the other was redundant in that it presented the tests of problem solving transfer when scientific
same information in a different form. explanations were presented as pictures and nar-
The importance of split-attention conditions ration rather than as pictures and on-screen text
(i.e. with both sources of information essential (Mayer & Moreno, 1998; Moreno & Mayer, 1999;
for understanding) rather than redundancy condi- Moreno, Mayer, Spires, & Lester, 2001). Accord-
tions (both sources of information independently ing to the researchers, such results are consistent
intelligible) for the modality effect can be seen with dual information processing theory. When
from the work on the expertise reversal effect. pictures and words are both presented visually,
Expertise reversal occurs when instructional the visual processor can become overloaded but
techniques that are highly effective with inexpe- the auditory processor is unused. When words are
rienced learners lose their effectiveness and may narrated, they can be dealt with in the auditory
even have negative consequences when used with processor, thereby leaving the visual processor to
more experiences learners. Information in a dual- deal with the pictures only. Thus, the use of nar-
mode presentation may become redundant when rated animation reassigns some of the essential
presented to more experienced learners. Kalyuga, processing from the overloaded visual processor
Chandler, and Sweller (2000) demonstrated that if to the underloaded auditory processor. Unlike the
experienced learners attend to redundant auditory earlier research that used book-based materials,
explanations, learning might be inhibited. In a the work of Mayer, Moreno and their colleagues
set of experiments with instructions on using in- used on-screen materials.
dustrial manufacturing machinery, inexperienced More recently, Brünken, Steinbacher, Plass,
learners in a domain clearly benefited most from and Leutner (2002) replicated the modality effect
studying a visually presented diagram combined in two different multimedia learning environ-
with simultaneously presented auditory expla- ments while using a dual-task approach to mea-
nations. After additional training, the relative sure cognitive load. Learners’ performance on a
advantage of the narration disappeared whereas visual secondary reaction time task was taken as
the effectiveness of the diagram-only condition a direct measure of the cognitive load induced
increased. When the same students became even by multimedia instruction. Brünken et al. found
more experienced after further intensive training evidence that the differences in learning outcome
in the subject area, the diagram-only condition demonstrated by the modality effect are related
was far superior to the diagram with narration to different levels of cognitive load induced by
condition, reversing the advantage of the dual- the different presentation formats of the learning
mode presentation previously obtained. material. Specifically, they found that an emphasis
The modality effect is especially important in on visual presentation of material resulted in a
the context of multimedia learning because the decrement on a visual secondary task, indicating
instructional medium involves different presenta- an overload of the visual processor. In further
tion modes and sensory modalities. Multimedia work, Brünken, Plass, and Leutner (2004) again

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reproduced the modality effect while measuring architecture and it can be argued, as a consequence,
cognitive load using a dual-task methodology. In has been unable to generate usable information.
this work, the secondary task was auditory instead The cognitive architecture outlined in this chap-
of visual and there was a decrement in performance ter may have the potential to begin a rectification
on the auditory secondary task when the primary of this state of affairs. By accepting that the ran-
task placed an emphasis on the auditory processor. domness as genesis principle is the source of novel
information and by considering the interactions of
this principle with knowledge held in long-term
CONCLUSION memory, it may be possible to generate instructional
recommendations concerning human creativity.
The split-attention, redundancy, and modality Theoretical work is commencing on this project.
effects discussed in this chapter can be explained
by cognitive load theory. In turn, instructional
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ADDITIONAL READING
Sweller, J. (2005). The redundancy principle.
Chase, W. G., & Simon, H. A. (1973). Percep- In R. E. Mayer (Ed.), Cambridge handbook of
tion in chess. Cognitive Psychology, 4, 55–81. multimedia learning (pp. 159-167). New York,
doi:10.1016/0010-0285(73)90004-2 Cambridge University Press.
De Groot, A. (1965). Thought and choice in chess. Sweller, J., & Sweller, S. (2006). Natural informa-
The Hague, Netherlands, Mouton. (Original work tion processing systems. Evolutionary Psychol-
published 1946). ogy, 4, 434–458.
Ericsson, K. A., & Kintsch, W. (1995). Long-term
working memory. Psychological Review, 102,
211–245. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.102.2.211

This work was previously published in Cognitive Effects of Multimedia Learning, edited by Robert Zheng, pp. 1-16, copyright
2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

510
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Chapter 3.2
Simulating Teaching
Experience with Role-Play
Scott J. Warren
University of North Texas, USA

Richard A. Stein
Indiana University-Bloomington, USA

ABSTRACT play experience that emerged from a design-based

research project as a means of supporting the
This chapter discusses the design and use of simu- development.
lated teaching experiences contextualized through
role-play in a multi-user virtual environment as
a means of providing pre-service teachers with INTRODUCTION
pedagogical and instructional experiences that
are increasingly difficult for university programs Every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, when the
to provide. It illustrates the underlying pragmatic signal emits clearly from transmitters hidden on
theory of communication that supports this model thousands of planets, moons, and asteroids and
of simulated experience as well as research meth- reaches Earth, a tall, blonde man named Calron
ods that we suggest can aid in understanding the logs onto the OTAK. Once in the computer system,
complex learning that stem from actor and student his digital self materializes in the central world,
interaction. The goal of this chapter is to provide which is filled with numerous other figures,
an instructional design model of simulated role- representing children from several continents.
Calron is not from Earth; he is from the distant
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch302

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Simulating Teaching Experience with Role-Play

world of Atlantis. A member of a secret Council, Calron is not really an alien from a distant
he seeks to improve the quality of life on both planet. Instead a simulated character role-played
planets through scientific inquiry aided by his by a pre-service teacher. The experience of being
friends on earth. Calron embeds the pre-service teacher within
Calron types greetings to several elementary what it is to be a teacher by simulating several of
and middle school aged students, calling them by the roles and responsibilities of teaching. Being
name from his past experiences with them during a Council Member provides learners with a live
the previous six months. He asks several questions action digital simulation of the pedagogical roles
about their learning activities in the space and that teachers engage in every day that range from
how students think their work is helping people coaching to facilitating and even dramatic acting.
on both Atlantis and Earth. Students pester him While the activity furthers student experience
with questions about the Archfall book, which related to the narrative that supports the project,
introduces them to the story and problems of the it provides a valuable set of interactions that will
world of Atlantis. He answers sometimes spe- increasingly interact with their students in interac-
cifically, sometimes vaguely; taking notes about tive digital spaces that simulate the learning en-
which students he has told what information, so vironments that currently consist of whiteboards
that he and other members of the Council can refer and desks.
back to it in the future. When students ask which
Quests they should complete next as these are The Challenge for Teacher Training
the main learning activities in the 3-D space, he
nudges them towards those that he and the Council With the increased need for trained teachers that
feel can best help the respective planets. Figure 1 continues to trouble schools in many U.S. states
presents an image of Calron as he appears in the (Matus, 2005) as well as countries worldwide,
book that accompanies the digital world. teacher training institutions are increasingly turn-
ing to distance learning applications to provide
Figure 1. Calron, a pedagogical agent and Atlan- simulated field experiences that mirror those that
tian Council member in Quest Atlantis students would traditionally receive by teaching
with a mentor teacher in a physical classroom
(Lehman & Richardson, 2004; Simpson, 2006).
In addition, there have been calls by the govern-
ment, professional teaching organizations, parents
and the media to improve the training of teachers
to include knowledge about the latest research
findings and knowledge about best practices in
education (NEA, 2004; PreventionAction, 2007).
While the technological solutions continue to
multiply, a number of problems exist that call for
solutions that involve the use of digital simula-
tions. The use of such simulations has shown
some promise for providing rich, meaningful
field experiences to pre-service teachers that can
prepare them for their future work as day-to-day
professionals and learners (Aldrich, 2003; Squire,
2004; Thiagarajan, 1996).

512
Simulating Teaching Experience with Role-Play

Viewing the development of a simulated digi- BACKGROUND

tal teaching experience through the lens of pure
simulation (or simulation games) can be aided by Issues, Controversies, Problems
adopting a theoretical stance that does not accept
a single historical, Kuhnian paradigmatic stance Teacher Field Experiences
(i.e. positivist/empiricist vs. contextualist vs.
relativist) (Bernstein, 1983; Hollis, 1994). This As the number of teachers needed in public schools
frees the designer or researcher from a view of increases, the number of available locations for
a simulated experience that provides only a nar- pre-service teacher experiences has not concur-
row glimpse into teacher or learner experience. rently increased (Simpson, 2006). While the use
Instead, this chapter proposes examining the of digital simulations and other forms of technol-
design or educational value of a simulated expe- ogy such as computer-mediated communication,
rience employing a pragmatic theoretical view digital video, and video conferencing systems have
that takes communication as the core function of shown some promise for addressing this shortage
human activity can provide a holistic means of of face-to-face field experiences, Simpson (2006)
developing a more complete picture of teaching notes several challenges to using field experiences
and learning. Early work in the area of pragmatic delivered at a distance:
theory and research centered on the idea that the
development of theory and its accompanying 1. Field experience in distance delivered
research should be geared towards the develop- teacher education programs is brief; this may
ment of new means of teaching and learning that stem from administrative limitations such
could be readily employing in educational settings as a limited number of school sites. Others
(Dewey, 1925, 1938). difficulties in these experiences come the
This chapter frames both a theoretical and fact that instructors have found it challeng-
methodological perspective for understanding, ing to include all the relevant knowledge
assessing, and teaching using simulated role-play about pedagogical practices and specific
from the pragmatic Theory of Communicative area content knowledge (i.e. mathematics)
Action (CA) (Habermas, 1981a) in several ways. that researchers have found necessary to
First, it identifies the core issues and problems ensuring a quality education for distance
inherent in many existing teacher preparation students.
systems. Further, we explore and critique the 2. Young (1998) notes that a central issue
splintered, underlying theoretical stances that related to providing a range of pre-service
guide the development of many face-to-face and field experience is that a consequence of
simulated teaching experiences and explain the many newly shortened programs is that ex-
means by which the theory can provide a more perience is often in a single school and that
holistic view of the nature of simulated experiences this solitary experience can be an inadequate
for teacher preparation, learning, and assessment. model for a future teacher.
Finally, we provide an example of a simulated 3. It is also often difficult for teacher educa-
teaching experience and future directions for tion institutions to find a sufficient number
this form of simulated role-play experience in of schools in which to place their students
educational settings. and expert teachers with which to pair them.
4. While ensuring that there are sufficient
schools for pre-service teacher, assuring
quality experiences is yet another problem.

513
 Simulating Teaching Experience with Role-Play

Ishler, Edens, & Berry (1996) and Howey to be useful, is leveraged during 2.) constantive
(1996) found that educational institutions speech acts or conversation to further develop and
delivering pre-service teacher education critique the theoretical understandings of speaker
have little supervision over local school and hearer. A third possible goal is to provide
sites. Therefore, ensuring that the mentor socially valid normative understandings that have
teachers are modeling best practice is dif- been generated through past consensus within so-
ficult or not done. As they are limited to cially or culturally shared experience such as social
the use of local schools or schools within a rules such as legal or moral conceptions through
reasonable traveling distance, those schools normatively regulated action. Lastly, the speaker
and teachers that may best model teaching may be attempting to express some internal state
are not used. or “lifeworld” understanding towards the goal
of taking some future action such as a direction
Reconnecting Theory and Practice to do something, known as dramaturgical action
(Habermas, 1981a; Habermas & Cooke, 2002).
Work related to Jurgen Habermas’ (1981a; 1981b) According to Habermas, what underlies all of
Theory of Communicative Action (CA) is geared these different forms of communicative actions
towards developing practical means of under- is intersubjective agreement between speaker and
standing and improving what is at the center of hearer. This theory has several implications for
the both this theory and teaching practice: human the development of educational simulations that
communication towards a goal. In instructional are intended to provide pre-service teachers with
settings, such communicative goals range from practice geared towards the multiple communica-
those of the teacher such as conveying strategic tive actions that they are expected to engage in
content information (i.e. Lansing is the capital of within their future classrooms.
Michigan), to eliciting responses from students that
confirm understanding, and further into areas of The Limits of Simulations with
negotiating or enforcing societal normative rules Communicative Action
(i.e. you should not hit your peers). The learning
goals that teachers have for their students may The limitation that faces traditional simulations
come from state curriculum or from personal goals when viewed through the lens of Communica-
established for individual students, but each is tive Action is that only the pre-service teacher/
communicated either directly through such actions student and simulated system are present. Why
as writing them on the chalk board or implicitly this is problematic is that the system cannot par-
through the goals of the specific activities and ticipate in conversation and critical discourse in
linkages to assessment. which the validity of the assertions made by the
These goals as communicative actions (i.e. student can be examined. Even more problematic
discursive speech acts, textual discourse) generally is that the student must tacitly accept the valid-
have one of four purposes. The first goal is gener- ity of all claims made by the system because it
ally to convey objective, empirical knowledge or remains static in the face of critique and cannot
fact commonly accepted in the present as valid by engage in a back and forth conversation towards
society such as information found in standardized consensus about the validity of the information
tests. However, this actually includes two different communicated through the technological structure
types of communication 1.) teleological or stra- of the simulation.
tegic action which relates to technical, in which For example, if the student teacher finds the
empirical knowledge deemed by the individual system’s communication about the appropriate

514
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means for disciplining a child in the classroom Quest Atlantis: A Simulated

to be inappropriate when they throw a piece of Conceptual Play Space
paper, the system often still only recognizes one
correct, valid answer (i.e. give the student a verbal An initiative within the National Science Founda-
warning) because of the scripted nature of many tion and MacArthur Foundation supported Quest
educational simulations and simulation games. Atlantis (QA) project was developed in order to
The participant in the simulation cannot engage provide students with a digital science-inquiry
in conversation with the system and state their experience using a multi-user virtual environ-
critique of the communicated approach because ment (MUVE) (Barab, Warren, & Ingram-Goble,
the simulation engages in purely strategic action 2008; Barab et al., 2007). Within the foundational
in which there are set rules for valid communica- narrative that situates student activities and pro-
tion behaviors that, in a human, would have been vides a rationale for students to work within the
accepted as useful knowledge for how to act in a OTAK, a simulated computer simulation of the
classroom. The learner may imagine instances in distant world of Atlantis, there are a number of
which the proposed strategy for acting would be characters who drive the learning activities and
inappropriate; however, they have no recourse to story which comes in the form of novels and comic
conversation with the system about the validity books (Warren, 2005, 2006b). These characters
of the required strategy. Their only option is to introduce new meta-storylines, explain new digital
refuse to participate in the simulated experience. developments within the 3-D environment, and
This problem resulted in the idea that it should provide brief background stories to situate the
be possible to leverage technology to mitigate the “Quests” that students complete in order to earn
major problems faced by student teachers in the rewards and prestige.
current teacher training programs:
The Need to Build Narrative Supports
1. distance of the teacher from their pre-service
experience, One of the primary complaints from the 4th, 5th and
2. the limitations placed on the amount of 6th grade public school learners that emerged from
structured or unstructured communications, informal and semi-structured interviews related to
3. the amount of critical impact they could have the narrative that supports QA. Specifically, they
on the students in a limited time period, and noted that there was a lack of interaction with the
4. the possibility of a poor quality teach- main characters that otherwise engaged them in
ing simulated face-to-face instructional the stories that framed the learning activities and
experience. drive their actions in the 3-D space (Dodge et
al., In Press; Warren, 2006c). Therefore, it was
However, the question remained as to how the determined that project team members should
one could develop a simulated teaching experience role play the six main characters a few hours a
that would to provide pre-service teachers with a week to provide student participants with the
flexible system in which there were opportunities opportunity to interact directly with the fictional
for the participant to engage with real students in characters as a means of enriching their experience
to simulate the communicative actions that are with and knowledge of the supporting narrative
present in day-to-day teaching. as it evolved.
At the same time the team was developing the
initial solution to this problem, the problem of a
lack of suitable pre-service teacher sites for field

515
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experiences was noted to the designers during an nity to interact with students on a daily basis in
unrelated meeting. As a result of this limitation, a way similar to how they would once they had
many pre-service teachers in the state of Indiana their own classrooms upon graduation in terms
were placed in schools out of state as far away of developing effective communication. Further,
as Cincinnati, Ohio, Louisville, Kentucky, and through role-play, they would be able to experi-
Chicago, Illinois. This resulted in round-trip ence the dramatics/acting as teacher/scaffolding
travel times ranging from two to five hours in student learning, which Habermas (1981a; 1981b)
some instances. The challenge was mainly due would frame as “dramaturgical action.” Actors also
to a systemic state geographical challenge that interact with and instruct students by providing
resulted in a lack of urban centers near teacher both explicit, realistic expectations for acting in a
preparation universities. Those centers near the safe, 3-D space while adding richness to student
universities tended to be rural or lacked sufficiently experience by communicating the story that drives
high student populations to meet the need for their activity in the project worlds. Training the
mentor teachers and classrooms for field experi- Council Actors was conducted by master teachers
ences. For those pre-service teachers that intended and project staff and was conducted similarly to
to teach in urban area, the opportunity to practice mentoring that is commonly done in public schools
in such settings was lacking and further, many of and teacher education programs.
the rural schools were burdened with high pre-
service teacher to mentor teacher ratio (Warren, Requirements of the Council
2006a). This led to a large number of students Actor Simulation
who spent only a few hours in the classroom as
students before they were given their own classes Council Actors were required to complete a
as professionals after graduation. number of weekly requirements in order to meet
Upon this discovery, it was determined that in their own field experience needs as well as those
order to address both the need for student interac- of the students they would work with in the 3-D
tion with the fictional characters and pre-service worlds. The following are the explicit require-
teacher need for interaction with real students, it ments provided to Council Actors for working in
was determined recruit undergraduate students the QA worlds that would provide them with high
in the pre-service education program to work in levels of contact with students while still ensuring
a simulated field experience called The Council coordination of teaching efforts across the team.
Actors.
1. Interaction: The Actor will interact with
kids or otherwise be in the space at least 6
SOLUTIONS AND hours per week.
RECOMMENDATIONS 2. Feedback: Actors will give feedback on
Council suggested and Community Quests
Design Solution during their down time in the space.
3. Staff Meeting: Actors will attend a Council
In order to recruit teachers for the program, The Actor staff meeting approximately one hour
Council Actors program was conceived as an per week and engage in team planning.
independent study course to provide a simulated 4. Council Meeting: At least one time per
field experience to pre-service teachers. The main month, all Actors will meet in the digital
benefit of this solution was perceived to be that it Council Chamber within Quest Atlantis for
would gives the pre-service teachers an opportu- 30-45 minutes per week.

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5. Web logs (blogs): The Actors submit blog sign with the burden of ‘utility,’ with gravity – its
entries for their characters 1-2 times per week form of representative equivalence – all this is
under the guidance of two project members over with…simulation, in the sense that, from
with expertise in this area. This allows them now on, signs are exchanged against each other
to approve all blog submissions and post rather than against the real (Baudrillard, 1993,
them in the appropriate space while ensuring p.6-7).” At this point, differences between the real
for narrative consistency. object and its reference or sign can no longer
be discriminated between, making their value
In addition to these guidelines for role-playing equivalent. (Baudrillard, 1994, p. 6)
the character and character responsibilities; there
were also two other key guidelines or pre-requi- If we accept this concept, then the reality rep-
sites. These are: the Actor has reviewed the novel resented by a simulation can be accepted as being
at length and has also reviewed the individualized the same as that in a different context outside the
character sheet for their particular character. The simulation. In a learning setting, this gains im-
findings that stemmed from the staff meetings in portance because it discounts the argument that
which the Actors told their stories of interacting both the classroom setting and the work students
with students impacted each new iteration of the do in classroom contexts must be authentic in
reified requirements document and provided in- the sense that it is exactly the same as the work
sight into the building of tacit knowledge of the they will be expected to do in the future for it to
pre-service teachers and staff members over time. be of value. From Baudrillard’s argument, work
completed by students in a simulation (e.g. as a
Transfer in the Simulation flight simulator) and the work that students may
complete in another context (e.g. flying a real
The Guide to Simulations and Games for Educa- plane) need not be an exact match and both have
tion and Training (Horn, 1977) defines the term authentic value. This is because humans already
simulation as a method of representing physical re- understand the exchange of the real for the ref-
ality. Further, Horn also note that the essence of the erential and value the practice of the referential
social system interaction must also be represented, equally in terms of future use. Therefore, learners
not just the physical. Therefore, simulations are do not need to complete the exact same task in
used to replicate essential aspects of reality so it order to perceive how the simulated task and ac-
may be better understood and/or controlled. In companying practices have value. Thus, simulated
addition, this definition sees user control as an experiences such as a role-play have transfer to
important feature of a simulation, positing that alternate contexts and work activities.
the user must be an active participant in an expe- The Council Actors simulation provides the
riential learning activity, whether physical, such pre-service teacher learners with control of the
as flying a plane, or social, such as engaging in major features of communicative action ranging
a debate about substantive international topics in from the strategic in which they post web logs
the forum of a simulated United Nations. that are used to convey “facts” about the Atlantian
However, this may not be a complete concep- planet just as they will write dates and events
tion as Baudrillard (1993) notes: for the American Revolution on the chalkboard.
The learners have control over what they choose
The systems of reference for production, signi- to reveal, the instructional methods by which
fication, the affect, substance, and history, all they convey information such as social norms,
this equivalence to a ‘real’ content, loading the or negotiate meaning and understanding through

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constantive communication within the simulated tion among the QA student participants, but would
space that is QA. By providing the pre-service eliminate the pre-service experience and benefit.
teachers with control over the social system that
in many ways mimics the learning and norma- The Role(-play) of the Pre-Service Teacher
tive aspects of the classroom, we provide them One important part that emerged was that the
with a simulated experience that leads to transfer primary role of the pre-service teacher is to nudge
to their future teaching experience. The Actors students towards using the learning affordances
experience simulates many of the interpersonal (Gibson, 1977) of the space such as the text of
conflicts that arise between students, rule enforce- Quests, Actor blogs, and other digital tools for
ment, and pedagogical moments that are part of learning. These encouragements provide students
the everyday classroom. with the opportunity to interact with the narrative/
characters, which they express an interest in doing
Simulating the Council: Balancing through their constantive communications with
Narrative and Learning the Council Actors. These “nudges” can be used
to direct students towards particular Quests that
The role of a Council Actor was revealed to be are of special interest to the Council Actors due
complex as the Actors began to engage with stu- to fictional events on Atlantis. These moments
dents in the space. Therefore, as we reported our of interaction act as opportunities for the teacher
findings in the staff meetings, we determined that actor to engage in the form of validity claim
being an Actor would require a number of guide- negotiation between teacher and student that we
lines for pre-service teachers to follow in order believe is necessary for understanding to occur.
to preserve the numerous narratives that exist in For instance, a typical interaction may emerge:
Quest Atlantis. This scaffold was necessary, not
only for the narratives to remain intact, but also Calron:So what is your favorite world in Quest
provided a structure to the overall experience and Atlantis?
commitment required of the pre-service teachers. Student:I like Culture.
In other words, while there were a number of Calron:What do you like in Culture world?
different roles that the pre-service teachers were Student:The stuff about music is my favorite
expected to engage in; there was also a need for Calron:Have you looked at the Quest about
a semi-structured experience for the pre-service Unidad’s favorite song?
teacher that they could refer back to in times of Student:No
trouble. This highlights both a limitation and a key Calron:I think it would be a good one if you like
opportunity of using the role-play design in that music
the guidelines above are listed as minimums for Student:Thks
participation. In contrast, the upper limits of the
amount of time spent would be defined by the pre- While this is a typical type of interaction in
service teachers as restricted by their other school which the Actor pushes a student who may not
and social commitments. With a different group of be completing the main learning activity in QA,
role-players, such as credentialed teachers hired which are Quests, they also act in several other
to spend considerably more time in the QA space ways such as providing understanding of group
than the pre-service teachers can afford, it may norms by referring the I-BURST rules that gov-
be possible to substantially increase the potential ern behavior in the space while another role is to
interactions between the teachers, students, and provide students with feedback. Council Actors
narrative. This would then result in high satisfac- review different learning activities such as com-

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Simulating Teaching Experience with Role-Play

Figure 2. Archfall cover image

munity or teacher Quests and provide feedback
that has a clear Atlantian view of the problem and
solution, while still connecting their work to the
real world and its impact on the distant world.
They also have the opportunity to help guide class
activities in conjunction with teachers. This allows
the pre-service teacher, with the help of a QA staff
member or teacher, to practice grading and giving
feedback that are two important responsibilities
of teachers on a day-to-day basis.

Tension: Non-Explicit Direction

A major challenge that emerged with this working
within this form of simulated teaching experience
is that Council Actors must avoid being overly
explicit in their answers as it may lock the nar-
rative in ways that makes it difficult to scaffold
for other Actors or may limit future development.
QA novels such as Archfall in the Two Worlds,
One Fate series provide a good example of the
questions rather than direct answers work better
non-explicit kinds of interactions that could serve
because they encourage students to critically
as a model of the kinds of interaction that should
examine their problem and seek their own solu-
used when acting as a Council member this. The
tion. Questions such as: “Why did you decide to
novels act as strong references for Actor behavior,
do that?” or “Have you thought about X?” serve
knowledge, background information, and context
as to challenge the student participants to come
as the Actor seeks to provide students with learn-
to their own conclusions and solutions without
ing experiences in the 3-D worlds. The cover of
being led directly to them.
Archfall is presented in Figure 2 and showcases
Kerbe and Alim, two of the Council members,
Tension: Empowering Learners Through the
surrounded by the Arch of Wisdom.
System
In instances where narrative-shifts may occur
Finally, we wanted to avoid presenting the Council
as a result of interaction with students, it is neces-
a group as all-knowing, perfect avatars of virtue
sary for not only a detailed description of the
lest we destroy one of the things that kids like about
situation to be kept; but for a decision to be made
them which is that they are flawed and somewhat
on whether to acknowledge the shift or to attempt
like themselves. There should be instances when
to minimize it. In either case, the narrative would
the Council member just does not know the an-
be used as the primary reference.
swer and recommends that the Questers ask their
friends, their teachers, or explore more on their
Tension: Providing Cognitive Challenge
own. By engaging in strong instructional methods
Another major challenge was that Council Actors
that empower the learners, we hoped that the pre-
are expected to avoid overly didactic, explicit
service teachers would learn how to encourage
instructional interactions in which they tell stu-
self-direction and ability to master the necessary
dents the answer to specific questions about how
skills to effectively communicate within the QA
to complete a learning task. Cognitive challenge

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 Simulating Teaching Experience with Role-Play

system towards the goal of understanding their RESEARCHING A SIMULATED

world through inquiry. One of the means by which TEACHING EXPERIENCE
we provided the Actors with guidance about these
Council members was to develop “templates” or While working to develop substantial methods for
“style sheets” similar to those that are used in research into complex environments that include
role playing games like White Wolf’s Mage: The simulations, games, MUVES, and blends of these
Awakening. These style sheets provide the Actors continues, we generated several suggestions for
with the core information about the character’s val- addressing issues of learning, attitude, and other
ues, experiences that are in the background of the important educational and psychological con-
narrative, physical, social, and mental attributes, structs relevant to the effectiveness of a simulated
as well as their personal beliefs in relationship experience in this format. Empirical forms of
to the Social Commitments which are central to research such as survey and pre-posttest methods
the Quest Atlantis moral and ethical system that should be employed to provide part of the picture
supports student activity. Figure 3 shows part of of pre-service attitudes towards learning based
Calron’s template that includes an example of this on design methods, issues of self-efficacy, and
guide that is provided to the Actors. understanding of instructional methods.

Figure 3. Style sheet for Calron character

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However, in order to provide a more complete and empowerment (Lather & Smithies, 1997;
picture when examining a role-play simulation, Leistyna, Lavanez, & Nelson, 2004).
we recommend that other methods that can delve From a researcher point of view, this becom-
more deeply into the socially negotiated and in- ing part of the community allows for honest
dividual experiences of the pre-service teachers communication by the participants of their indi-
should also be employed. These include, but are vidual understandings that bind their actions and
not limited to, qualitative methods that generate knowledge of their meanings in the context of the
data which can be used to revise the design of such social science perspective. Further, by engaging
a simulated teaching experience and may provide a dialogue between researcher-participant and
a lens by which we can better understand and study-participant, as well as the community, prob-
improve more naturalistic pre-service experiences lems and solutions are identified and generated
in face-to-face settings. Most importantly, these by the Council Actor members themselves, which
methods center the researcher as a co-participant leads to empowerment in the present context and
in the learning experience and therefore provide empowerment to solve problems in future situa-
a means to empower the pre-service teacher in tions (Leistyna et al., 2004) and therefore transfer
areas of student management, communication, of the simulated experience to their prospective
and problem solving before they take over their professional teaching experience.
own classroom. The most important research The Emancipatory Interest fundamentally
methods we employed were those that forced changes the purpose of research from observing
self-examination of Actors and sharing of those or describing and then reporting a change made
insights and challenges that emerged as we worked over time in a community to a purpose that in-
through the use of the simulated experience. The volves the researcher empowering community
information that emerged from these discussions members to identify and work towards solutions
resulted in the highest positive impact redesigns to as they reacquire power from the digital system
the experience over time and generated effective and reintegrate it into the community through
rule sets to govern role-play. purposeful communicative action. So, how do
we study a simulated role-play from the perspec-
The Emancipatory Interest tive of both emancipating the participants and
understanding the impact of such a design on
In terms of social science research, the Emancipa- the communicative actions that form the basis of
tory Interest is a concept that violates the under- instruction and learning?
pinnings of traditional empirical research (Gall,
Borg, & Gall, 1996), but was very important as Hermeneutic and
we sought to include CA as a grounding theory Phenomenological Approaches
for both the design of the learning experience for
the pre-service teachers and staff as well as the In order to address the idea that instruction and
research methods that were employed. The idea learning are communicative actions with the goal
of observer as objective outsider is abandoned of emancipating both instructor and learner, there
in favor of inserting the researcher, not only as are several methodological approaches that can be
participant-observer in the social learning and leveraged. Two in particular are the hermeneutics
acting processes, culture, and immersive forms and phenomenology (Bernstein, 1983). Both offer
of life of the local community, but as an active a number of benefits for social sciences research
proponent and advocate for effecting social change in terms of moving to a situated conception of

521
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knowledge that are important for developing a than decontextualized yes or no answers to narrow
simulated teaching experience like the Council hypothetical questions.
Actors. First, these stances view knowledge as Further, in modern conceptions of these re-
tied to context and situated within the individu- search methods, the researcher often becomes a
als experience with it. Knowledge, understand- part of the community and acts as a co-participant
ing and experience occur concurrently and from in the research and learning processes of the culture
these come meaning. “(U)nderstanding must be under study, which is important within the con-
conceived as a part of the process of the com- text of the Council Actors where the pre-service
ing into being of meaning” (Gadamer quoted in teachers and staff act as participant in, designer
Bernstein, 1983, p. 125). Therefore, the process of, and researcher of the simulated experience.
of research in social sciences from this perspec- This helps to overcome the commonly perceived
tive must study the process by which individuals “Ivory Tower” problem in which the researcher
come to understand situated knowledge and derive is viewed as an outsider telling the community
meaning from it. what is wrong and prescribing an alien approach
to solve a perceived problem. In the context of
Challenges to Such Approaches hermeneutic research, the researcher is instead
viewed as a co-worker who is developing solu-
However, both forms of research have both been tions in conjunction with the local community and
criticized on a number of fronts including charges solutions are phrased in terms of what the commu-
that they lead to relativism in which there is no nity members themselves propose (Carspecken,
fundamental truth or knowledge, they have a 1996; Denzin & Lincoln, 2003). In the case of
lack of usefulness for social science research the Council Actors, the researcher is always also
due to their descriptive nature, and they require an Actor themselves who can act as a modeler of
a substantial length of time to conduct a proper appropriate communication and teaching with
research study using such methods (Bernstein, students in the digital worlds.
1976, 1983). The first and second criticisms are
well-founded concerns as misapplied hermeneutic
methods can lead to overly specific, completely FUTURE TRENDS
relativistic information that adds nothing to the
body of research knowledge. However, if such As the population of the world continues to grow,
methods are used to describe the experiences the need for trained teachers who can walk into
and understandings of several people to provide the classroom and understand how to effectively
a larger picture of the situation through the lived communicate in order for students to learn and
practices of the Council Actor pre-service teacher grow. Concurrently, the opportunities for pre-
participants, the story of a culture and its forms service teachers to engage with students before
of life may be used for formative and diagnostic they take over their own classrooms continue
purposes, much like more traditional, empiricist to decline in many areas (Simpson, 2006). Role
methods of research. The descriptive nature of plays have already been found to be valuable as
hermeneutic research methods is more beneficial learning tools in military applications (Nieborg,
than Positivist paradigms for such diagnostic 2005), flight simulations, and other instances in
and formative purposes because it they allow for which there are fairly low-levels of complexity
the identification of problems and solutions as to the computers simulated behavior, because
conceived and phrased by the participants rather the artificial intelligence, while improving rap-
idly, lacks the responsiveness of true combat

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or flight situations that become more complex negotiate understanding through interpersonal,
exponentially in compressed time periods. This is constantive speech acts, and come to understand-
also true in standard classrooms, especially with ing of their relationships to societal norms. These
K-12 students who behave differently from day pre-service teachers, many of whom already use
to day based on myriad factors that come from these tools themselves, will need to be experts at
home, interpersonal relationships that implode communicating with technology and understand
in the hallway on the way to class, and the daily how the tool deforms or alters student understand-
foibles of self-image that change with the surging ing so that they can adapt their own instruction to
hormones of the individual student. meet the needs of a new kind of student.
In the future, providing pre-service teachers
with simulated role-plays in which they act as
the teacher acts can provide them with authentic CONCLUSION
expectations of the kinds of student behaviors,
questions, and challenges that they will face in As the need for qualified teachers with real world
the classroom on a day-to-day basis once they experience working with students rises throughout
take over their first class room. Just as we would the world and the opportunities for meaningful
prefer that the pilot of a $30 million fighter jet practice the art of teaching and interacting with
has had experience overcoming the common and students decline due to population shifts, increases,
uncommon problems that arise mid-flight and can and declines, cost of training, and low participa-
react effectively to the humans that fly the enemy tion of existing teachers in mentoring programs,
fighters, we want our pre-service teachers to be the need for simulated teaching experiences will
prepared for the unpredictable human challenges concurrently increase over the come decades. As
in a situated fashion more closely mimics what this need increases, innovated instructional and
they will encounter in a way that simulations are learning methods are increasing access to student
only now beginning to address. With our children’s populations using communication tools embedded
minds and education, we would prefer that future in online simulations and game products ranging
educators that may decide that teaching just is not from Second Life to Quest Atlantis that have
for them decide this based on realistic expectations their own existing or emerging storylines that
that stem from realistic interactions with students require human support to maintain. Role play in
well before they take over their own classroom. these simulated learning environments provides
As role-plays like this become more common, we opportunities for pre-service teachers to engage
can expect to find better trained teachers who are in meaningful pedagogical contact with the stu-
more readily able to start teaching on the first day dents that they may in the future teach so that
of school and fewer who wash out of the profes- they can understand the limitations, difficulties,
sion after two years because they did not know and instructional affordances of technologies as
how difficult it can really be to teach every day. a means of communicating meaningful learn-
Every day, the number of communication tools ing experiences from a variety of educational
splinter and rapidly expand in multiple forms paradigms from objectivism to contextualist or
where students use tools ranging from text mes- relativist world views.
saging Facebook and Second Life to those we have Just as importantly, these simulated role-plays
not yet conceived. Each new form of structural provide pre-service teachers with opportunities to
communication (using technology as a vehicle) understand how today’s learners use technology
conveys information that allows students to rap- to communicate. From a communicative action
idly coordinate their learning actions in groups, perspective, understanding how the structural

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communications that are mediated by technolo- Bernstein, R. J. (1983). Beyond Objectivism and
gies like Facebook and Second Life deform or Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics, and Praxis.
otherwise alter student knowledge and action is Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
going to be increasingly important as they are
Carspecken, P. F. (1996). Critical ethnography
further integrated in educational settings. Know-
in educational research. New York: Routledge.
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that arise from technological mediation through Denzin, N., & Lincoln, Y. (Eds.). (2003). The
pedagogical action is going to be one of the core discipline and practice of qualitative research
skills of many instructors as technology plays an (2 ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
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Dewey, J. (1925). Experience and nature. Chicago:
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Open Court Publishing.
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS perience is ill-structured and without meaningful

goals or objectives.
Field Experience: Activity that typically Pre-Service Teacher: Individuals in teacher
takes place in an authentic school or educational education programs who have not yet been
environment where an individual may practice awarded their initial teaching license.
and observe methods associated with a particular Role-Play: The act of portraying an entity
role – primarily applies to teacher field experience other than oneself. An immersive role-play would
which is a requirement of the in-service teacher require an investment into the character such as
prior to graduation. that of a professional actor in a particular part.
In-Service Teacher: Individuals who are Simulated Character: A non-real character
licensed teachers and currently teaching. with a deeply developed back-story. Simulated
Learning: The internalization of knowledge; characters include a core set of engagement and
may be directed (and therefore defined as instruc- activity rules that encourage adherence to the
tion) or may be ill-structured and/or unanticipated ‘spirit’ of the character.
in informal settings. Simulation: An experience that interactively
Narrative: Otherwise known as a retelling models some part of reality for a user.
or story in which commonly includes elements Teacher Experience: The act and art of being
such as plot, exposition (beginning), rising action in the role of a teacher. Activities are not limited
(conflict), climax (turning point), falling action to teaching, but also include mentoring, coaching,
(wrap-up), and resolution (conclusion). facilitating, reviewing and observation.
Play Space: An environment where incidental Virtual Worlds: Imaginary virtual persistent
learning may occur, where meaningfully directed environments where individuals can use an avatar
learning may occur; but where the majority of ex- to interact with other avatars and virtual objects.

This work was previously published in Digital Simulations for Improving Education: Learning Through Artificial Teaching
Environments, edited by David Gibson and Young Kyun Baek, pp. 273-288, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference
(an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.3
Impact of Podcasts as
Professional Learning:
Teacher Created, Student Created, and
Professional Development Podcasts

Kathleen P. King
University of South Florida, USA

ABSTRACT production, but also the robust research model,

formative and dynamic instructional design for
Until now, research on podcasting in education staff development and recommendations for
mostly examined teacher created podcasts in K-12 podcasting research strategies.
and higher education. This paper explores podcasts
in professional learning across several genres of
podcasts. Using a popular typology of podcasts, INTRODUCTION AND NEED
teacher created, student created and professional
development podcasts (King & Gura, 2007), this Since 2004, Internet-based new media formats
paper compares, contrasts and reveals the potential have soared. Prolific Internet use has generated
of multiple educational contexts and instructional public desires and expectations to be content
strategies, formative instructional design, interdis- creators. Opportunities such as political and
ciplinary strategies, formal and informal learning, personal blogs and independent podcasts of all
and effective uses of data gathering methods. The flavors as well as ever- popular YouTube® videos
significance of the study extends from not only flash across users’ screens and minds, creating the
the extensive reach of the data gathering and expectation of self as a new media communicator
(Walch & Lafferty, 2006). It is through the recent
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch303

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

advent of convenient and free Web 2.0 technolo- (1) What is the use and potential for podcasting
gies, such as blogs, podcasts and vlogs, and Free in multiple educational contexts? (2) What in-
Open Source Software (FOSS) (Rajendran & structional strategies are used in the podcast? (3)
Venkataraman, 2009) that people of all ages and How is formative instructional design utilized in
backgrounds are claiming their place and voice the podcasts? (4) What interdisciplinary strate-
on the Web (Frontline, 2008). The great value of gies are used? (5) What is learned about uses and
podcasting, a new media technology, for education formats of formal and informal learning? And (6)
is the ease of custom and inexpensive design, truly What effective uses of data gathering methods are
flexible, “anytime, anywhere” delivery format. recommended from these studies? The popular
Since 2005, anyone with access to a computer, typology of podcasts, teacher-created, student-
Internet and a $10 microphone can freely record, created and professional development podcasts
edit, and distribute audio content worldwide. is used in three studies examining the following
Similarly, anyone with Internet access can hear productions: UEGE, TTPOD/PFT, and DLPOD
these archived digital audios on computers or (see Figure 1).
mobile devices, 24/7.
Widespread social and instructional adoption
of podcasting has occurred since 2006, including THEORETICAL BASES
adoption for formal and informal learning. With
this increased use, educators and researchers need Major theoretical underpinnings of this research
greater understanding of podcast-related instruc- include formative evaluation and continuous
tional applications, data gathering opportunities, improvement of instructional design, research
impact, scalability and scope of reach, instructional design and methods, podcasting and new media
design, and research opportunities (eSchool News, as instruction, podcasting typology, and informal
2008; King & Gura, 2007; Williams, 2008). For learning.
example, there are numerous free data gathering
resources to couple with podcast use and yet no Formative Evaluation Informing
mention in the literature as to how schools might Instructional Design
use it to demonstrate impact of their programs and
services or instructors for formative improvement Critical to the approach of this study is that educa-
of curriculum, let alone recommended strategies tors can formatively design and evaluate instruc-
for educators’ reporting of them. Research studies tion (Caffarella, 2001). Continuous improvement
may also provide recommendations for the design via data gathering, analysis and interpretation
of additional action- based research and inquiry provides powerful means to proactively and dy-
in robust and systematic ways (Devaney, 2008). namically chart the course of successful learning
By analyzing findings from three related pod- as many educators have demonstrated (Jonassen
cast studies, this paper provides a macro research et al., 2003; Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, 1995).
perspective and recommendations in these areas. Broader and substantial research methodologies
The work collectively addresses the impact of pod- frame our thinking for instructional design, in-
casts on professional learning and uses King and quiry and data collection. These core frameworks
Gura’s podcast typology (2007) as a framework include Denzin and Lincoln (2008a, 2008b) on
for comparison and differentiation. This paper qualitative research, Gall, Borg, and Gall (1996)
presents findings, discussion and interpretation on statistics and research design, and Hinchey
of results for the following research questions: (2008) on action research.

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Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

Figure 1. The three cases: podcasts studied

Research Methods (as a for data gathering and research in educational

Theoretical Frame) podcasting. In addition, it provides a basis for
recommendations for more systematic and deeper
With action research as a vital model of research inquiry, which can improve student learning, and
in many teacher education programs today, in- advance the field’s future.
structors engaging in instructional improvement
using podcasts may go further and conduct action Podcasting and Instruction
research inquiries. Even if research is not formally
pursued, educators collect data and use student Podcasting distributes digital recordings via Really
responses in informal research for guiding instruc- Simply Syndication–feeds (RSS-feeds). That is,
tional design (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008; Hinchey, individuals record audio content with computers
2008). This article examines three different educa- or digital recorders, post it on the Internet on
tional podcasting studies, therefore understanding a publicly available server, create XML script
the framework of research methodologies and RSS-feed to string it together and deliver the
decision making are important foundations for episodes. Teachers and students, now podcasters,
our discussion (Gall, Borg, & Gall, 1996). visit the podcast directories on the Internet and
In the field of instructional technology among add their information to the searchable databases
diverse populations, action (Hinchey, 2008) and (King, 2008). Potential listeners visit the search
mixed-methods research (Creswell, 1998; Glaser for topics on the web or visit the directories, re-
& Strauss, 1967; Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998) have view descriptions, select and directly listen to or
been effective strategies across numerous studies download the files.
(Jonassen et al., 2003). Analyzing the studies at Expert authors carefully and specifically ap-
hand for their research methods provides greater plied the technical definition of podcasts to their
understanding of what educators currently do work (Walch & Lafferty, 2006). They define

529
 Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

podcasts as audio (and video) new media products pedagogical style, teachers may specifically plan,
hosted on servers and scripted with an XML/RSS design and create podcasts for other instructional
feed, utilizing push technologies. This definition purposes. For example, they may develop supple-
distinguishes podcasts from web-based audio or mentary classroom materials, distance learning,
video posts which are not syndicated, cannot be out of class or homework materials, tutorials,
“subscribed” to, nor automatically delivered to extension activities, etc.
listeners/learners. Student created podcast are often developed
Listeners may also port podcasts over to por- as part of classroom assignments. From k-16 to
table devices such as MP3 players, iPods, or some workplace training and doctoral studies, they
cell phones for mobile convenience (Richardson, may be used in a plethora of ways. For instance,
2006; Williams, 2008). This option allows listeners some teachers provide students opportunities to
to choose not only when they want to listen, but capture, archive and distribute their work as web-
also where. The rich podcasting medium reaches based audio or video projects, interviews, role
most people with Internet access; therefore, it playing or performances, historical narratives,
provides a platform for instruction from diverse presentations, simulations, etc. Indeed, creativity
perspectives. in student podcasting has been most widely seen in
Essential to framing our research, design and k-12 education, but is starting to emerge in higher
teaching efforts are understandings of education education, albeit slowly. This trend may be due
in a pluralistic society (Greene, 1993), culturally to different curriculum, professional development
responsive teaching (Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, opportunities and classroom time. Nonetheless,
1995), and multiculturalism (Spring, 1997). When with the growing number of Millennials or Digital
our learning space spans the globe and all 24 hours, Natives (Prensky, 2001) already graduating from
learners may engage with people from any lifestyle our colleges, higher education needs to transform
who have access, thereby eliminating traditional content expectations to be larger and in varied
boundaries of time, space, geography and class demanding media. Furthermore, we need post-
(Rajendran & Venkataraman, 2009). Therefore, secondary education to prepare students to be
greater skill in understanding and communicating effective communicators, inventors, and analysts
with people different from ourselves emerges. of digital media to guide our future. Assignments
integrating critical thinking in the content area
Podcasting Typology and developing innovative, creative, research
grounded media exemplify the relevant learning
King and Gura’s 2007 podcasting typology pro- possible with podcasts.
vides an effective means to differentiation among Professional development (PD) podcasts may
and compare educational podcasts. Podcasting be created by a variety of individuals, and orga-
for Teachers: Using a New Technology to Revo- nizations. These podcasting producers and hosts
lutionize Teaching and Learning (2007) identi- may include professional associations, teacher
fies three major genres of educational podcasts: educators/professors, staff developers, schools,
teacher-created, student-created and professional colleges and universities, non-profit organizations,
development podcasts. or government agencies, and certainly teachers
Teacher-created podcasts represent those de- (that is “by teachers, for teachers”). Podcast-
veloped by teachers, especially for instructional delivered PD affords much greater choice of time
purposes. These podcasts may include lectures or and space for engaging in professional learning.
presentations recorded and posted as an episode Indeed, the freedom shocks many educators and
in a class or subject series. In a more creative professionals, as they realize not only can they

530
Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

choose what they want to learn, but schedule it cess, use and research. Yet despite the trends of
at whim or will, and much of it is free. This new social adoption and the research opportunities,
generation of PD is not much like the mandatory educational research has been slow to wake to
training or staff development we sat through previ- this sleeping giant.
ously. Instead, PD on demand allows the lifelong
learner to be in control.
All of these forms of educational podcasting RESEARCH METHOD
create a growing archive which is freely available.
Individuals and organizations alike may select This research used a cross-case, case study model,
formal and informal staff development resources in a mixed-methods approach (Glaser & Strauss,
from this rich storehouse of content. Learning must 1967; Merriam, 1997). The case study analyzes
be selected with a critical eye for credentials and research approaches, instructional technology
expertise of the presenter. In addition, the relevance innovation, and adoption. Additionally, the re-
of content and integration of research, theory and searcher has been podcasting for three years and
practice are of prime importance for educational thereby can be considered an expert participant
podcasts. However, examining these character- observer (Creswell, 1998). She provides insight
istics creates a vibrant, relevant opportunity for into development, use and opportunities for
situated learning including critical thinking, technology, context, and meaning of new media.
lifelong learning and 21st-century learning skills Specifically, this study was a quantitative-qual-
(King & Gura, 2007; Partnership for 21st Century itative- quantitative sequential design (Tashakkori
Skills, 2004; Richardson, 2006; Williams, 2006). & Teddlie, 1998). In a Sequential Mixed Methods
Podcasting pursued in a contextualized, learner- Analysis (SMMA), the study used 5/7 stages out-
centered manner can be a powerful platform for lined by Onwuegbuzie and Teddlie (2003): data
education. reduction, display, transformation, consolidation,
comparison and integration. Data gathering meth-
Formal and Informal Learning ods included primary document examination and
evaluation, collecting statistical data of podcast
Familiar typologies of learning include formal, listener use from servers, hosting services, and
nonformal and informal learning (Coombs, 1989). statistical third-party services, blog comments,
By definition, informal learning is more learner- email comments, research articles and reports
centered, goal oriented, and flexible. Informal about the projects, website reviews, content from
learning’s focus on context and learner is inherent social networking sites, field notes, observations,
to the possibilities of the approach (Schugurensky, and podcast directory rankings and links. Data
2000). What distinguishes informal learning is analysis is tabulation, frequencies, and constant
the learners’ independence and connection to the comparison for emergent themes pursued until
contexts of daily life, including work (Livingstone, theoretical saturation (Glaser & Strauss, 1967).
1999; Schugurensky, 2000). The fields of adult The three studies and length of production
learning and teacher practice have done much to examined were, (1) a school leadership podcast
research (Argyris & Schon, 1974), codify (Tough, (9 months), (2) teacher professional development
1971), and build awareness (Dewey, 1938; Liv- podcast (3 years), and (3) student created podcast
ingstone, 1999; Polanyi, 1967; Tough, 1971) of (1 semester). Figure 2 provides a comprehensive
this area. Instructional technologies such as new illustration of the analysis strategy. It reveals the
media used for professional development provide three cases, and the sequence of data collection,
more rich opportunities for informal learning ac- and analysis.

531
 Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

Figure 2. Analysis strategy overview

Table 1 provides the reader with the details fuller realm of inquiry. Action research provides
and table of information gathered for each podcast a dynamic interaction with context, learning and
series. It shows the categories and results used development. Examining Figure 2 reveals each
for this study. It is provided here not only to reveal study using a different approach: quantitative
the early stages of data, but also as a model of research, mixed methods, and combined mixed-
data gathering and data display (Onwuegbuzie & methods approach for action research.
Teddlie, 2003) for researchers and podcasters who
desire to replicate or scaffold the methods pre- Findings and Preliminary Analysis
sented in this article.
Perusal of the data revealed a more varied edu-
cational contexts that might be expected. Based
FINDINGS: ANALYSIS AND on the podcast series descriptions, purpose, show
DISCUSSION notes, and review of their program format many
indicators were found. The settings included: staff
Mixed methods research and action research were development, direct learner instruction, indepen-
the predominate models describing the research dent continuing professional learning, teacher
methods used by the podcasts examined. Because education, and student research. That is, the two
so much data are available in quantitative format, broad groups of users, educators and students,
when fully configured and accessed, many people used the podcasts in different settings (and in
emphasize listenership. However, many early, non- different ways to be discussed later). Specifically,
educational podcasters (2005-2007) had a strong educators and school leaders used podcasts for
sense of audience and rely heavily on qualitative their professional development through formal
data. When a mixed method is used, it provides a efforts by their schools or in degree study, but

532
Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

Table 1. Comparison educational podcast research

Podcast/ New Media Stats Research

Years Typology (K&G) Other Data
Study Used Tools Methods
UEGE 5102 2008 Student - created Podcast Host-Libsyn Blackboard Mixed-Methods
(Foundations (Jan-May) Blog TTPOD Survey Action Research
class) Discussion PodPRESS Focus group
Board Essay
Video
TTPOD and PFT (8/05-7/08-pres- Teacher -created Podcast Feedburner Blog counts Mixed-Methods
(Teachers Pod- ent) Professional De- Blog Hosts (2) Blog posts
cast™ and velopment Discussion Frappr.com e-Mail content
Podcast for Board Site counter Survey
Teachers ™) Facebook Directories Focus group
Frappr Google Analyt- (NECC)
e-Mail ics Facebook
Call-in StatCounter
Web-voice PODPress
Servers
DLPOD (10/07-7/08-pres- Professional De- Podcast Feedburner Focus groups Quantitative
(District Leaders ent) velopment Website Host-Libsyn StatCounter
Podcast ™) e-Mail Site counter Clients
Call-in Directories PODPress
Google Analyt- Server
ics

also in their informal continuing professional the message in multiple modes (King, 2008; Kolb,
development. In addition, students used podcasts 1984; Williams, 2008).
in completing lessons by direct instruction: as they Educators using podcasting of these varied
were instructed to create or listen to a podcast, or genres demonstrate the value of using multiple
as a solution to find additional information. instructional strategies to reach students more
Educational podcasters were able to incorpo- effectively. This example is from one teacher
rate multiple instructional strategies in even one planning for student created podcasts,
podcast episode. This finding was again more In designing the course I tried to be especially
complex than may be expected, but encouraging sensitive and accommodating to access and eq-
because of the possibilities for further develop- uity issues (King & Griggs, 2000) and not make
ment. Examples of incorporating new media in assumptions about 24/7 access or over familiar-
empowering formats for underrepresented con- ity with technology. One way I addressed these
stituencies examples include, but are not limited variables was to design varied technology options
to, design formats of small group dialogue, peer required for assignments (King, 2008).
learning, peer review, learner created media,
class presentations which are designed as global Emergent Themes
resources and instructor created media; and genres
of: critical reflection, historical narrative, debate, Instructional Design and Monitoring Data. Major
first person narrative, storytelling, performances, patterns in dynamic, learner-centered instructional
and role playing. These innovative educators were design through monitoring data for learning ben-
keenly aware of being able to use the multiple efits were revealed in this study (Caffarella, 2001;
instructional strategies in order to reach a wider Jonassen et al., 2003). Such practices include
range of multiple learning styles and to deliver developing a unique reporting format illustrated

533
 Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

in Figure 3. Such reports integrate the research Instructional Strategies. The data also demon-
and instructional design thoroughly (action re- strates educational podcasters using inter-
search) with statistics from multiple sources into disciplinary strategies in their creations.
one tracking file and a one-page snapshot report. While presenting content on educational
The procedure of tracking the podcasts includes technology professional development (the
periodically gathering and downloading statistics, TTPOD series) for instance, podcast hosts
establishing an electronic filing and backup sys- also discussed, in-depth, math education,
tem to archive the data, consolidating the data, literacy education and financial literacy.
and distributing reports for programmatic and Alternatively a sample student created pod-
instructional improvement. Certainly such ex- cast (UEGE) integrated theory, research and
tensive data gathering practices are not the norm practice from health education, government,
with traditional classroom instruction. However, and philosophy.
the podcasting distribution system and foresight
to utilize it can enable educators to include the In addition, while content standards may be
practices into their existing instructional design easily and directly addressed with podcasts, other
routines. indirect benefits are very valuable for learners. Us-
One project (DLPOD) benefited from exten- ing these learning activities, instructors can assist
sive prior experience of the producer. This project learners to experience greater research skills and
established a statistical reporting format form the perspectives, validation, and freedom. Further-
start and the ease of production tracking was more, dialogue and peer learning are powerful for
significantly different. Unfortunately, to our critical pedagogy as these new media approaches
knowledge, no one in education has discussed or explicitly shift the classroom focus from teacher
published such documents previously. to learner (King, 2008; Wlodkowski & Ginsberg,
1995). New media enables learners to articulate

Figure 3. Consolidated statistical monthly report

534
Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

their views to their classroom and distribute them Contexts of Learning and Readiness. Podcast-
worldwide if desired (King & Gura, 2007, 2009). ing for professional learning is pursued both in
Alternatively, instructors can create a password formal and informal learning settings. Therefore,
protected mailbox to address learners’ needs and while millions of downloads have occurred as
sensitive discussions (King & Gura, 2008). educators independently decide to pursue their
Emergent Model of Instructional Design. In continued learning, some professors use the same
considering the process of instructional design, podcasts as part of their curriculum, aka listenings,
Figure 4 illustrates a simple model which concep- staff developers use them to deliver or extend
tually and practically guides teaching preparation formal learning (for example, UEGE, TTPOD).
and practice. While most educators use a required In addition, many young adults are Digital
curriculum, they may discover additional digital Natives (Prensky, 2001) and use technology to
and supplemental publisher resources. Building communicate, socialize, and meet most of their
upon these and other free or FOSS media (USA needs with it. Undoubtedly, Digital Natives’ early
Library of Congress Digital media, USA Na- adoption of this technology contributes to informal
tional Archives, Archive.org, Teachertube.com, learning podcasts in general like language learn-
Schooltube.com, etc) they may scaffold student ing podcasts, catapulting to the tops of the charts
learning to develop meaningful project based (for example, UEGE). Incorporating digital media
learning assignments. Using the Figure 4 model, into formal settings provides not only authentic
assignments focus on student created content, vehicles for learning, but also provides a model
such as student created podcasts, and include and experience in using podcasts for learning
the full cycle of curriculum-foundation, student purposes. In fact, in the UEGE and TTPOD data,
research and student evidence of understanding student essays, survey responses, and listener blog
through digital media. and discussion board posts reveal that learners’

Figure 4. Instructional design for educational podcasting

535
 Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

formal learning experience using podcast transfer be planned for designed, data gathering routines,
(Caffarella, 2001) to informal learning practices. report protocols and analysis established from the
start. TTPOD and DLPOD developed and sought
Educational Podcasting these data sources vigorously to good benefit.
Research Model Other formal instructional podcasts may be miss-
ing opportunities for organized research efforts
Based on review of the reports and articles, I pro- in gaining direct audience feedback.
pose a model for educational podcasting research Podcasting Data Gathering Strategies and
design, Figure 5. This model includes critical Sources. Extracted from this research, examples
characteristics that aid in research design include of free statistical tracking systems include: Feed-
(1) integrate research planning and instructional burner PRO, PODPress (through the podcast
design, (2), decide on data gathering methods, blog site), individual server statistics, Google
and reevaluate periodically, (3) plan on periodic Analytics™, and varied extents of statistics from
status/data reports- at least monthly, and (4) use individual hosts such as LibSyn, Podomatic, Blu-
the information for formative evaluation and im- brry.com, etc. Other examples of data gathered
provement. This model includes detailed essential at no cost were through the use of online surveys
elements of sound instructional design (Caffarella, and website statistics trackers (Statcounter, for
2001) and research methodology (Denzin & Lin- example) (see Figure 6). When coupled with
coln, 2008; Gall, Borg, & Gall, 1996). listener data this information provides podcasters
For example, qualitative data from listeners and instructors insight into how many people are
such as blog comments, emails, VOIP messages, listening, to what, and when (day); what content
discussion boards, and social networking provide is most popular; geographical location, operating
valuable data for instructional design and should system used, time zone and URL entry point of

Figure 5. Podcasting research design model

536
Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

Figure 6. Gathering data on podcasting distribution

site visitors and listeners. Such approaches and Further Recommendations

results were evident in two of the studies reviewed.
Listeners engaged in using these podcasts for
Limitations of this Study learning gained much from their colleagues’
and podcasters’ perspectives. The related blog
All studies have limitations based on their design and discussion board postings reveal impressive
and participant thresholds. In this research proj- demonstrations of effort, depth of research, in-
ect, the limitations include that although it was a sight, public speaking, global awareness, voice,
diverse set of educational podcast efforts, those empowerment and initiative by formal and infor-
studied were a convenience sample. This choice mal learners. Creating new learning communities
was necessary to use a unifying framework. There- is never easy, but using new media to support
fore, the author’s podcasts were used, albeit this traditional classrooms can extend learning. In
identity is disclosed, documented and described. addition, building a virtual community of practice
Establishing the boundaries of this perspective, (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Marsick & Watkins, 2001)
one realizes that this is an innovative educator, around a podcast resource can provide support
well versed in instructional technology and fo- and knowledge for educators who might have
cused on learner-centeredness, formative design little of either. In the case of the podcasts studied
and instructional research. Such an orientation here, they have variously used Facebook, blogs
provides an unusual context, but a rich source for and now Twitter to cultivate such communities.
exploring the potential of educational and research When using podcasts for formal and informal
applications of podcasts with current resources. learning, learners are using “new media” for rec-
Many fields study the work of innovators in order reational and social uses. This technology has a
to chart new approaches (Rogers, 2003). great excitement and popular validation connected

537
 Impact of Podcasts as Professional Learning

to it at this time. Aside from the benefits of users’ to assist in instructional improvement, research
flexibility and control of time and space, educators and investigation. At this time, podcasters follow
may leverage the new media as an added attraction this basic process only inconsistently.
and incentive to engage reluctant learners. In the
process learners also are invested in processes
which facilitate instructional improvement. They CONCLUSION
are exposed to more content; they have access to
repetition via rewind and replay functions, and There are a multitude of opportunities to use
depending on the instructional design perhaps podcasting for professional learning beyond the
engage in it more, and discover new opportunities model of course casting which our universities
for finding and using learning resources. seem to be enamored with today. Teacher-, and
In these several ways, the podcasts enable us to student-created, and professional development
deftly cultivate 21st-century skills (Partnership for podcasts provide abundant opportunities for
21st Century Skills, 2004, 2007). Through practice, flexible learning which include many additional
exploration and extension assignments critical educational opportunities yet to be extensively
thinking, research strategies, information literacy, explored. This study has revealed how one pod-
problem solving and collaborative learning skills cast series from each of three different genres
may be easily incorporated (ALA, 2006). of educational podcasts can extend learning
experiences to many instructional strategies and
learning contexts. It has revealed an interdisci-
EDUCATIONAL SIGNIFICANCE plinary instructional design approach which can
AND FUTURE RESEARCH be used in formal and informal learning. Finally,
the dynamic instructional design platform seen in
This research has provided greater understand- these examples offers a foundation for research
ing of what educators do and how they engage approaches, methods and recommendations. Still
in formative instructional design, data gathering only four years into the world of podcasting, we
and research in educational podcasting. Both the know educational podcasting has only begun to
reflective practitioner (Schon, 1987) and teacher explore its impact for professional learning.
as researcher (Hinchey, 2008) are familiar and
essential models for professional learning because
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velopment (IJICTHD), Volume 2, Issue 4, edited by Susheel Chhabra and Hakikur Rahman, pp. 55-67, copyright 2010 by IGI
Publishing (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 541

Chapter 3.4
Modelling Spoken Multimodal
Instructional Systems
Niels Ole Bernsen
NISLab, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

Laila Dybkjær
NISLab, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

The use of speech and spoken dialogue is a rela- A key advantage of instructional systems is to en-
tively recent addition to instructional systems. As, able instruction in the absence of a human expert
almost invariably, human instructors and students or teacher. From pre-school kids to adults of all
talk during teaching and training, spoken dialogue ages, everybody needs to learn and benefit from
would seem to be an important factor in systems the expertise of others when doing unfamiliar
that emulate aspects of human instruction. In this tasks. The classical solution is to be helped by a
chapter, the origins and state of the art of spoken human instructor who has two kinds of expertise:
multimodal instruction are descrbed. Strengths in the subject-matter in question and in effectively
and weaknesses of the speech modality, key roles communicating or transferring the expertise to
of spoken dialogue in multimodal instruction, students. While this approach has worked for mil-
functional issues in current spoken teaching and lennia, it suffers from the problem that expertise
training systems, commercial prospects, and some remains expensive and rare, relative to the number
main challenges ahead are then discussed. of those who wish to acquire or draw upon it. A
language instructor in class, for instance, has little
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch304 time for coaching each student individually.

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

An interactive instructional system, or system multimodal dialogue systems (the eighth section)
instructor, offers to supplement the human instruc- and commercial prospects (the ninth section) are
tor’s contributions to individual student learning discussed, and some main research challenges are
and problem-solving. In the ideal case, the system’s presented (the tenth section).
expertise, both subject-wise and pedagogically, is
near-equivalent to that of a good human instruc-
tor. Since systems can be copied infinitely, this INSTRUCTIONAL SYSTEMS
would enable students to work with an expert all
the time, in class, at home, and elsewhere, and By an (interactive) instructional system, an appli-
not just when the student has a human instructor’s cation whose main purpose is to teach or train the
undivided attention in class. It is hardly contro- user or help the user solve a particular problem is
versial that removing the difficulty of access to understood. Although often combined in practical
expertise and dramatically reducing its price is a applications, these goals are somewhat different.
worthwhile technological goal. A teaching system primarily teaches understand-
The roles of speech, spoken dialogue, and ing of some subject-matter, such as the periodic
conversation in instructional systems, most of system, basics of genetics, astronomy, planet
which include modalities other than speech, are geography, phases in the history of humanity,
described and discussed. Characteristically, human and so forth. A training system primarily trains
instruction involves spoken conversation with practical skills, such as language skills, how to
students no matter whether spoken interaction is operate some artefact, play golf, or fly a com-
central to the instructional task or has an auxiliary mercial airliner. Teaching and training systems are
role. In relative terms, speech is a newcomer in aimed at long-term learning effects in the learner.
the field of instructional systems, which for a By contrast, problem-solving support systems,
long time was characterised by typed text input/ such as one helping to install IP telephony on a
output. Spoken interaction is insufficient for most laptop, rarely incorporate ambitions of producing
instructional purposes, however. Other interactive long-term learning effects. If they help solve the
modalities are needed for optimising instructional problem at hand, they fulfil their purpose.
effectiveness and efficiency. New modalities and Aiming at long-term retention which largely
modality combinations hold the additional promise depends on the amount of elaboration done on
of providing system instructors for all users no the education material, teaching/training sys-
matter their perceptual or motor disabilities. tems typically focus on providing opportunity
Instructional systems are defined (the second for solving or otherwise addressing as many and
section), their history reviewed and the state of the as different problems or issues as possible in the
art of spoken instructional systems are described application domain. Key challenges in developing
(the third section), and conceptual architectures a good system are to make it pose the right chal-
and component technologies are presented (the lenges, evaluate the student’s attempts to cope,
fourth section). Using a simple example, how feed back evaluations, monitor progress, modify
to approach instructional systems analysis and challenge level depending on learning progress,
specification is discussed (the fifth section) and and stimulate motivation to continue learning.
a functional model of instructional interaction Problem-solving support systems focus on system
sketched (the sixth section). Since speech is not a problem-solving because the user is challenged
catch-all for instruction, when (not) to use speech already and needs help. Problem-solving support
is asked and key roles of spoken dialogue are pro- systems thus partially reverse the roles described,
posed (the seventh section). Examples of spoken so that the user poses the challenge, evaluates the

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

system’s attempt to cope, and feeds back evalua- Early Intelligent Tutoring
tions—but the system is still the expert. System Interfaces
Instructional systems need a usable interface
for human-system interaction. In a sense, this is no For many years, ITSs were basically GUI (graphi-
different from other interactive systems like word cal user interface) –based, using input from key-
processors or spreadsheet packages. Arguably, board and mouse and output on screen. Screen
however, usability requirements are particularly output was to begin with typically static text and
sharp for instructional systems: nothing is more graphics followed more recently by dynamic out-
de-motivating to self-instruction than a system put, such as video, animation, and virtual reality.
you cannot find out how to use; students often Since human tutoring typically involves natural
work alone or in small groups, lacking the usual language interaction, GUI-based instruction also
support from colleagues at work when something began to include typed student-system dialogue.
is amiss; and students typically need all system This trend seems to have grown with advances
functionality rather than the <20% functionality that now enable rather sophisticated linguistic
most word processor users actually use. interaction.

Natural Language Interaction

HISTORY AND STATE OF THE ART
Some early text-based dialogue systems are
Intelligent Tutoring Systems psychotherapist Eliza (Weizenbaum, 1966) and
SHRDLU (Winograd, 1971), the latter enabling
Intelligent machines for educational purposes date users to move blocks of different shape and colour
back to Pressey’s (1927) machine for multiple- around by using a vocabulary of about 50 words.
choice tests. Computer assisted training and Theoretical work on discourse and dialogue in
teaching dates back to around 1960. While the first the 1970s and 1980s (Grosz, 1974; Allen, 1979;
computer-assisted instruction (CAI) or computer- Grosz & Sidner, 1986) has played a major role
assisted training (CAT) systems were fairly simple, in advancing natural language interfaces. Spoken
one source of progress was incorporation of AI- interaction began to gather speed around 1990.
techniques in the 1970s. This led Sleeman and In the 1990s, most spoken dialogue systems
Brown (1982) to coin the term intelligent tutoring enabled users to accomplish some task, such as
systems (ITSs) to distinguish the new AI-based making a flight reservation (Bernsen, Dybkjær,
systems from simpler CAI/CAT systems. & Dybkjær, 1998) or checking bank information,
One of the first ITSs was the WHY teaching but few systems were instructional. An example
system (Stevens & Collins, 1977) which tutors of the latter is the speech-only Circuit Fix-It Shop
factors and causal relationships affecting rainfall. problem-solving support system (Smith 1991;
A later, well-known training system is Sherlock Smith & Hip, 1994). The system helps debug an
and its successor, Sherlock II, which tutor air force electric circuit and a main development goal was
trainees in diagnosing and repairing electronic to model mixed-initiative dialogue. Research on
equipment (Lesgold, Katz, Greenberg, Hughes, & spoken and multimodal interaction goes back at
Eggan, 1992; Lesgold, Lajoie, Bunzo, & Eggan, least to Bolt’s (1980) system which combines
1992). These are just examples of the multitude spoken commands and pointing-gesture input.
of domains addressed by ITSs over the years.

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 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Spoken Teaching and negotiation trainer for military personnel who need
Training Systems good negotiation skills when going to war zones
(Traum, Swartout, Gratch, & Marsella, 2005).
Spoken interaction made its way into ITSs in the Focusing on improving conversational abilities,
late 1990s. For instance, Graesser et al. (2001, these projects go beyond the strict task-orientation
2004) use talking-head output in their AutoTu- of most spoken dialogue systems, towards enabling
tor system but still rely on text input. AutoTu- a more open conversation within the domain. This
tor teaches newtonian qualitative physics and is even more so in the European Hans Christian
computer literacy. The conning officer virtual Andersen system for non-task-oriented conversa-
environment (COVE) system is for training Navy tion with the fairytale author about his life, person,
officers to become better ship drivers (Roberts, and fairytales (Bernsen et al., 2004). Aimed at the
2000). Interaction is via graphics output and 10-18 year olds, the system combines education
speech, the system using short spoken exchanges and entertainment.
to coach the learner during simulation. The ship- The Collagen (collaborative agent) project
board damage control trainer (Clark et al., 2001, (http://www.merl.com/projects/collagen/) (Rich,
2005) also uses spoken interaction and graphics Sidner, & Lesh, 2001), although fostered in the
output. Students must contain the effects of fire, spoken multimodal tradition, goes a long way
explosion and other critical onboard events, and towards merging with the ITS tradition and its
receive spoken instruction and feedback. The pedagogical emphasis. Collagen introduced a
system asks question on, for example, what to do platform for building mixed-initiative assistants
in a particular situation and which steps to take. for a wide range of applications and with consider-
The user answers via speech and/or pointing to able software re-use. Underlying the platform is
part of the vessel displayed on-screen. Teaching shared-plan collaborative discourse theory. The
system ITSPOKE (Litman & Silliman, 2004) uses platform has been used for, for example, an agent
the WHY2-Atlas (VanLehn et al., 2002) text-based that teaches how to operate a gas turbine and one
ITS as back-end. When given a problem in qualita- which helps set up and program a video-cassette
tive physics, the student types a natural-language recorder (Rich et al., 2001). To bridge to ITSs,
essay answer. ITSPOKE analyses the answer and domain-independent pedagogical agent Paco has
engages students in spoken dialogue to provide been developed and used for teaching students
feedback, correct misconceptions, and elicit more how to operate gas turbine engines (Rickel, Lesh,
complete explanations. Rich, Sidner, & Gertner, 2002). Language training
Since spoken dialogue systems began to go systems is another example of systems that draw
multimodal in the late 1990s, several dialogue re- on both traditions. The Colorado Literacy Tutor
search projects have explored spoken multimodal (Cole et al., 2003) is aimed at teaching students
interaction for teaching or training. Compared to to read fluently and understand what they read.
mainstream ITSs, the resulting systems tend to Talking animated head Baldi teaches vocabulary
focus less on pedagogical aspects and more on and grammar to autistic and hard-of-hearing
interaction. For instance, several training applica- children and helps them improve speech articula-
tions using spoken dialogue with virtual humans tion and linguistic and phonological awareness
have been developed at the University of Southern (Massaro, 2005).
California. One is a mission rehearsal system for
training critical decision-making skills in small-
unit US Army leaders (Hill, Gratch, Marsella,
Rickel, Swartout, & Traum, 2003). Another is a

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Speech in Commercial section. Spoken dictation systems are also being

Instructional Systems used as a help for dyslectic students.

While many commercial instructional systems

include text-to-speech output, there are still COMPONENTS AND
rather few that include speech recognition. Spo- ARCHITECTURES
ken output is primarily used to speak some text
aloud. Although any text may be read aloud, most In this section some basic aspects of components
commercial instructional software providers who and architectures for ITSs and spoken multimodal
stress the availability of spoken output, use it for dialogue are described.
some kind of language training (cf. later). Simi-
larly, most commercial instructional systems that Core Components of Intelligent
recognise speech are aimed at language training. Tutoring Systems
Text-to-speech output is, for example, included
in the reading, grammar, and vocabulary improve- A typical ITS includes the following abstract
ment programs from Merit Software (http://www. components:
meritsoftware.com). A product from Kurzweil
(http://www.kurzweiledu.com) aims to ease and • The student model (user model) collects,
enhance the reading, writing, and learning expe- stores, and updates information about the
rience of the visually impaired by speaking text individual student for use by the teacher
aloud. Knowledge quiz software from Interac- model. As a minimum, the model keeps
tive Speech Solutions and Microsoft’s Mobility track of how well the student performs
Solutions for Education (http://getccq.com) ask over time
questions in English while the question text is • The teacher model (pedagogical model)
displayed in the application window. Spanish- is a model of the teaching process adapt-
speaking students may click a button to hear the able to the individual student’s needs. The
question spoken in Spanish while still viewing model includes, for example, information
the English text. Several systems from Caltrox about when to introduce a new learning
(http://www.caltrox.com) use spoken output, topic depending on curriculum and student
including programs for learning multiplication model information, and decides on the per-
tables, teaching kids to count, learn the alphabet formance evaluation feedback to present to
or the spelling of words, and a text-to-speech the student
program for training English pronunciation and • The expert model (domain model) in-
vocabulary-building. cludes information relating to what is be-
Several commercial pronunciation train- ing taught as well as a model of how an
ing systems use speech recognition, including expert solves problems in the domain. This
Auralog’s Tell Me More (http://www.auralog. enables comparison with the student’s so-
com) and one from Protea Textware (http://www. lutions and helps identify and point out
proteatextware.com.au). These programs use the which problems of understanding and/or
speech recogniser’s recognition of the student’s skills mastery the student may have
pronunciation of words and phrases as a basis for • The user interface presents learning ma-
feedback on the pronunciation quality. Pronun- terial to the student and generally enables
ciation training is used as an example in the fifth student-system interaction

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 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

These functionalities can be realised in many interaction is not dialogue but only, for example,
different architectures and may vary hugely in un-interpreted single-word input/output as in the
sophistication. pronunciation trainer (the fifth section), natural
language understanding and generation are left
Core Components of out, and spoken dialogue management reduced to
SpokenDialogue Systems more basic interaction management. Multimodal
interaction requires additional input recognition
A typical architecture for spoken natural language and interpretation components and often also fu-
dialogue includes the following modules, compare sion of information received in different modalities
Figure 1: and/or additional output generation and rendering
components, possibly including modality fission.
• Speech recognition transforms the speech Space does not allow detailed discussion of
signal into one or several text strings spoken dialogue system component technologies
• Natural language understanding extracts and their pros and cons (see McTear, 2004; Del-
semantics from the recognised string(s) gado & Araki, 2005). Briefly, instructional systems
• Dialogue management decides, based on developers may use commercial or research speech
input semantics and contextual informa- recognisers depending on the recognisers available
tion, which output to produce next for the language(s) used, quality requirements,
• Natural language generation prepares an and whether commercial recognisers offer the
output text string in accordance with the particular features needed, for example, extraction
dialogue manager’s decision of prosodic cues. In the large majority of practi-
• Speech synthesis transforms the output cal systems, natural language understanding of
text into a speech signal spontaneous spoken or typed input is based on
• Application data and business logic pro- shallow (or robust) parsing which extracts key
vides backend information for the dialogue words, phrases, and possibly certain grammati-
manager. Its contents depend on the task cal constructs from the input string for building
and domain addressed. a conceptual representation of the input, using
analytical or statistical techniques, and typically
If interaction is text-based-only, speech rec- being guided by transcribed corpora of the kind
ognition and synthesis are left out. If spoken of dialogue the system should be able to engage

Figure 1. Conceptual architecture of a spoken multimodal instructional system

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

in. Deep parsing based on some comprehensive input processing stages, primarily at signal and
grammar fragment is generally not sufficiently semantics level. In output fission, the output
robust versus recognition errors, tends to get decided upon by interaction management is
lost in multiple input interpretations, and is not split between output modalities, such as speech
needed to obtain usable results. In most cases, and graphics, making sure that proper temporal
dialogue management must be developed from synchronisation is maintained (Martin, Buisine,
scratch unless the instructional system develop- Pitel, & Bernsen, 2006).
ers are on their way to having a platform which
allows partial re-use from other systems. Natural
language generation is typically based on stored SYSTEM ANALYSIS
output templates which are completed at run-time AND REQUIREMENTS: A
based on user input details and possibly on system SIMPLE EXAMPLE
state properties as well. Spoken output may be
pre-recorded human speech or—for increased Instructional system development follows general
flexibility—produced by free or commercial text- software engineering principles (Sommerville,
to-speech synthesisers which have achieved high 2006), adapting these to the application at hand.
levels of intelligibility and naturalness for sev- Decision on whether to use speech and spoken
eral languages. Finally, application-specific data dialogue should be made early in the lifecycle as
(teacher model, expert model) must be developed sketched for a simple spoken multimodal training
from scratch as must the student model unless the system. The example also illustrates basic student,
developers have partially reusable components teacher, expert, and user interface models in action.
from similar systems. The system does not include spoken dialogue but
Summarising, the addition of spoken dialogue might come to do so later.
to instructional systems implies non-trivial invest- Early lifecycle work focuses on analysing
ment in a family of technologies, most members the target system and specifying requirements.
of which are not simply off-the-shelf components. For analysis and specification, consideration of
Even if one chooses off-the-shelf recognition a standard set of factors (Bernsen & Dybkjær, in
and text-to-speech, and unless the application press) which helps structure analysis and deter-
requires basic dialogue capabilities-only, one mine requirements is recommended:
is into non-standardised software development
of, and contents provision for, natural language 1. Application type
understanding, dialogue management, and natural 2. User, that is, general user properties to be
language generation. taken into account
3. User profile, that is, description of the target
Spoken Multimodal user group(s)
Instruction Architecture 4. Use environment
5. Domain
Since ITSs are primarily characterised by the 6. Task or other activity
right-most backend components in Figure 1 7. Interaction
while spoken multimodal systems are mainly 8. Interaction device
characterised by the other components shown,
combining the two parts produces an ITS with Assuming that the target application is a
a spoken multimodal interface. Figure 1 simpli- pronunciation trainer, how those factors might
fies input fusion which may be done at different influence its specification will be sketched.

547
 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Even the most cursory target application training vocabulary presented to students and
description typically carries implications with algorithms for evaluating student pronunciation.
respect to several factors. A description (1), such The expert output is simply a set of pre-recorded
as “a speech recognition-based system for training text, audio and video files. An animated head is
immigrants in Danish single-word pronunciation” planned (Hansen, 2006). In the student model,
(Bernsen, Hansen, Kiilerich, & Madsen, 2006) basic and generalised results are distinguished
implies the goal of improving student skills rather between. Basic results are the logfiles stored each
than knowledge and understanding (2) in the Dan- time a student pronounces a word and the system
ish second-language domain (5). Training should rates pronunciation quality based on phonemic
be in some quiet use environment (4), the user similarity with a native speaker’s pronunciation of
profile (3) being, if feasible, that of immigrants- the same word. Generalised results are computed
in-general. Within the domain, a corpus of words over basic results, for example, an accumulated
which covers all Danish phonetic variations is numerical score for consecutive pronunciations
needed. Basically, the student’s task (6) is to of different words or identification of a set of
pronounce the words one-by-one. Decision on pronunciation problems for a particular student.
which input/output modalities to add to spoken The teacher model is relatively simple. Since
single-word input and in which interactive roles Danish single-word pronunciation has no levels
(7) is less straightforward, which carries over to of difficulty (it’s all hard!), the teacher model es-
the choice of interaction devices (8). An open issue sentially (i) gives feedback on each pronunciation
is how each training word should be presented to and (ii) uses student model generalisations to pres-
the student, for example, via (a) typed text, (b) ent pronunciation problem diagnoses and suggest
an audio file of a native speaker’s pronunciation, remedial training exercises. Finally, the relatively
(c) an audio/video file, (d) a semi-transparent simple user interface requires user identification
animated human head pronouncing the word and through id entry (ensuring that user modelling
displaying the vocal tract in action, or some or all models the right user) and enables training word
of these. Another issue is whether to use spoken selection, optional word presentation(s), word
dialogue for some interactive role or if, for ex- pronunciation, pronunciation quality score pre-
ample, a standard GUI environment is sufficient. sentations (individual and cumulative), diagnostic
In the current pronunciation trainer version, feedback, and (planned) audio or video replay of
the expert model includes the phonetically rich the pronunciation (Figure 2).

Figure 2. Pronunciation training system with max. score Smiley emoticon feedback

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Interestingly, the hardest part of pronunciation systems are all task-oriented: the problem space
trainer development is one that tends to challenge is a task space in which the student works. Only
many instructional systems, that is, to produce the Andersen system has no task space because
optimal, pedagogically meaningful student it is not task-oriented but domain-oriented. What
model results and teacher model feedback on the developers can fix is the person’s personality,
performance and progress. Simply put: it tends physical appearance, domain knowledge, habits,
to be easier to evaluate student performance qual- and so forth. (2) For task-oriented systems, de-
ity than to diagnose its deficiencies and propose velopers can fix the nature and number of actual
tailored remedial action. This is where human problems to be solved, such as pronouncing each
teachers and trainers excel, partly because their word, critiquing each interview case, solving
perception of student performance details is each math problem, reaching negotiation goals
keener, and partly because their reasoning about or simulation targets, or solving particular eco-
those details is sharper than what current systems system problems. This cannot be done for the
can do. famous-person system because it is very much an
empirical question what the students would want
to learn from the person. (3) For each problem, the
A MODEL OF INSTRUCTIONAL developers can determine the solutions that will
INTERACTION be accepted as being correct and to which extent.
Correct solutions may be defined either in terms
Spoken multimodal instruction is characterised of following correct procedure or arriving at cor-
by the fact that a particular modality, speech, is rect results, or both. The famous-person system
used in multimodal combination. To address the has neither correct procedure nor correct results.
potential roles of speech and spoken dialogue in
instructional systems, a model of instructional User Interface
interaction is needed. This section sketches a
general model of a (self-) teaching or training The problem space should be presented using the
session illustrated through reference to rather modalities most appropriate for the purpose, such
different system examples: the pronunciation as text, speech, video and animated-face graphics
trainer, case-based teaching of medical patient for pronunciation training, static text for medical
interviews, math training, the negotiation trainer interview cases and static math notation for math
and the Andersen system (the third section), flight problems, giving the student time to carefully study
simulation, and systems for teaching models in each problem, speech and animated conversational
physics and ecosystems. characters for negotiation and famous-person, a
haptic-visual cockpit environment for flight simu-
Expert Knowledge lation, possibly augmented with acoustic alarms
and spoken controls, and some combination of
Large parts of system contents and behaviour can static text and static/dynamic graphics for physics
be fixed in advance because these are independent and ecosystem models. Some implications are that
of the input users might produce. (i) any modality or modality combination might be
The developers can fix (1) the problem useful for problem space representation in some
space—the words to be pronounced, a set of particular instructional system, (ii) many, if not
medical interview cases or math problems, a set of most, problem space representations are inherently
negotiation goals or flight simulation targets, or a multimodal, and (iii) only a fraction of problem
model that should be worked upon. These example space representations have spoken dialogue as

549
 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

main interactive modality, as in the negotiation scoring that enables easy comparison between test
and famous-person examples. sessions over time. Some might (11) reverse the
roles of student and teacher/trainer, the student
Student and Teacher teaching the system how to, for example, solve
equations or model an ecosystem, the system ask-
Now let the student be added to the model. ing questions in the process (Biswas, Schwartz,
Typically, the system is a longer-term companion Leelawong, & Vye, 2005). Another interesting
which the student (4) first needs to learn how perspective is (12) multi-user teaching/training
to use and then uses for some period of time systems where several students work together.
to improve knowledge or skills. Working with The model needs not be fully implemented for
the system, the student must (5) understand the a system to be instructional. Flight simulators, for
problem space as presented, (6) understand the instance, are typically just that, mission presenta-
problems to solve, and (7) try to solve the prob- tion, system operation instructions, and process
lems and present solutions. The system must (8) and result feedback evaluations being provided
evaluate each solution and feed back evaluations by human instructors. Rather, the model is an
of process and/or results, (9) generalise evalua- ideal model aimed to include all the functionality
tions of performance in order to spot patterns of necessary for an instructional system to enable
difficulty in the student’s problem-solving, and self-training unaided by human instruction.
present its generalisations together with suggested
remedies for removing the observed patterns of
difficulty. Remedies might include special ses- WHEN (NOT) TO USE SPEECH
sions for solving problems of a certain kind or IN INSTRUCTIONAL SYSTEMS
increasing the level of difficulty for successful
students. (9) requires observation of the individual The fifth section listed factors to consider when
student online and building of a model of that specifying an instructional system. The sixth sec-
student’s performance based on the observations tion described a model of the kinds of informa-
made. This process is, in principle, the same for tion to be exchanged at the user interface. This
all input modalities: (mouse or hand) pointing, provides the background for asking when (not) to
spontaneous speech, free text, and so forth: The use speech and spoken dialogue in teaching and
system evaluates inputs one-by-one, accumulates training systems, in which roles, and possibly
the evaluations, spots patterns, compares training/ combined with other input/output modalities.
test results over time, updates the student model, A modality is defined in modality theory as a
and so forth, and uses the resulting information to particular way of representing information in
guide learning based on recommendations from some physical medium. Today, the three principal
the teacher model. media used for interacting with computers, and
the corresponding human senses, are: light/vi-
Model Variations sion, acoustics/hearing, and haptics (mechanical
contact)/touch (Bernsen, 2002).
Finally, some model variations shall be added.
Some systems might (10) distinguish between (a) Strengths and Weaknesses
training/learning sessions and (b) test sessions, for of the Speech Modality
example, making (a) more free-style with ample
pedagogical feedback and (b) more formal with Speech has several modality properties that make
no pedagogical feedback but with performance it well-suited as a main modality in instructional

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

interaction, which is why speech is being widely mation and discussion summaries, whereas
used by human instructors. Studies of speech in their discussions were all spoken conversa-
multimodal contexts show that these properties tion (Bernsen & Dybkjær 2001)
are, among others, as described in Bernsen (1997) • Speech is ill-suited for expressing (8) high-
and Bernsen and Dybkjær (1999): ly specific and detailed spatial informa-
tion like the contents of images and spa-
• Speech is a natural human modality for tial 3D scenes, or exact spatial locations.
(1) situated discourse in which situation- This is why many instructional systems
or context-dependent information is be- use static and dynamic output graphics,
ing exchanged rapidly and spontaneously such as images, data graphics, video, or
between interlocutors, each of whom can virtual and augmented reality information
take the initiative presentation—to complement speech or
• Speech, and language more generally, has otherwise. For input, this is why it is useful
(2) very high expressive potential, so that to combine pointing gesture and speech to
virtually any piece of information could, in enable users to point to objects and events
principle, be expressed in speech instead of trying to explain their locations
• Compared to written language that evolved in speech. For similar reasons, speech in-
for non-situated information exchange, put is mostly a poor replacement for (hap-
speech is more expressive due to (3) the tic) object manipulation by hand
richness of the acoustic signal which • Speech input and/or output must be re-
conveys far more than linguistic content, placed by other modalities, for example,
including emphasis, emotion, attitude, ur- sign language or written text, if users
gency, and so forth are (9) hard-of-hearing or have speech
• An acoustic modality, and unlike graphics disabilities
and haptics, speech is (4) omni-directional
• Cognitively, speech can be effectively un- These speech modality properties contribute
derstood and generated in most (5) heads- towards explaining why the problem space of
up, hands-occupied situations, such as in instructional systems is often dominated by non-
the flight simulator speech modalities. Among the benchmark systems,
• Speech has (6) high saliency, that is, is the pronunciation trainer combines speech input
quite attention-catching with “canned” output in a GUI environment; the
medical patient interview and maths systems focus
On the negative side, the high salience of speech on static written text (property 7), the negotiation
(6) can become a source of distraction both for training and Andersen systems have spoken con-
the student and others. Moreover: versation at centre-stage together with animated
interface agents as both systems explore situated
• Speech, being (7) temporal and tran- human discourse and the latter explores combined
sient, does not offer the advantages of speech/pointing gesture as well (properties 1, 3, 8),
static modalities, such as static graphics the flight simulator space is dominated by haptic
or haptic text, of allowing students free input control and augmented-reality vision but has
perceptual inspection of the information an auxiliary role for speech (4, 5, 6, 8), and the
conveyed. That is why we found that users model teaching system spaces are dominated by
prefer static typed text over speech when various forms of text and output graphics (7, 8).
exchanging exact, high-complexity infor-

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 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Increasingly, spoken dialogue applications in which spoken dialogue is unnecessary can be

include output talking faces or embodied ani- defined, that is, when the instructional task is
mated characters (Cassell, Sullican, Prevost, & completely self-explanatory to the target users.
Churchill, 2000). From one point of view, this A system that comes close is the Baldi language
is natural because human speech forms part of tutor which uses Baldi’s talking face to improve
comprehensive communicative acts which include the vocabulary of autistic and hard-of-hearing
facial expression, gaze, gesture, and more; from children (Massaro, 2005). Roughly, Baldi shows
another, some argue that the animations contribute a screenful of, say, vegetables in static graphics,
little to instructional interaction and waste screen names them, asks the child to click on, for ex-
real-estate better used for presenting instructional ample, the zucchini, praises or gives another try,
task-related information; in a third view, their asks about another static image, and so forth, and
presence adds to instructional interaction more of moves on to a new screen. Baldi actually speaks
the personal and expressive aspects characteris- to the kids and so might a human instructor, but
ing human instruction. This is an ongoing debate the point is that everything is so straightforward
(Ruttkay & Pelachaud, 2004). In some cases, the that spoken dialogue is rarely needed.
animated face or agent is key to the application, Taking self-explanatory instruction as a limit-
for example, the semi-transparent human head ing case, it is proposed that spoken dialogue may
demonstrating vocal tract articulation for pronun- be added to instructional interaction for three main
ciation training, when the embodied character acts purposes, that is:
as physical training instructor; or when students
learn from conversation with a life-like person • Task-oriented dialogue about the core
from another age. teaching or training tasks, that is, when the
student solves a problem in dialogue with
Roles of Spoken Dialogue the system, including system feedback on
in Instructional Systems the problem-solving process or solution
• Non-task-oriented conversation, primar-
What are the most important roles of spoken ily when the problem space itself is one of
dialogue or conversation in problem-solving- complex spoken dialogue or conversation
oriented instructional contexts? Given the enor- but also when, for example, other tasks
mous diversity of potential applications, target and solutions are less clear-cut and require
user populations, and so forth, and the limited discussion
number of spoken multimodal instructional sys- • Meta-communication about the interac-
tems developed so far, the best approach may tion, including handling of miscommu-
be to learn from the roles of spoken dialogue in nication, help dialogue, introductory dia-
human instruction. logue about instruction purpose, problem
The question may be refined by considering a space, how to use the system, and so forth
limiting case. When a human instructor is present
and speech is not replaced by alternative options SPOKEN DIALOGUE IN
for situated discourse, for example, sign language, MULTIMODAL INSTRUCTIONAL
spoken teacher-student dialogue becomes pos- SYSTEMS
sible. Given the expressivity of spoken dialogue,
teacher and student will almost unavoidably talk The seventh section identified three main roles for
from time to time, asking, discussing, clarifying, spoken instructional dialogue. Based on these, how
helping, and so forth. However, a limiting case far we are in exploiting spoken dialogue for multi-

552
Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Figure 3. Example from (Rickle et al. 2002)

modal instruction is now illustrated and discussed.
Task-oriented dialogue and task-transcending
conversation, meta-communication, and spoken
interaction and learning gain are discussed in the
eighth section.

Spoken Dialogue in Task-

Solving and for Conversation

Today, nearly all instructional systems that include

spoken dialogue are task-oriented and use limited
mixed-initiative dialogue. Fully user-directed
dialogue (no system initiative) seems unsuited for
instruction while purely system-directed dialogue
prohibits any kind of spoken intervention by the
student. Limited mixed-initiative is typically ob-
tained by carefully crafting the system’s dialogue
as illustrated in Figures 3 through 8. An obvious
question is why these systems do not allow free
mixed-initiative like in human instruction. Some
reasons are:

• Speech recognition errors

• Vocabulary and (semantic) grammar
• Task and domain delimitation

Spontaneous speech recognition is error-prone, Figure 4. Example from (Peters et al. 2004)
for several reasons. One is lengthy input: the
longer the input the more likely misrecognition
becomes. Since free initiative may encourage long
input, ways must be found to reduce input length
to keep misrecognition tolerably low. This can be
done by carefully crafting the system’s output in
order to control initiative and limit input length.
The alternative is to impose use of fixed spoken
keywords and phrases but this increases student
learning overhead and is infeasible for all but
quite small-vocabulary input.
Systems allowing spontaneous speech input
are often challenged as regards the sufficiency of
their vocabulary and grammar. The solution is to
continuously collect user input data and bootstrap
the system on this data until it performs satisfac-
torily. This may require considerable effort. The

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 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Figure 5. Example from (Litman and Silliman, Figure 7. Example from (Traum et al. 2005)
2004)

Figure 6. Example from (Forbes-Riley and Lit-

man, 2006); hand annotated emotions in square
brackets
Figure 8. Example from (Bernsen and Dybkjær,
2005)

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

more open the domain is the more data is needed. culty to the individual, and motivate and encour-
Clear and clearly communicated task and domain age even if the student has not got it yet. This is
delimitation is crucial, so that the student knows non-trivial pedagogical art even for human tutors.
exactly what the system can and cannot conduct Evaluative feedback may be given in many dif-
dialogue about. Inappropriate delimitation runs ferent ways. It may be simple like the smiling or
a high risk that users address out-of-domain is- sad emoticon face for pronunciation training
sues, creating recognition and grammar problems (Figure 2) which only reflects the quality of the
(Bernsen et al., 1998). The system’s last defence most recent pronunciation, comment nicely on
is meta-communication which is difficult to en- the most recent student action (Figure 3), or be
gineer and always disturbs dialogue smoothness general as in Figure 4 where the system explains
(the eighth section). why the student gets the next task. The Figure 7
Figures 3 through 8 show instructional dia- system gives no explicit feedback on student
logue engineering aimed at minimising interaction performance. Rather, the performance measure
problems. System questions are typically closed is how willing to cooperate the doctor becomes.
either through explicitly listing the answers to Good instruction draws on many information
choose among (e.g., last tutor output in Figure sources, including awareness of students’ cog-
5) or by inviting short specific answers (e.g., nitive and emotional states. Still in its infancy,
first tutor questions in Figures 4 and 5, second in multimodal emotion recognition and generation
Figure 6). If the output invites student initiative, is a popular research area today. In the speech
the tacit assumption is that the system will remain modality, prosody delivers cues to the speaker’s
in control. Thus, in Figure 3, Paco offers initia- emotional, cognitive, and volitional states, po-
tive with little risk because the answer involves tentially informing the tutor that the student is
haptic screen graphics action rather than complex uncertain, lost, frustrated, or saddened by repeated
oral explanation. The Figure 7 dialogue is higher- failure, compare the hand-annotations in Figure
risk because it opens up towards conversation. 6. Vocal expression of emotional state has been
There is still a task to solve, however, that is, to investigated for decades (Scherer, 2003). Among
convince the doctor that he must move. Figure 8 the problems in recognising emotions from speech
goes further by showing real conversation with is that emotions rarely come in a pure full-blown
the fairytale author. Since there is no instructional form (Batliner, Fischer, Huber, Spilker, & Nöth,
task, the developers can only control student input 2003) but must be recognised through cues ex-
by making the character try to gently constrain pressed not only prosodically but also linguisti-
the domains and topics of conversation. cally. These cues may contribute to detecting
Smooth and cooperative dialogues are major trouble in human-computer dialogue (Batliner et
goals in most task-oriented applications, instruc- al., 2003). Also in instructional systems, emotion
tional or otherwise. Student cooperativity can be detection is considered important and is actively
taken for granted as long as the student wishes to being researched. For instance, studies indicate
learn and manages to find out what (not) to talk that student emotions of frustration and anger
to the system about. However, good human in- correlate with system performance, in particular
structors are not merely cooperative in an ex- speech recognition problems (Rotaru & Litman,
tended Gricean sense of being to-the-point, taking 2006), and ongoing work addresses how student
into account student’s background knowledge, emotion can be automatically detected and used
and so forth (Grice, 1975; Bernsen et al., 1996) in tutoring dialogue (Ai, Litman, Forbes-Riley,
but re-phrase and re-explain when needed, never Rotaru, Tetreault, & Purandare, 2006).
leave the student behind, tune the level of diffi-

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 Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Cognitive modelling is another source of good the ways in which users might phrase the request.
instruction which manages to select the striking However, understanding failure cannot always be
example, or the successful analogy, based on de- remedied by verbatim repetition. This problem is
tailed understanding of the student’s background better avoided through careful output design than
knowledge and interests. Training of the social resolved on-line. System-requested repetition is
skill of seeing things from the other person’s easy to do and may work if the request is due to
perspective and acting accordingly during ne- simple recognition failure of words and concepts
gotiation is illustrated in Figure 7 which shows known to the system. However, verbatim user
part of a dialogue-turning-bad between a military repetition will not work if the input is out-of-
officer and a virtual doctor. The doctor includes vocabulary, grammar, or domain. It remains hard
substantial cognitive modelling based on nego- for systems to make these distinctions, which is
tiation theory. Regarding the cognitive aspects probably why, as remarked by McTear (2008),
of student certainness and correctness which are much spoken dialogue miscommunication re-
particularly important to instructional systems, search has focused on speech recognition rather
studies show that tutors respond differently to than other error sources. For these other sources,
student certainty and uncertainty, respectively more active strategies are needed, such as ask-
(Liscombe, Hirschberg, & Venditti, 2005), and ing the user to re-phrase, asking a new question
that there is a correlation between uncertainness/ (first system turn, Figure 6) or, like in Figure
incorrectness and recognition problems (Rotaru 8, stepwise nudging the user to change topic or
& Litman, 2006), which indicates the importance relinquish initiative.
of asking questions at the right level of difficulty. In general, it is worse for the system to mis-
The factors mentioned are just some of those understand the user than to fail to understand
that will continue to challenge developers of spo- and ask for repetition or re-phrasing. The former
ken multimodal instructional systems and their often makes the system appear silly and the user
components for a long time to come. may initiate correction dialogue which can be dif-
ficult to handle. Linguistically and conceptually,
Spoken Dialogue for Meta- correction input is more diverse than repetition
Communication requests, and the system may have to relate the
input to what was said several turns back. More-
The third role for spoken dialogue is for meta- over, as systems aspire to interpret new types
communication, or communication about the of input information, such as student emotion,
communication (interaction) itself, which may new sources of misunderstanding must be dealt
be required throughout an instructional session. with. System-initiated correction is ubiquitous in
Under meta-communication repetition, correc- instructional discourse, compare Paco’s turns 4
tion, clarification, help dialogue and everything and 7 (Figure 3), and its non-meta-communication
to do with introducing the system, its instructional complement, confirmation, is well illustrated in
purpose and use are included. Some types of meta- Figures 3 through 6. In fact, constructive and
communication are hard to cope with in today’s motivating correction and confirmation design is a
spoken dialogue systems and better error recovery major part of instructional systems development.
strategies are very much in demand (Bohus & Figure 4 illustrates careful generalised corrective
Rudnicky, 2008). feedback design. Arguably, the main problem is
User-requested repetition signals failure to to flexibly handle student input which is not quite
hear or understand what the system said and can right and not quite wrong either.
usually be handled with a vocabulary that covers

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Modelling Spoken Multimodal Instructional Systems

Clarification is typically a difficult kind of Spoken Interaction and

meta-communication dialogue. Clarification Learning Gain
requests may require explanation of virtually any-
thing mentioned during dialogue. The best strategy Instruction is all about learning gain. One-to-
is to try to prevent user clarification requests by one human tutoring seems to be very effective
design, that is, by sticking to core-task, core- compared to classroom sessions. Although so-
domain terminology, and explaining everything phisticated instructional systems do not achieve
necessary before the student asks. However, this the same learning gain as good human tutors,
is easier said than done even when the system is they seem to do better than classroom teaching
being designed for students having well-defined (Graesser, Person, Lu, Jeon, & McDaniel, 2005).
prior knowledge and skills. Everybody can for- Regarding the speech modality, it has been
get the meaning of some technical term but the explored if speech recognition problems affect
system can easily make a nuisance of itself by learning gain. Empirical studies have not been able
explaining all technical terms as it goes along. to show negative effects on learning (Pon-Barry,
Unless the user’s potential clarification needs Clark, Bratt, Schultz, & Peters, 2004; Litman &
are obvious, this problem has no easy solution Forbes-Riley, 2005), although recognition prob-
and becomes harder the less task-oriented the lems may cause frustration and affect perceived
system is, the wider the domains it covers, and usability and motivation to use the system.
the less is known about the student population. The impact on learning gain of spoken output
Somehow, future systems must be aware of their quality, including pre-recorded human speech
own ignorance as illustrated in Figure 8. System versus synthetic speech, has been investigated
requests for clarification are part-and-parcel of by Forbes-Riley, Litman, Silliman, and Tetreault
instructional discourse but remain hard to do. (2006) in the context of ITSPOKE (the third
It is symptomatic that there are no examples in section). Learning gain was not influenced by
Figures 3 through 8. voice quality but this may be due to the fact that
Student requests for help may concern how the spoken text was also displayed on-screen.
to solve a task or operate a device or the system This question seems to require more investiga-
itself. General context-independent help is fairly tion. However, as synthetic voices improve, any
easy to design and may be compared to what is negative effects are likely to disappear anyway.
found in GUI help menus. Context-dependent Also the comparative question of learning
help is often more difficult because the task- or gain with spoken versus typed text interaction
discourse context must be taken into account. In remains an open one (Pon-Barry et al., 2004).
Figure 3, having been corrected, the student re- A study by Litman et al. (2006) suggests higher
quests context-dependent help on how to continue learning gain for spoken human-human tutoring
from the present state. Since the task context is compared to written interaction whereas results
well-defined, all the system has to do is inform for human-computer tutoring are less clear.
about the next correct action in the context. While Learning gain is probably also strongly related
help dialogue is generally useful, there is more to teaching strategy. Aiming at instructional sys-
hesitation in recommending spoken dialogue for tems, various studies of human tutoring address
introducing the system, its instructional purpose, what makes a good teacher and which factors
and use. Speech is sub-optimal for lengthy and influence learning gain. Nevertheless, it remains
complex explanation and, since students typically an open question whether instructional systems
use the system for a while, an electronic manual should behave in the same ways as human teachers
is often preferable. do. Thus, du Boulay and Luckin (2001) review

557
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comparisons of human and computer tutors and of teaching, and training systems for many different
teaching strategies, such as the Socratic approach, purposes. Today’s research systems are typically
and including, for example, how to deal with errors sufficiently rich in content to allow realistic train-
and how to provide feedback. Some examples of ing or teaching but rarely have the robustness
what has been investigated are: Jackson, Person, required of commercial systems.
and Graesser (2004) examined the relationship However, several factors seem likely to slow
between dialogue moves and student learning down the proliferation of spontaneous spoken mul-
using AutoTutor (the third section). In line with timodal instructional systems in the near future.
previous research, they found that students who One such factor is speech recognition technol-
received more pumps and hints and played the ogy. Recognisers sometimes misrecognise and,
active part in knowledge construction learned although this may not influence learning gain, it
more than those who received more prompts and is known to cause frustration. Thus, companies
assertions from a tutor who controlled knowledge might be cautious launching applications which
construction. Core, Moore, and Zinn (2003) looked include spontaneous speech dialogue. The first
at initiative using two different teaching strategies computer games with spoken input have not
and, somewhat surprisingly, found that there is no received unanimous acclaim partly because of
direct relationship between initiative and learning. recognition errors, and the car industry keeps
launching spoken keyword-based navigation and
other systems rather than spontaneous speech
CONCLUSION technology. Another factor which was elaborated
in in the fourth section is that adding spontane-
Commercial spoken multimodal instructional ous spoken dialogue to instructional systems has
systems are still rather few, and systems using relatively high entry costs for researchers and
spoken dialogue in some role or other are fewer industrial developers alike. The family of technolo-
still. This no doubt reflects the more general fact gies required include several components which
that spontaneous speech dialogue systems have are poorly standardised as well as being rich in
entered the market only recently, where they are application-specific contents, both of which fac-
being used to help solve limited tasks of various tors contribute to making development expensive
(non-instructional) kinds. Arguably, most instruc- and risky. Thirdly, the market is not necessarily
tional systems which include spoken dialogue, will willing to pay a lot for the great opportunity to
have to handle spontaneous spoken input because improve everyone’s skills and knowledge through
it is unrealistic to demand that students learn and self-training and self-teaching supported by the
remember lengthy sets of fixed keywords and kinds of spoken dialogue which are ubiquitous in
phrases whilst engaged in learning or training human instruction.
things that are difficult enough in themselves.
However, with spontaneous speech dialogue sys-
tems having entered the market, the technology FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
would seem likely to spread across a wide range of
application areas, including instructional systems. It has been argued that the technologies already
The research systems that have been seen pro- exist for including spoken dialogue in a wide range
vide a useful indication of how far we are. With of multimodal instructional systems. To see why
the technologies illustrated in Figures 3 through the research challenges ahead remain massive,
8, it is possible, today, to build useful spontaneous five main reasons why there is still a way to go
speech, mixed-initiative, multimodal or unimodal

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This work was previously published in Handbook of Conversation Design for Instructional Applications, edited by Rocci Lup-
picini, pp. 363-387, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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566

Chapter 3.5
Applying the ADDIE Model
to Online Instruction
Kaye Shelton
Dallas Baptist University, USA

George Saltsman
Abilene Christian University, USA

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

This chapter assembles best ideas and practices Online education has quickly become a wide-
from successful online instructors and recent lit- spread and accepted mode of instruction among
erature. Suggestions include strategies for online higher education institutions throughout the world.
class design, syllabus development, and online Although many faculty who teach traditional
class facilitation, which provide successful tips courses now embrace some teaching methods
for both new and experienced online instructors. popularized by online education such as incor-
This chapter also incorporates additional ideas, porating online quizzes and discussion boards,
tips, and tricks gathered since the paper was origi- some instructors may still feel intimidated when
nally published in the October 2004 issues of the asked to develop a course offered entirely online.
International Journal of Instructional Technology Even the best lecturers may find that teaching
and Distance Learning as “Tips and Tricks for online leads to feelings of inadequacy and being
Teaching Online: How to Teach Like a Pro!” ill-prepared. While providing training, offering
tools for ePedagogy, and sharing success stories
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch305 are good ways to build faculty confidence, solid

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

Figure 1. The ADDIE model

instructional course design is still a necessary
process for quality online instruction.
The ADDIE model, described by Molenda
(2003) as “a colloquial term used to describe a
systematic approach to instructional development,
virtually synonymous with instructional systems
development” (p. 34), is a generic instructional
design model that provides an organized process
for developing instructional materials. This sys-
temic model is a five-step process that can be
used for both traditional and online instruction.
The five steps, analysis, design, develop, imple-
ment, and evaluate, provide an ideal framework
to discuss solid instructional design techniques for
online education. In addition to this discussion, fact, Olgren (1998) reminds us that “if learning
this manuscript offers tips and tricks for design- is the goal of education, then knowledge about
ing and teaching an online course, gathered from how people learn should be a central ingredient
conversations and interviews with online instruc- in course design” (p. 77). The course developer
tors, current literature, conference presentations, should examine ways in which online learners are
and the authors’ personal experiences as distance similar to learners in traditionally offered courses
educators. and how they are different as this also leads to
an understanding of audience needs within the
course. As far as demographics, Gilbert (2001)
ANALYSIS describes a typical online student as being over
25, employed, a caregiver, and already with some
The analysis phase, though one of the most es- amount of higher education experience (p. 74).
sential in the ADDIE model, is often overlooked. However, the demographics are changing at many
Like any significant project, excitement to get institutions as more online courses are being of-
started often overtakes methodical planning, and fered and traditional full-time students are elect-
the eagerness to see the finished results can put ing to take online courses as part of their regular
relevancy and quality at risk. Undertaking some- course load. Therefore, both andragogical (adult
thing as involved as developing an online course learning theory) and pedagogical methods of
demands careful analysis. For the purpose of this course design as well as some mix of experiential,
book, we divided the phase into three segments: problem-based, and constructivist approaches to
analysis of the learners, analysis of the course learning should be considered.
(including its goals and learning objectives), and Students enrolled in online courses often have
analysis of the online delivery medium. different expectations than when enrolled in tradi-
tional courses. These expectations, described by
Analysis of the Learners Lansdell (2001), include increased levels of feed-
back, increased attention, and additional resources
In this part of the analysis phase, the course to help them learn (as cited by VanSickle, 2003).
designer or design team should perform an audi- In response to meeting these expectations, alterna-
ence analysis to provide focus on the learners, tive methods of instruction and class facilitation
their needs, and their learning preferences. In have evolved to support student cohesiveness and

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encourage learning. To successfully challenge for the authors, online delivery is assumed to have
the online student, increased communication is the following characteristics:
required between instructor and student (White,
2000). While much of that communication is • The course is held online during a regu-
created in the later phases of the ADDIE model, larly defined class semester or quarter or
a careful analysis of the required communication an established amount of weeks.
elements will ensure that the intended communica- • The course is broken up into separate
tion is on target and appropriate for the audience learning modules.
at hand. • Student participation is required within a
set time period—each content module is
Analysis of the Course presented with a given start and end time.
• Learning takes place as students synthesize
In most cases, online courses are not new to the the prepared material and interact in class
institutional curriculum but existing courses which discussions with peers and the instructor(s)
are being created for a new medium. Therefore, within the required time period described
course goals and learning objectives already exist above.
and may not need modification. However, since
the course developer will be, in essence, recreat- Online course delivery offers exciting possi-
ing the course from the ground up, the course bilities, as well as frustrating limitations. Without
developer should review the learning objectives an analysis of the delivery medium, the online
for the course and how that relates to other courses course can result in what Fraser (1998) calls
and the overall program curriculum. A working “shovelware”— content that is simply moved from
knowledge of the goals and objectives is a must one medium to another without regard for the ca-
as these will be the guiding principles for all pabilities of that medium. To fully understand the
content creation. concept, consider Fraser’s (1999) analogy: “When
The course developer should seek answers to the motion picture was invented, early practitioners
the following questions: Why does this course saw it primarily as a means of distributing exist-
exist? What does it seek to accomplish? Who is ing material, such as stage performances. It was
the course for? What are the learning objectives? some time before movies were recognized as a
In what ways does this course fulfill degree new medium with expressive possibilities, which
requirements? The answers to these questions while overlapping existing media, went far beyond
provide the proper perspective in the following anything previously attainable” (p. B8). Could you
instructional design phases as well as provide imagine Star Wars as a stage performance? Just
a working set of priorities to be used in course as film transformed storytelling, online education
design and development. is reshaping education.

Analysis of the Online

Delivery Medium DESIGN

Online courses, being a relativity new medium The design phase begins to organize strategies and
of instruction, have yet to achieve a universally goals that were formulated in the analysis phase.
understood definition. It is helpful for the course It also provides details which enhance the course
developer and others involved in formulating a delivery process. Brewer, DeJonge, and Stout
working definition of online delivery. For example, (2001) found that course planning and prepara-

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Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

tion directly influences course effectiveness and expectations should be stated in the opening ori-
really hinder student learning. entation material as well as in the course syllabus.
Before designing an online course, it is helpful Preparation includes clear definitions of the fol-
for instructors to view existing courses already lowing within the syllabus: contact information,
offered online. Not only does this familiarize course objectives, attendance requirements, a
the course developer with the basic components late work policy, the course schedule, orientation
of an online course, it usually inspires ideas that aids, grading scales and rubrics, communication
generate excitement about the design process. practices, technology policies and overall course
A Web search can find open examples, but may design.
be limited since most courses are located within
password protected courseware management Contact Information
systems. However, there are two open initia-
tives which can be readily accessed: the MIT’s The syllabus should include administrative in-
Open Courseware (ocw.mit.edu) and Carnegie formation such as available office times, phone
Mellon’s Open Learning Initiative (www.cmu. number and e-mail address, and preferred mode(s)
edu/oli); both Websites offer many courses in of contacts. However, unlike a traditional course,
various disciplines that can help instructors with instructors should be very clear about “online of-
their own course design. A third, The University fice hours,” or hours of unavailability. Boettcher
of Calafornia Berkeley, provides online material and Conrad (1999) suggest an online instructor
in the form of Webcasts and enhanced podcasts not be available 24 hours a day to students, but
(http://Webcast.berkeley.edu/courses). establish a framework for turnaround response.
The design phase is most analogous to that of This framework should offer recommendations
the creation of a blueprint, a plan for construction for how long a student should expect to wait
that helps guide all involved toward the intended before repeating an e-mail request that has gone
outcome. For online instruction, that blueprint is unanswered and as Jarmon (1999) suggests, how
the course syllabus. The syllabus is the heart of the quickly students should expect a response.
design phase; careful preparation of the syllabus If there is a specific time when the instructor
prepares the learning environment and discourages will be online, he or she should include a “fastback”
confusion and miscommunication. For this phase, time, or online office hours. A fastback time is a
the major components are examined within the time period when students can expect a quicker
framework of a typical online course syllabus. than normal e-mail response, usually within the
Ko and Rossen (2004) relate the syllabus to hour or soon after the message is received. Many
a course contract and observe that new online instructors offer online office hours where they
instructors do not usually include enough informa- enter the class chatroom and wait for questions.
tion. McIsaac and Craft (2003) term the syllabus It is often reported by instructors that students
as the roadmap for the course and remind us that under-utilize this time of interaction, choosing to
students will be frustrated if they try to work ahead send e-mail as their questions arise, rather than
only to find out the syllabus has changed within the waiting until a prescribed time in the future.
course. They suggest having a structured syllabus An alternative to using the virtual office hour
available before the course starts so students can for questions is to use the chatroom for social
be prepared for course expectations. conversation. A virtual social experience helps
Within the syllabus, student expectations create a closer bond with instructor and class-
should be clearly defined along with well-written mates, and strengthens the learning community.
directions relating to course activities. These This is a form of a “cyber sandbox” as described

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by Palloff and Pratt (1999). The cyber sandbox is tion and still catch up with their coursework upon
defined as a generic discussion area for students their return or do a few modules ahead of time
to just hang out and talk about movies, jobs or before they leave. While online courses do allow
other interests. The creation of a social outlet not for flexibility, students must participate regularly
only helps keep regular class discussions on topic, with their instructor and classmates. Students may
but Palloff and Pratt (1999) found that the social ask if they can post ahead of the other students or
connection promotes group cohesion. take the course on a self-paced schedule. Because
of the prevalence of this question, online instruc-
Course Objectives tors should have a policy regarding early posting
and state it clearly in the syllabus.
Well-defined course objectives, derived from the Participation in online courses is inherently
analysis phase, are an important element to be different from traditional courses. Students do
published in any course syllabus. However, clearly not automatically understand how to participate
stated objectives are even more imperative as in online courses. Course participation require-
students do not have the opportunity to participate ments should be defined in the syllabus and with
in “first day of class syllabus discussions” so com- each assignment. Where possible, assignments
mon in many traditional courses (Jarmon, 1999). should be grouped into familiar categories such
The communication of course objectives is also as class discussion, Web searches, quizzes, read-
important because in an online course, much of ing assignments, and so forth. Creating a sample
the responsibility for learning is placed upon the discussion, or model, may increase students’
student. Failure to properly inform the student of understanding of the participation requirement
the objectives leaves them feeling confused and and how credit is assigned.
puzzled about assignments, and moreover, where
the entire course is headed. Late Work Policy

Attendance Requirements A policy for late assignment submissions and

missed exams should be created. Students who
Attendance requirements should be clearly stated, are not actively participating in the learning com-
as attendance is necessary for successful online munity are not supporting other students. Because
learning communities. Palloff and Pratt (2001) of this interdependence, some instructors have a
advise, “If clear guidelines are not presented, “no late work accepted policy,” while others assign
students can become confused and disorganized reduced credit. Another option is to create alterna-
and the learning process will suffer” (p. 28). The tive assignments or exams for past due work. To
online learning community requires students facilitate course management, these alternative
to take active roles in helping each other learn assignments could be offered at the end of the
(Boettcher & Conrad, 1999). Students who do course for those who missed assignments during
not participate not only cheat themselves, but also the normal time period.
those in the learning community.
If instructors expect good participation, then Course Schedule
the requirements must be clearly defined. Ko
and Rossen (2004) observed that when students One of the most important elements of an on-
were not graded, their participation was less than line syllabus is the course schedule. The course
adequate. In fact, some students may think that if schedule defines each learning module with
they take an online course, they can take a vaca- beginning dates and due dates, assigned read-

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ing, assessment, and other activities. The course good study practice. Frequently asked questions
schedule becomes the course map for the student (FAQ) support self-help in answering questions
and should be included with the course syllabus (Jarmon, 1999) as it allows students to look for
and placed redundantly throughout the course. information before e-mailing the instructor. In fact,
In fact, Ko and Rossen (2004) assert that “in an McCormack and Jones (1998) suggest an FAQ
online environment, redundancy is often better can significantly reduce questions. One doesn’t
than elegant succinctness” (p.76). If the Website need all the questions or answers up front, as over
or course management system allows linking time as questions arise and answers are provided,
from the syllabus, then link each course content a comprehensive FAQ will emerge that can be
module to the schedule making it readily available utilized in future semesters.
to the student. Students should be encouraged
to print out and carefully follow their course Grading Scales/Rubrics
schedules. Similarly, Johnson (2003) suggests
that instructors should also “keep a schedule of Grading scales and rubrics should be defined for
activities for themselves: when to interact with each assignment. If the courseware management
students, when to respond to questions, when to system allows, each assignment could be linked
grade assignments, and when to give feedback on to the rubric for clarity. When group assignments
performance” (p. 112). are utilized, instructors should use a grading rubric
The instructor should allow for flexibility and for the students to grade each other as well as the
revisions of the schedule based on the progress entire group. This motivates students to participate
and needs of the class but should avoid adding and provides for equity in group work grading.
additional assignments not covered in the course It is also helpful if the instructor assigns groups
syllabus. Careful consideration of course assign- or teams the first time as the class should get to
ments should be given before the course starts to know each other before self-selection is allowed.
be sure that students meet the required learning
objectives (Table 1). Communication Practices

Orientation Aids An inbox consistently full of e-mail will be

overwhelming to most instructors. Therefore, it
Orientation notes for success in the class should is important to include in the syllabus, guidelines
be available for the student (Jarmon, 1999). This for class behavior and posting to the discussion
may include hints for time management and boards, e-mail protocols, and assignment submis-

Table 1. Sample online course schedule

Sample Online Course Schedule

Session Date Begins Content Assignments Due Date
1 January 15 Chapter 1 of text Post Introductions to Class Discussion January 21
2 January 22 Chapters 2-3 of text Class Discussion January 28
3 January 29 Chapter 4 of text Class Discussion February 4
Outside Reading Summary
Review for Exam
4 February 5 Exam I over Chapters 1-4 Exam I open 3 days only Feb 11-13 February 13

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 Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

sion procedures. Establishing e-mail protocols and Course Design

communication guidelines will assist the instruc-
tor in classroom management. Many instructors The online course design should provide an in-
require the course session number or identifier tuitive navigation path for the student. Students
in the subject line so that the e-mail related to should be able to locate the syllabus, calendar,
the course can be filtered to a separate mailbox. assignments, and other required activities quickly.
If students need immediate attention, the word Individual content items can be easily identified
“Help” should be placed into the subject line so for the student by adding a consistent icon each
the instructor knows to open that e-mail first, as- time it is used. For example, each time a reading
suring prompt instructor response. assignment is presented, an icon of a book could
Many instructors create individual e-mail be used. Using the same colors and design for
sub-folders for each online student. E-mail that similar items will aid the student as well. As a
has been answered or graded can be filed away, final suggestion, each module of content should
providing for a record of all course correspon- have an overview page for organizing the unit of
dence. Another tip for instructors is to read their material (Hirumi, 2003).
mail backwards from newest received to oldest. In
many cases, students have solved their problems so
that earlier questions become irrelevant. Students DEVELOPMENT
may also be asked to use their institutional e-mail
address so that instructors are not confused by Development is a rewarding phase in that the
address changes mid-term or are forced to deal results are concrete and visible. The development
with bounced mail from full inboxes. stage will include a review of the course objec-
tives, an analysis of the textbook, content module
Technology Policies development and content chunking, the creation
of content, the development of learning objects,
Technology policies should be stated in the syl- student assessment and additional resources. As
labus directing students to a helpdesk or resource a side note, development is also a stage where
other than the instructor for technology difficul- faculty members may be the most dependent upon
ties. Additionally, instructors should encourage outside assistance due to the skilled creation of
students to create draft postings of assignments in graphical and multimedia elements commonly
a word processor and save them before posting to found in online courses. In every other stage,
the class. This will minimize spelling and gram- even though coaching and mentoring are highly
mar mistakes and provide a backup copy for the recommended, faculty are usually capable of
student in case of technical problems. Students completing the requirements alone and with skills
should also be reminded to save all work on a that are already within their repertory.
computer hard drive and to a removable device,
such as a floppy disk or USB flash drive. Saving Course Objectives
work to a USB drive allows the student portability
between home, office, and campus systems, and a The online course objectives should be clearly
chance of recovery if systems go down. Finally, identified within the analysis phase and built
students should be instructed to monitor spam into the syllabus in the design phase, and now
filters that may prohibit them from receiving their robustly used to guide the course developer during
online course e-mail. the development stage. Each lesson unit should
be designed with the overall course objectives

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Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

in mind and the objectives should be stated at the instructor should decide to change textbooks,
the beginning of each lesson unit informing the all of the publishers’ licensed or copyrighted
student of the content to be covered. The learning material must be removed from the course and
outcomes of the lesson unit should also match replaced with content from the new text or from
the course objectives and appropriate degree other sources. It advisable to clearly document
objectives, where applicable. Methodologies for each resource with its original source so that it
assessing these objectives can be altered for the can be easily found should it need to be removed
online classroom. If any activities such as the use down the line.
of online group collaboration or asynchronous
class discussion will be needed to meet course Lesson or Module Unit
objectives, they should be identified in this phase.
When designing the course schedule, the course
Textbook should be broken into lesson units. These are often
one-week periods, but can be shorter or longer,
The textbook is an important asset for an online depending upon the course. Ideally, a good lesson
course. The instructor should examine the text unit has many parts such as introduction, session
from the perspective of online delivery and objectives, reading assignments, instructional
understand that in most cases, the text will be content, handouts, class discussion, written assign-
a primary source for content delivery. The text ments, quizzes and exams, and a unit summary.
should be a strong, stand-alone resource for the The flow of the course should be intuitive,
course and ideally offer ancillary support for the transitioning from week-to-week, or session-to-
student such as Website links and review quizzes. session without the student feeling lost or isolated
In many cases, textbooks will provide additional in the process. The total number of sessions in the
resources for both faculty and students. Textbooks course has a great impact on the course design.
that offer the instructor assistance in the form of a Just adding or eliminating as few as two sessions
CD-ROM, test bank, lecture outlines, PowerPoint can lead to total course redesign. If the number
slides, or Website material give added support of course sessions changes often, consider using
in creating an online course. Some textbooks smaller content chunks (see “Content Chunking”)
published by Prentice Hall, Irwin-McGraw Hill, that can be combined into a single unit. Redun-
and others, offer these licensed resources free-of- dancy of key course information is important.
charge should the instructor adopt the text. Other Each learning module should contain a check-
textbooks offer course cartridges of content that list to facilitate student completion. This should
import directly into courseware management be “print ready” so that students can print and
systems like Blackboard or WebCT. read them offline. Course content that presents
Instructors are sometimes reluctant, when an easy-to-find and understandable checklist
transitioning a course from traditional to online, will save numerous e-mails later from students
to adopt a new textbook, but if the result is easier inquiring about due dates and pleading for dead-
course conversion, they usually concur. The course line extensions.
text book should be chosen early enough in the
process for the instructor to become familiar Content Chunking
with the contents of the textbook, and, of course,
should support the core objectives of the course. Content chunking is more of an instructional de-
Changes in the text may require extensive changes sign process, rather than a theory. It uses modular
in the supporting course content. Additionally, if design in the delivery of online content. Each

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 Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

“chunk” of material is broken into small, under- in each of the courses. This consistency throughout
standable lessons or vignettes for the students to the program conveys institutional ownership and
absorb. An example of chunking would be to break endorsement of the courses and the materials in
apart a lecture (that would amount to five written these courses. More importantly, it allows students
pages for example) covering several topics into to find the material they are looking for quickly
smaller pieces (perhaps one or two pages each). and without unnecessary inquiries to the course
The entire lecture, if left un-chunked, would be instructor.
a tedious Webpage to scroll through, and more Along with the guidelines for a consistent look
importantly, too much information to absorb in one and feel, the style guide may also suggest the
session. Instead, the concept of content chunking format in which the course material is presented.
would break the lecture into perhaps five or six The institution often recommends an instructional
smaller concepts. When a lecture is broken into design theory for the creation of course materials
topics or ideas and put on separate pages, research and publishes this in the style guide along with
shows the student is more likely to understand examples. When students are presented with a
the content. In the online format, students can familiar learning unit layout, they are more able
navigate through the session exercising personal to focus on the content and learning objectives,
preferences; for example, to skip the lecture and which should increase student learning.
take the quiz first. It is to their best benefit if the
content is organized and easy to move through Learning Objects
logically.
Quality course content should be a constant In regard to online learning objects and interac-
concern for the institution. Course content con- tive learning elements, there are three options:
tributes highly to the success of students and the buy, borrow, or build with the latter consuming
online education program. Course content can be the most of this section. Should a faculty mem-
obtained from several methods such as purchas- ber elect to buy or borrow an element, module
ing from peer institutions or for-profit entities. or course, there are many choices now readily
However, most of the pioneering institutions in available. While they may not be exactly what
online education use internal sources for content the faculty member had in mind from the analysis
creation. and Design stages, textbook publishers and online
content brokers offer many choices, although
Content Creation some disciplines may be better represented than
others. In the borrow category, learning object
Using rich media such as online graphical models repositories such as MERLOT and Wisc-Online
and video can be impressive but is time consum- provide the course designer with peer-reviewed
ing and expensive. Text-based content is easy to modules and most are free.
create, but cumbersome for the student to read, So what exactly are learning objects? Accord-
especially if it cannot be printed. Often, online ing to the IEEE Learning Standards Committee
students will print out the lectures and highlight (2001), a learning object is “any entity, digital
or mark the text as they read; therefore, text-based or non-digital, which can be used, re-used or
lectures should be designed with this in mind. referenced during technology-supported learn-
Some institutions have created a style guide for ing.” Many free resources for learning objects
the development of online courses. A style guide are available online, or learning objects can be
recommends colors, font styles, icon usage, and developed specifically for each course. The fol-
the placement of certain institutional information lowing is a list of repositories:

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• Apple Learning Interchange: http://ali.ap- or open additional browser windows; however,

ple.com/ali/resources.shtml there are many ways around these safeguards
• Campus Alberta Repository of Educational such as secondary computers, digital cameras, and
Objects: http://www.careo.ca/ countless other ways to beat the system.
• The Connexions Project at Rice University: Obviously, the proctored testing environment
http://cnx.rice.edu provided by having all the students in a single
• Multimedia Educational Resource for location under the direct supervision of the course
Learning and Online Teaching (MERLOT): instructor is difficult to duplicate online. Some
http://www.merlot.org institutions, especially those with local audiences,
• Wisc-Online Learning Object Project: still require on-campus proctoring of exams or
http://www.wisconline.org work with institutions within testing consortia to
provide such services. While this is an option, it
For many faculty, the choice to build from does not really fit within the ideal of a completely
scratch is the option they elect to exercise fre- online and time-flexible course. Therefore, many
quently. The creation is often team-based, where course developers have looked for alternative as-
one or more instructors partner with one or more sessments and opportunities to examine student
instructional designers and/or graphical design- learning with alternatives to traditional testing
ers. Team-based approaches help alleviate the methodologies. One suggested method is called
need for support by spreading the burden across authentic assessment which is defined as “a form
multiple individuals with multiple talents. Team- of assessment in which students are asked to per-
based courses can also allow for improved course form real-world tasks that demonstrate meaningful
content and more complete materials due to the application of essential knowledge and skills”
broader range of expertise and experiences from (Mueller, 2006). This method works exception-
multiple individuals. ally well in online environments and should be
considered whenever possible. A good resource
Assessment can be found at jonathan.mueller.faculty.noctrl.
edu/toolbox/Index.htm.
The distance element of online education adds a Provision of the grading rubrics used for scor-
unique twist to assessment of student learning. ing assessments within the course material is also
The online platform and ubiquity of technology highly recommended. Students should be aware
among students affords the course developer a host of grading criteria and allowed to self-evaluate
of electronic tools. Online assessment tools are wherever possible. One commendable practice is
usually provided with a courseware management to have student pre-score their work and submit
system as well as commercial vendors such as: their assessment along with their work at the time
of submission. This allows the faculty member
• Questionmark: Questionmark Perception to focus discussion on points of disagreement,
(http://www.questionmark.com) helping guide students to better critical evaluation
• Respondus: Respondus (http://www.re- and awareness of their own work.
spondus.com/)
• Software Secure: Securexam (http:// Additional Resources
www.softwaresecure.com/)
In the connected world of the Internet, outside
These vendors support high stakes testing with resources are easily built-in to the course. Linking
products that do not allow students to print exams to Websites and online resources is obvious. Other

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 Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

resources, such as library resources, online reserve e-mail that invites the students to join the class,
materials, and institutional support resources such telephone students who do not appear the first
as a writing center and tutoring centers provide week, and duplicate your welcome e-mail in a
students with just-in-time resources and referrals. class announcement if the course management
Even referrals and links to technical support and system allows. The announcement should also
helpdesk resources may be provided to the students encourage students to regularly check their e-mail.
where course developers anticipate certain tech- The first week should have fewer assignments
nical tasks might prove challenging to students. to allow students to post introductions and get
to know each other. Technical issues should be
resolved immediately.
IMPLEMENTATION
Introductions
The next phase, implementation, includes opening
the course and initiating instruction. An enthusias- The instructor should spend time getting to know
tic and engaging opening week of class is a great the students individually during the first week of
way to start the course. This time period is fragile; class and encourage students to do the same. An
disruptions or unnecessary interferences may set a introductory discussion inviting the participants
tone that stifles learning for the remainder of the to share something in particular with the group is
course. It is important to create an initial impres- a successful strategy for building learning com-
sion that will stimulate the development of the munity. The instructor should participate heavily
learning community and nurture the students to in this discussion (being careful not to dominate)
maturity. Hirumi (2003) suggests the following and should respond to one or two comments in
goals for students in the first week of the course: each student’s introductory posting. Ko and Ros-
sen (2004) suggest the “initial postings in the
• Have a good understanding of course re- discussion forum, your first messages sent to all
quirements and expectations, by e-mail or listserv, or the greeting you post on
• Can locate and interpret relevant policies your course home page will do much to set the
and procedures, tone and expectations for your course. These ‘first
• Are confident in their ability to use various words’ can also provide models of online com-
tools and course features, and munication for your students” (p. 189). To assist
• Can identify challenges associated with with personal connection, the instructor should
and discuss strategies for facilitating vir- print out the introductory discussion and keep it
tual teamwork” (p. 87). near the computer for reference. When respond-
ing to a student’s question, the instructor should
The course should begin with a welcoming occasionally refer to the discussion and reference
e-mail and announcement, instructions for class- a personal note to the student such as “How is
wide introductions, emphasis on the syllabus, a your son who plays college baseball doing this
tone of excellence established, and nurturing the season?” The discussion following the question,
learning community. leads the student to feel as though he or she is
talking one-on-one with the instructor.
Welcome E-Mail and Announcement Offering an icebreaker in the first session,
such as “share your silliest moment in college” or
Moore, Winograd and Lange (2001) offer several “name the animal you most identify with,” helps
tips for the first session of class: send a welcome to alleviate nervousness and provides insights to

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Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

the fellow students’ personalities. Several good in the course because they may not be able to as-
icebreakers that also provide an instructor with sess their progress as easily online (Boaz, 1999).
student information include the VARK learning
styles (http://www.vark-learn.com/english/index. Nurturing the Learning Community.
asp) and the Keirsey temperament sorter (http://
www.keirsey.com). The Kingdomality profiler As the course progresses, the learning community
(http://www.kingdomality.com) provides not only will still require nurturing from the instructor. A
a medieval vocational assessment, but is fun and learning community becomes self-sufficient when
generates discussion. Each of these Websites offers an instructor provides ample communication, fa-
instant feedback, and the students can post their cilitates the discussion board, treats each student
results and a short paragraph whether they agree as an individual, adds emotion and belonging,
or disagree. Many other Websites allow students responds quickly to questions, models required
to discover their commonalities and similarities behavior, creates appropriately sized groups, and
and can be found with a simple Internet search. clearly outlines expectations for group activities.

Emphasize the Syllabus Provide Ample Communication

A great tip for the first class session is to create Online students are eager for communication as
a syllabus quiz or scavenger hunt that “teaches it is “the foundation of successful distance learn-
students how to navigate your course” (Schweizer, ing courses” (Johnson, 2003, p. 113). In fact,
1999, p. 11). Next, offering bonus points to as- Johnson (2003) also suggests that communication
sess syllabus comprehension is a successful way throughout the course “must be ongoing, regular,
of engaging the student in the first class session. continuous, and easy” (Johnson, 2003, p. 113).
Encouraging students to review the syllabus Lack of instructor-student communication early
more thoroughly can alleviate confusion later in on will create a negative learning community,
the course as they familiarize themselves with thus debilitating the learning process. Instructors
the course requirements. For example, an art should use class-wide announcements, group e-
appreciation course requires outside visits to an mails, and chat archives to facilitate accessible,
art museum. This requirement is clearly listed in public communication in the online course. As the
the syllabus; however, students sometimes want course continues, students should be encouraged
to visit a Web museum instead. This is type of to facilitate the discussion and assume some of
question should be clarified with a syllabus quiz the roles previously controlled by the instructor.
to alleviate any disappointment, confusion, or Communication must be both reflective and
scheduling conflicts. proactive. Many courses use class-wide journals
or summaries to bring closure to modules. Send-
Establish a Tone of Excellence ing out class-wide summation,introduction, and
transitional e-mails at the end of each module,
The first several weeks also set the tone for wrapping up the previous content, and introducing
academic participation. Instructors should grade the next module provides for a sense of transition.
discussions/assignments stringently in the first few Reminding the students of requirements for the
assignment cycles. Establish a tone of excellence current module, such as projects or exam dates,
early and encourage students to do their best. is helpful to the students and it only takes about
“Students want to receive timely and personal 10 minutes a week for either of these tasks. Pro-
feedback” (Boettcher & Conrad, 1999, p. 97) early active communication yields fewer questions,

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 Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

saving dozens of hours answering the questions the discussion to take place without their inter-
individually. Johnson (2003) recommends that vention; experience will eventually guide them.
students should be taught to communicate early For good discussion board facilitation, the
any questions or confusion they may have due to instructor should randomly reply to students and
the lack of body language available in the online provide prompt explanations or further comments
environment. Instructors cannot see looks of regarding the topic of discussion. Johnson (2003)
confusion or frustration. found that “when a professor shows interest in
Instructors should keep their interaction with discussions by commenting on students’ ideas and
the class as accessible as possible. Using the insights, students feel valued and encouraged to
“Course Announcement” area frequently for participate more” (p. 113). The instructor should
reminders and duplicating important information provide feedback in the discussion even if it is
in e-mails will increase open communication and merely a “cheerleading” comment, redirection, or
provide the entire class access to the information. guideline submission. The instructor should inter-
It is also important to communicate to students vene when the discussion seems to be struggling
each time grades are posted. This creates a “don’t or headed the wrong way (Palloff & Pratt, 2001),
call me, I’ll call you” communication pattern for but should not over-participate in the discussion,
grade information and alleviates individual e-mails as this will be considered stifling and restrictive.
from students requesting grades on their assign- Some instructors prompt absentee or “lurker” stu-
ments. Students will quickly realize the instructor dents with a gentle reminder e-mail or telephone
will post a notification when grades are posted, call. According to Bischoff, (2000), “A phone call
so requests are unnecessary. Within that commu- may prove more timely and effective” (p. 70) in
nication, students should be reminded to contact helping a student engage in the discussion.
the instructor if they notice a missing grade. This Many instructors assign assistant facilitators
places the responsibility back with the student for and summarizers for each discussion session,
finding and submitting any missing work. providing opportunities for different kinds of
student involvement. Other instructors use
Facilitate the Discussion Board “coaching teams” made up of students or tutors
as the first line of support, then invite the students
Bischoff (2000) reminds us that “the key to online to ask the instructor for clarification or further
education’s effectiveness lies in large part with the assistance. Under favorable circumstances, the
facilitator” (p. 58). Likewise, for class discussion “discussion will end in acceptance of different
to be successful, the instructor should become a opinions, respect for well-supported beliefs, and
facilitator and review discussions without control- improved problem-solving skills” (Brewer et al.,
ling them. Many online instructors have found 2001, p. 109). McIsaac and Craft (2003) remind
that too much activity can be as harmful as none us that class discussions should take place after
at all. This particular role of the facilitator in the the reading assignments; students may also need
online classroom can be difficult for a traditional to be reminded of this before they participate.
instructor. A traditional instructor may be accus-
tomed to dominating or controlling the discussion Treat Each Student as an Individual
through lecture; however, in an online class, all
students have equal opportunity to participate in Instructors should value individual contributions
the discussion and may outside of the instructor’s and “treat their students as unique” (White, 2000,
influence. It takes a good deal of time for some p. 11). A simple technique is to use the students’
instructors to feel truly comfortable in allowing preferred names or nicknames in all correspon-

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Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

dence. It is also important to add positive emotion Model Behavior

and visual cues. The online environment can be
limiting when the communication is mostly text- Instructors who engage students in collaborative
based. Typing the cues in an e-mail can serve the groups should facilitate development of social
same purpose as nodding a head in agreement or skills. This begins at the onset of the course when
offering a welcoming smile as would occur in a the learning community is formed and students
traditional course. recognize the online classroom as a safe place to
interact. Group skills should be modeled by the
Add Emotion and Belonging instructor and outlined in the course syllabus.
For example, if a two paragraph introduction is
When online learning is facilitated incorrectly, expected, the instructor should model that in their
students can feel isolated and cheated. This could own introduction to the class.
lead to feelings of separation and disappointment
that negatively impact learning. White (2000) Create Appropriately Sized Groups
advises that “a positive emotional climate can
serve as a frame of reference for online students Most students enjoy the online social interaction
activities and will therefore shape individual and find that it encourages their learning experi-
expectancies, attitudes, feelings, and behaviors ence. Independently minded students discover
throughout a program” (p. 7). Since there are that the asynchronous nature of the course enables
no visual clues in the online classroom, one them to participate more readily than in the face-
suggestion for communication is to type out the to-face classroom. In creating groups, Ko and
emotion expressed in parentheses (*smile*) or Rossen (2004) recommend that instructors divide
to include emoticons, such as:-) for happiness students into groups instead of allowing students
or:-0 for surprise or dismay. It is also possible to to pick their own. Students may find it difficult
describe body language in e-mail. Salmon (2002) to meet online and form groups quickly. Many
offers this example: “When I read your message, instructors search the introductory material to
I jumped for joy” (p. 150). This descriptive effort find common elements among students to hasten
shows the students the instructor’s personality group cohesion.
and positively stimulates the online community. Groups should not be too large or too small.
It is also beneficial, as Hiss (2000) suggests, for The most effective group size appears to be four
online instructors to remember to keep their sense students per group. Utilizing these suggestions,
of humor. groupwork should begin early to promote a posi-
tive learning experience in the classroom. The ac-
Respond Quickly tual process for completing the project should be
outlined by the instructor, but the final outcome
Time delays in a threaded discussion can be should be the group’s responsibility.
frustrating for students. This is especially true if
a response was misunderstood and students have
attempted to clarify. Instructors should try to EVALUATION
post daily or on a regular schedule that has been
communicated to the students. Some instructors The final stage of online instruction is for evalu-
create homework discussion threads for content ation and assessment. Evaluation is a rewarding
support, which provides a forum for students to experience where one can observe learning occur-
help each other. ring in the minds of students and reminds many

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instructors why they choose this as their career. end with course evaluations. The instructor can
Evaluation is a time of reflection and satisfaction develop a discussion thread for students to post
for a job well done. At this stage, instructors should feedback about the course anonymously, includ-
assess each student’s performance against course ing possible suggestions for improvement. If a
objectives, including what worked well and what student does offer feedback, the instructor should
should be improved. This is often accomplished by acknowledge the feedback and be appreciative
evaluating the course with a “best practices” online for the remarks.
course rubric, keeping a journal and by soliciting Feedback instruments should provide the stu-
feedback on instruction and course content. dents with a way to communicate what they like the
best or least about the course instruction. Schwartz
Online Course Rubrics and White (2000) suggest a mid-course feedback
process by enlisting a student volunteer to send an
With faculty teaching online for over a decade, e-mail message to the class soliciting feedback.
online course rubrics have been developed to help They also suggest the following questions be used,
evaluate quality in online courses. These rubrics encouraging honesty and participation:
examine best practices for design, requirements
for interaction, and attempt to measure the overall • List three areas that are working well in
quality of the course. Currently, there are several this course
excellent rubrics but we can thoroughly recom- • List three ways to improve the class. (p.
mend the following: California State University 175)
Chico’s Rubric for Online Instruction (www.
csuchico.edu/celt/roi/index.html), Blackboard’s The student volunteer would gather the mes-
Exemplary Course Rubric (www.connections. sages, remove names, and send them to the in-
blackboard.com/), and Quality Matters (www. structor. If possible, course changes in response
qualitymatters.org). to students’ comments will allow students to feel
empowered through taking an active role in their
Keep a Journal education. The feedback should also be used to
change subsequent courses taught.
Self-examination with contemplative thought is
a successful approach for course improvement. Solicit Student Feedback
A recommended practice is to keep a journal that on Course Content
records items that should be redesigned or altered
the next time the course is taught. The instructor All online instructors should look for possible
should make notes of assignments that worked well course revisions. Course content should never
and those that were difficult, and critically evalu- remain static. Moore et al. (2001) propose that
ate the effectiveness of content and instruction. “because online course design and teaching are so
new, evaluating the effectiveness of your course
Solicit Student Feedback and then refining it based on the results of that
on Instruction evaluation become imperative” (p. 12.3). If using
end-of-course summary feedback, the instructor
Student feedback improves instruction. A good must receive this feedback in time to reevaluate
place to gather the feedback is inside the course the course for the next semester and modify, if
management system. It is helpful to survey for necessary. Another possibility is an end-of-session
student feedback during the course, not just at the discussion regarding the focus of the next session,

580
Applying the ADDIE Model to Online Instruction

thus allowing for minor course revisions even as Boaz, M. (1999). Effective methods of communi-
the course continues to be taught. cation and student collaboration. In Teaching at a
distance: A handbook for instructors (pp. 41-48).
Mission Viejo, CA: League for Innovation in the
CONCLUSION Community College.
Boettcher, J. V., & Conrad, R. M. (1999). Faculty
Online teaching has brought a new modality to
guide for moving teaching and learning to the
education. It has also brought frustration and
Web. Mission Viejo, CA: League for Innovation
anxiety to instructors attempting this new method
in the Community College.
of instructing students. Moore et al. (2001) shared
that “one faculty member who had only just fin- Brewer, E., DeJonge, J., & Stout, V. (2001). Mov-
ished her course online said it was like diving into ing to online: Making the transition from tradi-
a great chasm, blindfolded” (p. 11.3). Instructors tional instruction and communication strategies.
who are comfortable with the traditional methods Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, Inc.
for teaching in the classroom may still struggle to
Fraser, A. B. (1999). Colleges should tap the
engage students over the Internet. While many of
pedagogical potential of the world-wide web.
the same techniques apply, teaching online requires
The Chronicle of Higher Education, 45(48), B8.
additional techniques for success. The ADDIE
instructional model provides a basic path for de- Gilbert, S. D. (2001). How to be a successful
veloping and teaching an online course: analyze online student. New York: McGraw-Hill.
the course objectives and audience; design and
Hirumi, A. (2003). Get a life: Six tactics for op-
develop the materials and activities; implement
timizing time spent online. In M. Corry & C. Tu
the course materials and encourage learning, and
(Eds.), Distance education: What works well (pp.
finally, evaluate the effectiveness. In the online
73-101). New York: The Haworth Press.
classroom, the environment is prepared with a
carefully designed syllabus and policies and the Hiss, A. (2000). Talking the talk: Humor and
learning community is nurtured to grow and be- other forms of online communication. In K. W.
come self-sufficient. By utilizing these strategies White & B. H. Weight (Eds.), The online teach-
for teaching online effectively, an instructor will ing guide (pp. 24-36). Needham Heights, MA:
engage the online learner, nurture a successful Allyn and Bacon.
learning community, and alleviate the frustration
IEEE Learning Technology Standards Committee.
and fear that goes along with teaching online.
(2002). The learning object metadata standard
(WG12). IEEE Learning Technology Standards
Committee (ILTSC), Piscataway, NJ: IEEE. Re-
REFERENCES
trieved December 29, 2006, from ieeeltsc.org/
Bischoff, B. (2000). The elements of effective wg12LOM/lomDescription
online teaching. In K. W. White & B. H. Weight Jarmon, C. (1999). Strategies for developing ef-
(Eds.), The online teaching guide (pp. 57-72). fective distance learning experience. In Teaching
Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon. at a distance: A handbook for instructors (pp.
1-14). Mission Viejo, CA: League for Innovation
in the Community College.

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Johnson, J. L. (2003). Distance education: The Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (1999). Building learn-
complete guide to design, delivery, and improve- ing communities in cyberspace: Effective strate-
ment. New York: Teachers College Press. gies for the classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Ko, S., & Rossen, S. (2004). Teaching online: Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2001). Lessons from
A practical guide (2nd ed.). Boston: Houghton the cyberspace classroom: The realities of online
Mifflin. teaching. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
McCormack, C., & Jones, D. (1998). Building Salmon, G. (2002). Developing e-tivities: The
a Web-based education system. New York: John key to active online learning. London: Kogan
Wiley & Sons, Inc. Page, Ltd.
McIsaac, M., & Craft, E. (2003). Faculty develop- Schwartz, F., & White, K. (2000). Making sense of
ment: Using distance education effectively in the it all: Giving and getting online course feedback.
classroom. In M. Corry & C. Tu (Eds.), Distance In K. W. White & B. H. Weight (Eds.), The online
education: What works well (pp. 73-101). New teaching guide (pp. 167-182). Needham Heights,
York: The Haworth Press. MA: Allyn and Bacon.
Molenda, M. (2003). In search of the elusive AD- Schweizer, H. (1999). Designing and teaching
DIE model. Performance Improvement, 42(5), an on-line course: Spinning your Web classroom.
34–36. doi:10.1002/pfi.4930420508 Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Moore, G., Winograd, K., & Lange, D. (2001). VanSickle, J. (2003). Making the transition to
You can teach online. New York: McGraw-Hill teaching online: Strategies and methods for
Higher Education. the first-time, online instructor. Morehead, KY:
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Mueller, J. (2006). Authentic assessment toolbox.
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Authentic Assessment. Retrieved December 30,
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edu/toolbox/index.htm classroom. In K. W. White & B. H. Weight (Eds.),
The online teaching guide (pp. 1-12). Needham
Olgren, C. H. (1998). Improving learning out-
Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon.
comes: The effects of learning strategies and
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WI: Atwood.

This work was previously published in Adapting Information and Communication Technologies for Effective Education, edited
by Lawrence A. Tomei, pp. 41-58, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.6
E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs
and Discussion Forums:
An Empirical Survey about the Past,
the Presence and the Future

Reinhard Bernsteiner
University for Health Sciences, Austria

Herwig Ostermann
University for Health Sciences, Austria

Roland Staudinger
University for Health Sciences, Austria

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

This chapter explores how social software tools can One major task of higher education is to train
offer support for innovative learning methods and students for the requirements of their future work
instructional design in general and those related to in order to apply and adapt their knowledge to
self-organized learning in an academic context in specific workplace-related requirements and set-
particular. In the first section the theoretical basis tings. Due to the ongoing pressure on enterprises
for the integration of wikis, discussion forums and to cut costs, the periods of vocational adjustment
weblogs in the context of learning are discussed. in a company will become shorter and shorter.
The second part presents the results of an empiri- On the one hand the rising pressure of innova-
cal survey conducted by the authors and explores tion and the fast-paced development in the econ-
the usage of typical social software tools which omy results in increased demand for continuous
support learning from a student’s perspective. employee training. On the other, growing global
The chapter concludes that social software tools competition forces enterprises to use available
have the potential to be a fitting technology in a resources very economically, so that employee
teaching and learning environment. training is considered to be necessary and desired
even though it is conducted under considerable
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch306 time and cost pressure (Köllinger, 2002).

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

According to these goals, the settings of the Educators and teachers therefore have to con-
education must be changed adequately. “While sider the implications of these developments for
most of higher education still ascribes to traditional the future design of their courses and lectures.
models of instruction and learning, the workplace In 2002 a new term, “Social Software”, entered
is characterized by rapid changes and emergent the stage to refer to a new generation of internet
demands that require individuals to learn and applications. One focus of this new generation is
adapt in situ and on the job without the guidance the collaboration of people in sharing information
of educational authorities“ (Sharma & Fiedler, in new ways such as social networking sites, wikis,
2004, p. 543). communication tools and folksonomies (Richter
In the field of higher education, it has become & Koch, 2007).
an important goal to develop “digital literacy” Wikis, weblogs and discussion forums will
and educate learners as competent users and par- play a central role in the new context so the areas
ticipants in a knowledge based society (Kerres, of application and possibilities will enlarge enor-
2007), but it can be assumed that there is a new mously. It can be assumed that this will also have
generation of students, the “digital natives”, who considerable influence on learning and the usage
are accustomed to the digital and internet technol- of these instruments as learning tools.
ogy (Prenksy, 2001). The paper presents the results of an empiri-
Oblinger and Oblinger (2005) characterise cal survey in order to highlight the benefits of
next generation students (called “n-gen”, for Net- the above mentioned web-based social software
Generation) as digitally literate, highly internet tools from the student’s point of view. 268 first-
savvy, connected via networked media, used to semester students, all in the first term of their
immediate responses, preferring experiential studies) at Austrian Universities from different
learning, highly social, preferring to work in teams, study programs took part in this survey. The
craving interactivity in image rich environments students were asked to use one or more of these
and having a preference for structure rather than tools as a learning tool. The participation in this
ambiguity. survey was voluntary.
According to a study conducted by Lenhart The presentation of the results of this survey
and Madden (2005), half of all teens in the USA is divided into three parts: first the usage of the
may be considered as “content creators” by using tools by the students (before they started with their
applications that provide easy-to-use templates to studies), secondly the experiences the students had
create personal web spaces. made with the tools during the study and, thirdly,
Classical face-to-face learning is seen as the potential future usage.
rigid and synchronous and it promotes one-way The paper concludes with a discussion of the
(teacher-to-student) communication. Thus it is not results of this survey in contrast with other empiri-
surprising that more and more students are opting cal studies already published. Also the limitations
for web-based education, as a more flexible and of this survey and ideas for further research are
asynchronous mode (Aggarwal & Legon, 2006). pointed out.
The higher education system should provide
answers to this new generation of students who
enter the system with different background and THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
skills. They are highly influenced by social net-
working experiences and able to create and publish This part refers to the necessary theoretical
on the internet (Resnick, 2002). background required for the following empirical

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study. Especially the areas of “Social Software” Until now the internet (Web 1.0) has one big
and “Learning” are addressed. disadvantage: it is easy to get information in it,
but it is quite complicated and inconvenient to
Social Software act as an author and take part in the development
of contents. Web 2.0 should enable all internet
The term „social software” emerged and came users to actively take part in the further develop-
into use in 2002 and is generally attributed to ment of the internet. Everyone should be able to
Clay Shirky. Shirky, a writer and teacher on the contribute easily. The focus of Web 2.0 is on the
social implications of internet technology, defines behaviour of the user. It should empower people
social software simply as “software that supports to communicate and collaborate and contribute
group interaction” (Shirky, 2003). and participate.
Another definition of social software can be This growing phenomenon is very interesting
found in Coates (Coates, 2005) who refers to and ought to be examined carefully, in order to
social software as “Software that supports, ex- understand how the web is evolving and how this
tends, or derives added value from human social continuously regenerative cycle of performance
behaviour“. and technological innovation empowers “learning
Users are no longer mere readers, audiences by sharing” (Thijssen & Vernooij, 2002).
or consumers. They have the ability to become Based on the key principle of “architecture of
active producers of content. Users can act in participation”, social software can be seen as part
user and producer positions and they can rapidly of the Web 2.0. Wikis, weblogs and discussion
change the position. forums are tools that are seen as social software
Nowadays the term “Social Software” is close- applications and were selected for further research
ly related to the “Web 2.0”. The term “Web 2.0” and the empirical study presented below.
was introduced by Tim O’Reilly, who suggested
the following definition: “Web 2.0 is the network Related Empirical Research
as platform, spanning all connected devices; Web
2.0 applications are those that make the most of Institutions in the field of higher education have
the intrinsic advantages of that platform: deliv- made efforts to introduce various IT-supported
ering software as a continually updated service learning tools in the daily routine of students and
that gets better the more people use it, consuming lecturers (Evans & Sadler-Smith 2006; Aggarwal
and remixing data from multiple sources, includ- & Legon, 2006; McGill, Nicol, Littlejohn, Grier-
ing individual users, while providing their own son, Juster & Ion, 2005; Dooley & Wickersham,
data and services in a form that allows remixing 2007; Duffy & Bruns, 2006).
by others, creating network effects through an Published results of the usage of weblogs in
‘architecture of participation,’ and going beyond the prolearn-project (www.prolearn-project.org)
the page metaphor of Web 1.0 to deliver rich user have shown that a large majority of respondents
experiences” (O’Reilly, 2005). considers personalization and adaptation of the
Web 2.0 technologies such as blogs, wikis, learning environment as important and crucial fac-
podcasts, and RSS feeds or discussion forums tors. Learning should be individualized to become
have been dubbed “Social Software” because more effective and efficient. Personalization is a
they are perceived as being especially connected key element of the learning process, and specific
and allowing users to develop Web content col- problems need specific solutions, as students dif-
laboratively and publicly (Alexander, 2006). fer greatly in their backgrounds and capabilities.

585
 E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

Learning materials are typically too general in construction of knowledge by an individual. As a

order to cover a very wide range of purposes and consequence there is a recommendation to align
personal learning needs. Compared to classical (Holmes, Tangney, FitzGibbon, Savage & Mehan,
learning personalization can be the most impor- 2001; Du S. & Wagner, 2005; Jonassen, Mayes
tant added value that e-learning can offer. With it, T. & McAleese R., 1993) learning environments,
education can be optimised and adjusted to various especially in the academic context, with associ-
working conditions and needs, because students ate complex learning objectives to constructivist
have different goals, interests, motivation levels, learning principles. Learning is not seen as a
learning skills and endurance (Klamma, Chatti, transmission of content and knowledge to a pas-
Duval, Fiedler, Hummel & Hvannberg et al., 2006). sive learner. Constructivism views learning as an
Chao (2007) explored the potential uses of wikis active and constructive process which is based on
in the field of software engineering (38 participants), the current understanding of the learner. Learn-
especially for software project team collaboration ing is embedded in a social context and a certain
and communication. Overall, twenty-five students situation (Schulmeister, 2005).
agreed and one student disagreed (two neutral) The constructivist approach shifts learning
that wiki is a good tool for project collaboration. from instruction-design-centered to a learner-
Concerning the applications of wikis, more than centered learning and teaching mode. The role of
twenty-three students found that a wiki is a good the educator changes from directing the learner
tool for maintaining a group diary, managing user towards supporting and coaching him/her.
stories (project requirements), and project tracking Baumgartner et al. (2004) have suggested
and reporting. While a majority of students found three different prototypical modes of learning and
that a wiki is a good tool for updating a project teaching. These three different modes of learning
plan, managing acceptance tests, defect tracking, and teaching are neutral to specific so they can
and developing user document, there was also be applied across all subject domains. Therefore,
a significant number of students who disagreed each teaching model can be used to teach e.g.
(Chao, 2007). sociology subjects as well as for teaching e.g.
First results using wikis for collaborative writing technical sciences. Learning can be portrayed
(about 40 participants) also reported similar results. as an iterative process that can subsequently be
In this study students used wikis to write articles subdivided into different phases which are sum-
partly together with the lecturer. marized in Figure 1:
After early problems with software usage In particular, these three different prototypical
software and writing contributions in the wiki, modes for learning encompass the following:
students were able to write articles by themselves
or in teams. The motivation among students was Learning/Teaching I:
on different levels, so the lecturer had to increase Transferring Knowledge
it during lessons. Other students, however, were
highly motivated and were creating the contents At the starting point the learner needs to be pro-
and added them to the wikis (Bendel, 2007). vided with abstract knowledge to lay the theoretical
foundations and to understand relevant signposts,
Constructivism and Learning - road markings and orientation points. This kind
Presentation of the Learning Model of factual knowledge is static and has little value
by itself in real and complex situations. It merely
From a constructivist point of view learning fo- serves as a shortcut to prevent pitfalls and to help
cuses on the learning process by looking at the to organize his/her learning experiences.

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E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

Figure 1. Prototypical modes of learning and teaching (Baumgartner, 2004)

The knowledge of the student is based on Teaching III: Developing, Inventing,

knowledge possessed by the teacher. Students Constructing Knowledge
have to learn what teachers ask them to learn.
The teacher has the responsibility to make the Teacher and learner work together to master prob-
knowledge transfer as easy as possible. lems. This model includes problem generation
and/or invention. The environment is constructed
Learning/Teaching II: Acquiring, in such a way that it represents, at least in certain
Compiling, Gathering Knowledge aspects, reality or reality in a constrained form.
This model includes two-way communication on
In this section of the individual learning career, equal terms, using either linguistic representations
the student actually applies the abstract knowl- or other adequate kinds of language.
edge and gathers own experiences. In order to Teaching III has strong links to constructivism.
limit the action and reflection possibilities, the From a constructivist point of view learning is
learner interacts within a somewhat restricted, considered as an active process in which people
artificial environment, which is reduced in construct their knowledge by relating it to their
complexity and easy to control by the teacher. previous experiences in complex and real situ-
To provide feedback, the learning environment ations in life. In their practical lives people are
is designed to include relevant devices where confronted with unique, unpredictable situations
students can deposit their interim products and whose inherent problems are not readily observ-
teachers can inspect it. able (Baumgartner, 2004).
The emphasis in this model lies on the learning Constructivism does not represent a distinct
process of the student. Teachers try to help the theoretical position in the field of education. There
students overcome wrong assumptions, wrong exist some different approaches, thus constructiv-
learning attitudes and assist in the reflection ism can be understood as a continuum. For learning
process of the subject domain. the two streams “communal constructivism” and
“social constructivism” are essential (Pountney,
Parr & Whittaker, 2002).

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 E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

The social constructivism regards learning as support. In order to achieve this goal, a special
a social process. Reality cannot be discovered, learning environment must be provided.
it does not exist prior to its social invention.
Thus knowledge is also a human product, and is Consequences for IT-Supported
socially and culturally constructed. This means Learning and Teaching
that knowledge is socially co-constructed, which
is a negotiation process by the individuals with Computer software can be used for all three models
other individuals and with their environment. ranging from programmed instruction (Learning/
Social constructivists accept the existence of an Teaching I) to problem solving software (Learning/
“inter subjectivity” as a shared understanding Teaching II) to complex simulations and/or so-
about a knowledge object among individuals. called micro worlds (Learning/Teaching III). It is
Social constructivism stresses the importance of said that the inherent nature of the internet brings
feedback and reinforcement. the real world into the classrooms and with its
On the basis of the upcoming technologies hyperlink structure it clearly advocates the model
for learning and education Holmes et al. (2001) Teaching III (Hsu, 2008; Baumgartner, 2004).
have suggested a new educational theory that The use of the internet, and especially through
goes beyond the existing social constructivism. its social software, gains in importance because
According to their theory learners are not only it can contribute to exceed the limits of classical
constructing their own knowledge but they also teaching models. By adapting learning and teach-
produce knowledge for other students and learners. ing models to the new technical possibilities, the
They consider that peer tutoring and project-based roles of learner and teacher are becoming more
learning are obvious techniques. Furthermore indistinct, because the learner can take a central
they advocate the ideas of cognitive apprentice- part in the design and arrangement of the learning
ship, the publishing of information, flexibility in process (Kerres, 2006).
the time table, a radical look at the way in which Systems that support learners with respect to
assessment is done. the learning model III are called Personal Learning
Siemens (2005; 2006) coined the term “con- Environments (PLEs). PLEs are mostly web-based
nectivism” due to the fact that by using the applications and are based on learning manage-
web learning and knowledge management have ment systems (Seufert, 2007).
changed dramatically. He understands learning PLEs are personal and open learning envi-
as creating networks. In order to deal with the ronments and they are suitable for cross-linking
increasing plethora of information he suggests the contents and people. Learners can use PLEs to
outsourcing of explicit knowledge to the network manage individual learning progress. They are
of the respective community. Having knowledge ideally available for life-long-learning and are
is not in the center, but rather knowing who can supported by the following processes:
provide the necessary information to generate the Reflexive writing: Besides easy reading access
knowledge needed to contributions it is the simple and efficient and
Students should be enabled to invent new rather robust encoding standard usually used in
things, produce or generate new knowledge. Con- social software that allows the explicit modeling
sequently, learning and teaching at universities in of content flows, feedback loops, and monitoring
most cases can be assigned to the requirements procedures of various kinds. Thus supporting
presented in Learning/Teaching II and III with these systems support an ongoing reiterative
respect to theories concerning the digital learning process of explication and reflection (Fiedler,

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E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

2003). PLEs should support the development of Life-long-learning: Life-long learning is a

the ability to learn (“learning to learn”): Through key issue for knowledge society for today and
the publication of one’s thoughts and reflections, tomorrow. In order to cope with the fast change
content is made available for assessment as well of knowledge future knowledge workers have to
as for further development, thereby improving thus be prepared to react fast and manage their
self-observation and self-reflection skills. The further education and training at the workplace.
way the learner can learn and acquire will be In addition, they have to take responsibility for
improved (Baumgartner, 2005). their own employability (Klamma, Chatti, Duval,
As already discussed new learning theories Hummel, Hvannberg & Kravcik et al., 2007).
for digital learning support have been developed, Life-long learning is seen as multi episodic, with
for example “social and communal constructiv- individuals spending occasional periods of formal
ism” that considers learning as a social process education and training throughout their working
or “connectivism” that understands learning as life (Attwell, 2007b). Life-long learners need tools
creating networks. that can be used for all learning activities no mat-
Communication and discussion: The inte- ter what subject they learn or which educational
gration supports the exchange of ideas as well as institution they attend.
finding like-minded people. Furthermore, social Quality of contents: The quality of contents
software tools simplify the process of establishing is a key factor that determines the sustainable us-
connections between people of the same interests. age of a knowledge management system. (Maier,
They also simplify the construction of connections 2004, p. 247)
between people with similar interests. Simultane- Pleasure: Besides the activities that should be
ously its open and expandable philosophy supports supported by social software tools the usage of the
going beyond the thinking in groups (of a common tools must give pleasure to the users. If knowledge
interest) by supporting diversity and bringing management should be fostered, playful behavior
together different perspectives and backgrounds needs to be supported rather than strict norms
(Efimova & Fiedler, 2004; Schulmeister, 2004). (Schneider, 2004; Landry, 2000).
This supports learning from different perspectives. Unlike a Learning Management System (LMS)
Community building: PLE-tools have to that is usually related to one special institution
provide a personal learning area for their authors. or to one special course, a PLE is focused on the
However, this does not force a general learning individual learner. A PLE should combine a broad
flow or learning style. Nevertheless, learners are mixture of different resources and sub-systems in
not alone and can profit from the feedback of a a “personally-managed space” (Attwell, 2006).
community in order to examine and enhance the In the previous decade, Learning Manage-
development of own ideas (Efimova & Fiedler, ment Systems were developed that moved toward
2004; Fiedler, 2003; Böttger & Roll, 2004). enterprise-level applications. “But the wealth of
Achieving synergies of self-organized and joint new, user-friendly, tools in the Web 2.0 environ-
learning should be enabled by those tools. Through ment suggests that the all-in-one monolithic
reading in other learning environments, especially e-learning systems may be entering a phase of
beginners are enabled to learn from experts. At obsolescence by the ongoing development of the
the same time they can actively participate in dis- web” (Craig, 2007).
cussions beyond geographic or thematic borders Social software applications have the potential
(Efimova & Fiedler, 2004; Fiedler, 2003). to cope with these requirements (Brahm, 2007).

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DESCRIPTION AND Discussion Forum

CLASSIFICATION OF SOCIAL
SOFTWARE TOOLS A discussion forum or web forum is a service
function providing discussion possibilities on
In the following section three social software the internet. Usually, web forums are designed
tools, weblogs, discussion-forums and wikis, are for the discussion of special topics. The forum is
described more in detail and the tools are com- furthermore subdivided into sub-forums or sub-
pared. Students were able to select these tools topics. Contributions to the discussion can be
during the empirical study. made and other people may read and/or respond
to them. Several contributions to a single topic
Weblog are called a thread.
The application areas of the two instruments
A weblog, a compound of “web“ and “logbook”, weblogs and forums are quite similar. The most
usually just called “blog”, is a website that con- essential differences between weblogs and discus-
tains new articles or contributions in a primarily sion forums can be described as follows:
chronological order, listing the latest entry on top.
Primarily, a weblog is a discussion-oriented • A forum is usually located on one platform
instrument especially emphasizing two functions, while many bloggers develop their own,
RSS-feed and trackback. RSS-feeds, also called individual environment. They connect
RSS-files can be read and processed for further their weblogs via RSS-feed and trackback
use by other programs. The most common pro- functions.
grams are RSS-readers or RSS-Aggregators that • Through the integration of RSS-files and
check RSS-enabled websites on behalf of the user trackback functions a discussion process
to read or display any updated contribution that can be initiated and continued crossing the
can be found. The user can subscribe to several boundaries of the bloggers’ own weblogs
RSS-feeds. Thus, information of different websites without having to observe other weblogs.
can be retrieved and combined. Preferably, news • Weblogs tend to be more people-centered
or other weblogs are subscribed to. whereas forums are more topic-focused.
Trackback is a service function that notifies an Through the use of weblogs, learner-spe-
entry in a weblog if a reference to this contribu- cific learning environments can be con-
tion has been made in another weblog. By this structed without interfering with the learn-
mechanism a blogger (person who writes contri- ing environments of others (Baumgartner,
butions in a weblog) is immediately informed of 2004).
any reactions to his contribution on other weblogs
(Hammond, Hannay & Lund, 2004). Wiki
Weblogs are often interrelated with other
weblogs, the blogosphere, and discussion forums AWikiWikiWeb, shortly called Wiki, is a hypertext
are rather concentrated on one specific topic. The system for storing and processing information.
interrelations between discussion forums are not Every single site of this collection of linked web
as intensive as in the blogosphere. pages can be viewed through a web browser.
Furthermore, every site can also be edited by any
person. The separation between authors and read-
ers who write their own text, change and delete

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them is obsolete as also third parties can carry out as well as finding like-minded people.
these functions (Augar, Raitman & Zhou, 2004). Furthermore, social software tools simpli-
The most essential differences between we- fy the process of establishing connections
blogs, wikis and discussion forums can be de- between people of the same interests. They
scribed as follows (Wagner & Bolloju, 2005, p. 5): also simplify the construction of connec-
tions between people with similar inter-
Learning Activities Supported by ests. Simultaneously its open and expand-
Social Software able philosophy supports going beyond
the thinking in groups (of a common in-
The integration of different Social Software Tools terest) by supporting diversity and bring-
offers support in the following learning activities: ing together different perspectives and
backgrounds (Efimova & Fiedler, 2004;
• Learning from different perspectives: The Schulmeister, 2004).
integration supports the exchange of ideas

Figure 2. Comparison of weblogs, wikis and discussion forums

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 E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

• Synergies of self-organized and joint learn- ling of content flows, feedback loops, and
ing: Social Software tools provide a person- monitoring procedures of various kinds,
al learning area for their authors. However, thus supporting an ongoing reiterative pro-
this does not force a general learning flow cess of explication and reflection (Fiedler,
or learning style. Nevertheless, learners are 2004).
not alone and can profit from the feedback
of a community in order to examine and Integration of Social Software Tools
enhance the development of own ideas and the Learning/Teaching Modes
(Efimova & Fiedler, 2004; Fiedler, 2004;
Böttger & Röll, 2004). Baumgartner (2004) has integrated different types
• Digital apprenticeship: Through reading of Content Management Systems in relation to the
other wikis, forums or weblogs regularly, most suitable learning/teaching mode. He clearly
beginners are enabled to learn from ex- states that the boundaries are overlapping and
perts. At the same time they can actively that every tool – in one way or the other – could
participate in discussions beyond geo- be used for every teaching model. The following
graphic or thematic borders (Efimova & Figure 3 presents the integration of the Social
Fiedler, 2004; Fiedler, 2004). Software tools and the learning/teaching modes:
• Weblogs and comparable tools support the Weblogs and forums can be defined as “dis-
development of the ability to learn (“learn- cussion-oriented“ tools because the discourse and
ing to learn”): Through the publication of exchange of ideas related to a certain topic is the
ones own thoughts and reflections, content pre-eminent aim. Weblogs offer the possibility to
is made available for assessment as well as support all three phases of the learning process.
for further development, thereby improv- However, the main focus can be assigned to the
ing self-observation and self-reflection modes “Teaching II” and “Teaching III”.
skills. The knowledge change of the learn- Based on the multitude of interaction pos-
er will be improved (Baumgartner, 2005). sibilities, wikis can be attached to “Teaching
• Social Software supports reflexive writing: III“ (Baumgartner, 2004). Additional functions
The simple, but efficient and rather robust were added to weblog-tools that go beyond the
encoding standard usually used in Social scope of the central use of weblogs, e.g. longer
Software allows for the explicit model- articles can also be stored. Through the creation

Figure 3. Prototypical Modes and Social Software Tool

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E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

of directories, a structured collection of links can At the end of the testing phase - after four weeks
be implemented. of using the tools - selected student reported their
Through the additional linking of weblogs, experiences with the tools used. Thereby students
wikis and forums, there is the possibility to develop who had decided not to use the tools in the first
a personal knowledge collection (Kantel, 2003). place got an impression about the usage, advan-
tages and disadvantages of the tools by their fellow
students. Following these short presentations a
EMPIRICAL SURVEY questionnaire was completed that provided the
basic findings for further inspections and research.
The purpose of this survey was to determine A total of 268 first-semester students of differ-
if the integration of web-based social software ent Austrian universities in five selected courses
tools (wikis, discussion forums and weblogs) took part in this survey. The majority of the par-
are suitable to foster learning from the student’s ticipants were between 18 and 20 years old. The
point of view. portion of female students was about 17%.
According to a survey conducted by Seybert
Aim of the Survey and Methodology (2007) concerning gender differences in computer
and internet usages for young people (aged be-
Scrutinizing the possibilities and constraints of tween 16 and 24), there is no gap between men and
social software tools (wikis, discussion forums women in Austria. The proportion of women and
and weblogs) as a personal learning environment, men (in the relevant age class) that used a com-
students at Austrian universities were asked to use puter (almost) once a day is with 72% the same. A
one or more of the offered tools for their research, study by Otto et. al. (Otto, Kutscher, Klein & Iske,
home work and documentation purposes. In most 2005) indicates that there is a positive correlation
cases collaboration of students was required to between a formal educational background and the
perform the assigned tasks. usage of the internet in Germany.
The students were asked to use the tools for “Beside socio-cultural resources like family
one course only during Winter Term 2006. Fur- background, peer structures and social support
thermore, there was no obligation for the students in general, the formal educational background
to use a tool at all, they were just encouraged to turns out to be the main factor for explaining
do so. Students were also offered the possibility differences in internet usage” (Kutscher, Klein
using two or three tools - their selection was up & Iske, 2005, p. 219).
to the students. As a consequence for the analysis of the results
The courses were organized as blended- of this survey, no distinction between male and
learning courses, so they included on-campus female students was made.
lessons and off-campus work in which the stu- Table 1 presents the distribution of the partici-
dents could work face-to-face or using the social pants concerning the degree program the students
software tools. are attending:
More than 90% of the students attending the For the further analysis of the results no dis-
courses took part in this survey. In order to give tinction according to the degree programs will be
the participants an impression of the functional- made.
ity and usage of the tools short presentations of This questionnaire asked each participant
the tools were made by an instructor before the questions about her or his subjective impression
students made their choice. of the application of the tools. It included five-

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Table 1. Distribution of students regarding the Table 2. Tools selected by the students
degree program
Per Cent Number
Distribution Only one tool selected
Management & Law 17% Wikis only 23,1% 62
Management & IT 31% Discussion forums only 22,4% 60
Management & Industrial Engineering 22% Weblogs only 0,4% 1
Mechanical Engineering, Electronics 30% More than one tool selected
Wikis and discussion forums 42,9% 115
Wikis and weblogs 1,9% 5
point Likert scales for rating constructs such as Discussion forums and weblogs 0,7% 2
eligibility, perceived quality or enjoyment. Wikis, discussion forums and weblogs 6,7% 18
The study was conducted to find answers No tool selected
about the No tool selected 1,9% 5

• usage of social software before the study

started According to the above table the combination
• selection of the offered tools of wikis and discussion forums is the most se-
• perceived quality of the contributions and lected combination of tools (42,9%), followed by
the support for learning wikis only (23,1%) and discussion forums only
• applicability of the instruments to support (22,4%). In the end only five students (1,9%) did
communication and community-building not take part in the study; they did not select a
• the correlation of the usage for private and tool, although they first had had the intention to
educational purposes of the tools do so. Only one student used weblogs only. Gen-
• fun factor using the instruments erally, weblogs were not used very intensively by
• potential future usage the participants.
Table 3 shows the usage of the tools by the
The results of the study are presented in three participants before they took part in the study. It
parts: indicates that wikis (76%) and discussion forums
(78%) are currently the most widely used tools.
• Part 1: Analysis of the usage of wikis, dis- Weblogs are only used by 11% of the asked
cussion forums and weblogs of the stu- students.
dents before the study was started The results clearly show that the weblog hype
• Part 2: Experiences made with the tools had not yet reached the surveyed students. Due
during the study to the fact that only about 11% of the students are
• Part 3: Potential future usage of the tools currently using weblogs, the results for this instru-
ment are not published for the first part of the
Part 1: Tool-Selection and
Pre-Study Usage
Table 3. Students already using the tools
Due to the fact that the students could select the
Wiki Forum Weblog
tools on their own, Table 2 shows the results of
Yes 76% 78% 11%
this selection process.
No 24% 22% 89%

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analysis. When it comes to the potential future problems, computer games, leisure activities, etc.
usage of the instruments, weblogs are taken into were mentioned. A repetition of this image can be
consideration again. identified when the disagreement with the ques-
The following section presents the results for tion is analyzed. 29% of the students do not or
questions analyzing the usage in more detail. rarely use forums for private purposes, compared
Tables 4 and 5 present the current usage of the to 36% in their education.
tools for private and educational purposes. The
question: “I often use (wikis, forums) for private Part 2: Experiences Made
purposes” was asked. During the Study
Table 5 shows the results for the correspond-
ing question “I often use (wikis, forums) for edu- This section presents the results of the study con-
cational purposes” are presented. cerning experiences with the usage of the tools
A huge majority (90%) stated that they use during the study.
wikis for educational purposes and about two thirds
(68%) used wikis for private purposes. Wikis are Quality and Support for Learning
therefore more intensively used for educational
purposes than for private purposes, whereas the The next section refers to questions concerning the
usage of forums is exactly the opposite, they are quality of contributions of wikis and discussion
more used for private purposes than for education. forums and their support for learning.
The answers of the students concerning this The results of the question “The quality of
question were that wikis are foremost considered contributions in (wikis, forums) is in general
as a source of serious information, whereas forums good” regarding the quality of contribution are
are ideal for getting hints or clues to problems presented in Table 6. The contributions of wikis are
related to their privacy. Questions about computer evaluated to be much better than those of forums.
The surveyed pupils had the possibility to give
reasons for their assessment concerning the qual-
Table 4. Usage for Private Purposes ity of contributions via additional qualitative
answers. The following summarizes the addressed
Wiki Forum reasons:
I totally agree 33% 33% One reason for this excelling grade for the qual-
I generally agree 35% 29% ity of wikis is the “Wikipedian Community”. The
neither ... nor (neutral) 9% 9% term “wiki” is often seen as synonym for the free
I slightly disagree 16% 17% online encyclopaedia Wikipedia (www.wikipedia.
I disagree 8% 12% org). Wikipedia is widely used for a great variety

Table 5. Usage for Educational Purposes Table 6. Perceived Quality of Contributions

Wiki Forum Wiki Forum

I totally agree 57% 22% I totally agree 38% 10%
I generally agree 33% 29% I generally agree 52% 31%
neither ... nor (neutral) 3% 12% neither ... nor (neutral) 10% 41%
I slightly disagree 8% 24% I slightly disagree 2% 15%
I disagree 1% 12% I disagree 0% 4%

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Table 7. Clarity of Contributions

of tasks, so for research on all topics needed for
educational and private purposes. Wiki Forum
In contrast to the good evaluation of contribu- I totally agree 2% 4%
tions of wikis, the open architecture of wikis was I generally agree 6% 18%
also mentioned. In most cases this open architec- neither ... nor (neutral) 29% 37%
ture allows everyone to edit entries which results
I slightly disagree 34% 27%
in the uncertainty of whether the knowledge pre-
I disagree 29% 14%
sented is correct or not. The quality of contributions
in discussion forums was rated rather mediocre.
Forums are primarily used for technical problems, Table 8. Reading Contributions helps to acquire
especially computer related problems, and to get Contents
in contact with an expert of a certain topic and to
get information on online-games. Wiki Forum

The next question “The usage of (wikis, fo- I totally agree 23% 8%
rums) leads to misunderstandings and confusion” I generally agree 36% 21%
is about the clarity of the contributions (Table 7). neither ... nor (neutral) 32% 31%
Only a minority think that the contributions I slightly disagree 5% 25%
are not clear and may lead to misunderstandings. I disagree 3% 15%
In this case wikis are also rated better than forums.
The next questions addressed the support of
these instruments for learning. Table 8 summa- Table 9. Writing Contributions helps to acquire
rizes the results for the question “When reading Contents
contributions in (wikis, forums) it is easier for me
Wiki Forum
to acquire the learning contents”:
I totally agree 8% 7%
More than half of the students express that
I generally agree 13% 19%
reading contributions in wikis is helpful for learn-
neither ... nor (neutral) 45% 34%
ing, whereas only about 8% think that it is not
I slightly disagree 14% 22%
helpful. Compared to forums, wikis were again
I disagree 19% 17%
much better evaluated especially considering the
big difference with the negative evaluations of
forums.
Table 9 presents the learning support achieved Applicability for Communication
by writing contributions (“When writing contri- and Community-Building
butions in (wikis, forums) it is easier for me to
acquire the learning contents”): The question was formulated as follows: “(wikis,
A different picture emerges in the statistics forums) are appropriate to support communica-
when comparing the evaluation of how writing tion” (Table 10)
an article or post supports the learning process. The results clearly demonstrate that discussion
Here forums take the lead when it comes to forums are “made for communication” whereas
positive assessment. In both cases there were a wikis are rather seen as a kind of reference book
large number stating that writing is neither posi- or encyclopedia, as already mentioned above.
tive nor negative. The majority of the students The results of the next question, “(wikis,
rather read than wrote, whereas more students forums) support the set up of communities”, can
wrote in forums than in wikis. be seen in Table 11.

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Table 10. Applicability for Communication

Part 3: Potential Future
Wiki Forum Usage of the Tools
I totally agree 9% 39%
I generally agree 33% 37%
The third section of the empirical study deals with
neither ... nor (neutral) 29% 17%
the potential usage by students who had not used
one of the instruments before the study. Students
I slightly disagree 15% 4%
gained knowledge and experiences by using the
I disagree 15% 3%
tools during the study by themselves or on the
basis of the reported experiences made by their
Table 11. Support for Community-Building fellow students.
The first question “I will use (wikis, forums,
Wiki Forum weblogs) for educational purposes in the future”
I totally agree 10% 28% yielded the results shown in Table 13.
I generally agree 25% 32% According to this study wikis will then have
neither ... nor (neutral) 39% 23% a bright future and will be used often for educa-
I slightly disagree 15% 11% tional purposes, whereas forums will be used less
I disagree 10% 6% often. About 54% of the surveyed students had
the intention of using wikis more or less often in
the future. About 16% did not think that they will
Opinions about the applicability of wikis to use wikis often in the future and 30% are not yet
establish a community is split. About 35% say sure if they will use this instrument or not.
that wikis are supportive of building a commu- The results for forums and weblogs indicate no
nity, compared to 25% who said that wikis do not clear trend, but forums were rated slightly higher
support community-building. The support of than weblogs. 39% of the students stated that they
forums to build a community is rated much better
– 50% indicated that forums are well suited to Table 12. Fun Factor when using the Instruments
build a community. These results were to be ex-
pected because they confirm the nature of the Wiki Forum
instruments. I totally agree 26% 19%
I generally agree 36% 37%
Fun Factor when Using the Instruments neither ... nor (neutral) 31% 26%
I slightly disagree 5% 14%
In surveying whether students gain pleasure (“I I disagree 1% 4%
enjoy using (wikis, forums)”), wikis again came
back on top (Table 12).
A majority of 62% enjoy using wikis and fo- Table 13. Future Usage in Educational Context
rums (56%). Considering the answers that there (current non-users)
is no (I disagree) or little (I slightly disagree) fun Wikis Forums Weblogs
when using these instruments wikis (6%) are much
I totally agree 18% 16% 13%
better rated than forums (18%).
I generally agree 36% 23% 23%
neither ... nor (neutral) 30% 16% 24%
I slightly disagree 9% 12% 13%
I disagree 7% 33% 27%

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 E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

can image to use forums (36% for weblogs) in In an empirical study conducted by Wheeler,
the future for their education. At the other end of Yeomans and Wheeler (2008) 35 undergraduate
the scale, 45% did not have the intention to use students (1st-, 2nd- and 3rd-year) of a teacher
forums (40% for weblogs). training (Bachelor of Education) have been using
The equivalent question “I will use (wikis, fo- open-content wiki software for one year as an
rums, weblogs) for private purposes in the future” integral part of their studies. Ages ranged from
leads to similar results (Table 14). 18 to 25 years, and there were two mature stu-
From this point of view, wikis are again the dents. Each participated in this evaluative study
leading instrument, followed by forums and we- voluntarily. Students used the wikis regularly
blogs. during their classroom sessions as a space to store
It must be said that the answers to this set and edit the work from their research exercises,
of questions represented feelings, attitudes and and as a forum for discussion. During teaching
opinions about instruments that had not yet been sessions students were invited via the integrated
used by the asked participants. The purpose of discussion board to post their views on their use
posing these questions was to gain insight into of the wiki. They were also invited to complete
the mindset in regard to these instruments. a post-module questionnaire via email.
The authors conclude that “wikis have the
potential to transform the learning experiences
DISCUSSION of students worldwide. The benefits appear to
outweigh the limitations.“ (Wheeler, Yeomans
The results clearly show that wikis are currently & Wheeler, 2008, 994) Collaboration, rather than
the most often used instrument and furthermore competition, should be emphasised as a key aim
have the greatest potential as a tool for learning of any wiki-based activity.
and knowledge management in the field of learn- A study conducted by Solvie (2008) took place
ing – and these findings are in line with other during a three week period of a semester long
empirical studies (Bendel, 2007; Chao, J. 2007). reading methods course for preservice teachers.
Other studies (Nicol and Macleod, 2004; Eighteen preservice teachers participated in the
McGill, Nicol, Littlejohn, Grierson, Juster and study. A combination of quantitative and qualita-
Ion, 2005) report that a shared workspace helped tive methods was used.
to support collaborative learning. Especially the One major purpose of this study was to get
possibility of being able to access and contribute insights into the usage of a wiki in combination
to the development of resources at any time and with individual learning styles thereby the cog-
from any location was appreciated by the students. nitive learning style model by Kolb was used.
Generally the results show that the used wiki
provided a space for effective collaborative work.
Table 14. Future Usage in Private Context (cur- The furthermore found out that there is a correla-
rent non-users) tion between the individual learning style and the
specific usage of the wiki.
Wikis Forums Weblogs
Participants who believed the wiki was helpful
I totally agree 11% 14% 9%
in constructing knowledge of reading contents
I generally agree 36% 23% 22%
in this environment said seeing all the informa-
neither ... nor (neutral) 30% 25% 24%
tion together was helpful. Learning more about
I slightly disagree 14% 7% 16%
and looking in depth at their particular work
I disagree 9% 32% 28%
was helpful, and researching their approach was

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E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

enjoyable. The participants had some problems lishment of a learning and teaching environment
using the technology but these problems were in which students and teachers can experience a
associated with their own level of confidence in greater degree of equality and engagement. Du
use of technology. & Wagner (2007) published results of a study of
The survey at hand made a distinction between an Information Systems undergraduate course
reading and writing contributions with wikis (31 participants). This study indicated that the
and discussion forums. The results show that performance of students’ weblogs was a significant
reading contributions in wikis is helpful (with predictor for learning outcomes, while traditional
the answers “I totally agree” and “I generally coursework was not. Moreover, individuals’cogni-
agree”) for learning (59%) compared to 21% who tive construction efforts to build their own mental
stated that writing in wikis is helpful for learn- models and social construction efforts to further
ing. Reading contributions in forums helped 29% enrich and expand knowledge resources appeared
of the participants whereas writing in forums is to be two key aspects of the constructivist learning
helpful to 26%. This survey supports the general with weblogs. According to this study there is a
statement that a shared workspace that supports potential benefit of using weblogs as a knowledge
a constructivist and learner-centered approach is construction tool and a social learning medium
helpful for learning. (Du & Wagner, 2007).
An empirical study on an eLearning module In this survey at hand weblogs were not yet
on an MSc in Information Technologies and widely used and their potential seems to be limited.
Management was conducted by Gilbert, Morton It can be assumed that these limited prospects will
and Rowley (2007). Nineteen students located change, when the penetration of weblogs into the
across the globe where enrolled on the module. daily routine of the students will increase – for
All students were graduates, but most of their private as well as for educational purposes. These
prior learning experiences had been in standard results are confirmed by Reinmann (2008) who
face-to-face delivery mode. A discussion forum states that blogging in an educational context
was integrated in the learning environment that (“edublogs”) is obvious when the possibilities
was used by all students more or less frequently. are taken into consideration whereas the usage
Most of them were very or quite comfortable about of these tools is not widely spread in the daily
posting contributions to the discussion threads, routine. There are already projects and there is
although some students were not confident to a lot of information about using weblogs in edu-
make contributions. Compared to email, chat, cational settings (Scheloske, 2008; Reinmann &
telephone or face to face the discussion forum Bianco, 2008).
was the most widely used communication channel The results about the potential future usage
among the students. of wikis, weblogs and discussion forums show
Concerning the impact on learning students that these tools have the potential to be used for
responded that they learnt from other students. life-long learning. According to this study, wikis
The support from other students with discussion will have a bright future and will be used often for
forums were the most frequently cited aspects of educational and private purposes. The results for
the learning process whereas some were reluctant discussion forums and weblogs indicate no clear
to be the first contributor. trend, but forums were rated slightly higher than
The pedagogical value in the context of learn- weblogs. Other studies (Klamma, Chatti, Duval,
ing is described in several publications (Babcock, Hummel, Hvannberg & Kravcik et al., 2007;
2007; Hurst, 2005). Weblogs can foster the estab- Attwell, 2007a) confirm these results, whereas

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 E-Learning with Wikis, Weblogs and Discussion Forums

weblogs are considered to be more powerful for study summarizes its results as follows: “The In-
personal knowledge and learning management ternet, for young people, is part of the pattern of
(Williams, 2004; Böttger & Roll, 2004; Fiedler, their day and integrated into their sense of place
2003). and time. The Internet just is.” (Media Awareness
The contribution of this thesis to the discussion Network, 2004, p. 8)
that can be found in Oblinger and Oblinger (2005), With respect to the individual learning styles
Lenhart and Madden (2005), Aggarwal and Legon of young people Bennett et al. (2008) come to
(2006) or Prensky (2001) about the already avail- the conclusion that “young people’s relationships
able “digital literacy” of young people indicates with technology is much more complex than the
that wikis and discussion forums are currently digital native characterization suggests. While
the most widely used tools. More than 75% are technology is embedded in their lives, young
already using these tools, whereas weblogs are people’s use and skills are not uniform. There is
only used by 11% of the asked participants. From no evidence of widespread and universal disaf-
these results it can be concluded that there is some fection, or of a distinctly different learning style
form of digital literacy among young students. the like of which has never been seen before. We
Critics of the net-generation and the derived may live in a highly technologized world, but
consequences for learning and teaching state that it is conceivable that it has become so through
there is “a sense of impending crisis pervades evolution, rather than revolution.”
this debate. However, the actual situation is far Thus it is important to provide systems that
from clear. […] Our analysis of the digital native offer all possibilities of setting up a personal
literature demonstrates a clear mismatch between learning environment in order to enable people
the confidence with which claims are made and to work and learn according to their individual
the evidence for such claims” (Kennedy, Judd, learning style.
Churchward, Gray & Krause, 2008) To avoid possible pitfalls about the application
Schulmeister (2008) points out that the term of these instruments in the context of learning,
“generation” has often been used in the past by some social and psychological issues must be
attributing some specific characteristics or quali- taken into consideration (Kreijns, Kirschner &
ties to people living in a certain period of time. In Jochems, 2003). Social interaction is essential
the USA, for example, earlier generations have for members of a team to get to know each other,
been classified by researchers as the “matures” commit to social relationships, develop trust and
(1900-1946), the “baby boomers” (1946-1964), develop a sense of belonging, in developing a
“Generation X” (1965-1982) or the “net genera- learning community. The size and the composi-
tion” (1983-1991). In many cases these attributes tion of the learning communities seem to be an
are only valid for a minority of this generation important factor how interaction and communi-
but by establishing a classificatory system this cation within the learning community will take
minority is used to represent a whole generation. place (Dooley & Wickersham, 2007). There are
In other publications (Media Awareness Net- also many unresolved issues, like provision of the
work, 2004) it is reported that for young people technology and the services, intellectual property
it is normal to grow up with new technologies. rights and digital rights management, security of
Computers and other new technologies like mobile data, access restrictions to the contents or ques-
phones are not new for them, they just exist and tions in the field of information ethics (McGill,
they use new technologies to manage and organize Nicol, Littlejohn, Grierson, Juster & Ion, 2005;
their daily life (Tully & Zerle, 2005). A Canadian Attwell, 2006; Sharma & Maleyeff, 2003).

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FINAL REMARKS REFERENCES

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The results of this study are the basis for the
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This work was previously published in Novel Developments in Web-Based Learning Technologies: Tools for Modern Teach-
ing, edited by Nikos Karacapilidis, pp. 174-198, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.7
Integrating Blogs in
Teacher Education
Yungwei Hao
National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan

ABSTRACT as a potential framework for evaluating the qual-

ity of reflection in blogs. It is expected that this
This chapter demonstrates some of the educa- instructional model of blogs will help educators,
tional merits of blogs; including how blogs can in particular teacher educators and instructional
be integrated in teacher education and proposing a designers, to design courses to more effectively
methodology for evaluating blogs to meet the goals meet the goals of higher-order thinking required
of reflection and technology literacy in teacher in 21st century teacher education.
education. An undergraduate-level course was
integrated with blog technology to help readers
better understand the inquiry-oriented nature of INTRODUCTION
the blog medium. This exemplar course modeled
Web 2.0 technology to teacher educators and Some people do not regard teaching as a profes-
pre-service teachers who intend to integrate the sion and think that teaching requires little train-
technology into their future teaching. Surveys and ing. According to this belief, anyone who has
interviews were used to investigate participant the content knowledge would be able to teach.
attitude toward blogs. The researcher proposes These are misconceptions. As Darling-Hammond
Zeichner and Liston’s (1987) Reflective Index (2006) indicated, teachers have a list of things
they should know and should be able to do,
including knowing how people learn, teaching
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch307

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Integrating Blogs in Teacher Education

effectively, meeting individual learner’s needs, BACKGROUND

communicating and managing their classrooms
well, and the like. One of the competencies, The use of Internet technologies has been changing
teaching effectively, often contributes to students’ human interaction, communication, and relation-
learning (Darling-Hammond, 2006). Especially in ships. By including Internet technologies in educa-
the digital era, teaching effectively requires more tion, the technology revolution makes the learning
than content knowledge. To teach effectively, environment diverse and complicated, and the role
one needs knowledge of content, pedagogy, and of teachers in students’ learning is transformed into
technology integration, and the interplay of these facilitating. Can teacher education keep updated
three bodies of knowledge known as technological with these changes and meet pre-service teach-
pedagogical content knowledge (TPCK) (Mishra ers’ needs for their future teaching careers? The
& Koehler, 2006). answer is far from certain, because the new skill
Mishra and Koehler (2006) defined technologi- sets required by the new century classrooms differ
cal pedagogical content knowledge: from skills developed by current teacher educators.
This knowledge is different from knowledge The 21st century students are growing up in the
of a disciplinary or technology expert and also time when Internet access has become widespread.
from the general pedagogical knowledge shared Youngsters send/receive e-mails, use instant mes-
by teachers across disciplines. TPCK is the basis saging, search for information online, play online
of good teaching with technology and requires un games, and make online friends. Widespread
understanding of the representation of concepts access to information and resources is bringing
using technologies; pedagogical techniques that young people the pros and cons of the digital age.
use technologies in constructive ways to teach To deal with the complexity of this environment,
content; knowledge of what makes concepts dif- students need up-to-date skills to compete in the
ficult or easy to learn and how technology can 21st century working environment. According to
help redress some of the problems that students the report enGauge 21st Century Skills: Literacy
face; knowledge of students’ prior knowledge in the Digital Age (2003) by the North Central
and theories of epistemology; and knowledge of Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL),
how technologies can be used to build on existing four groups of skills analyzed through literature
knowledge and to develop new epistemologies or reviews, surveys and interviews, represent the
strengthen old ones. (Mishra & Koehler, 2006, p. 21st century skills needed by students, citizens,
1028-1029). and workers in the Digital Age. The skills are 1).
Teacher education programs usually provide Digital-age literacy: including basic, scientific,
pre-service teachers with separate courses in which economic, and technological literacy, visual and
content, pedagogy, and technology literacy skills information literacy, and multicultural literacy
are introduced to learners. The interplay between and global awareness, 2). Inventive thinking:
the three components tends to be neglected. This including adaptability and managing complexity,
chapter is not about developing technology nor self-direction, curiosity, creativity, and risk taking,
content knowledge, but rather about solidifying and higher-order thinking and sound reasoning,
technological pedagogical content knowledge 3). Effective communication: teamwork, collabo-
by using blogs to meet the tremendous academic ration, and interpersonal skills, personal, social,
needs of teacher education in ways that have never and civic responsibility, and interactive commu-
before been available. The final goal of this chapter nication, and 4). High productivity: prioritizing,
is to identify the importance of blog technology planning, and managing for results, effective use
for pre-service teacher education. of real-world tools, and ability to produce relevant,

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high-quality products. In the 21st century, we will during the last few years, blogging has become a
need to go beyond textbooks and define literacy popular online activity across all ages, races, and
to include the ability to exercise thinking skills countries. Many people either blog or read blogs
and to utilize Internet technologies. every day. Blogging is a method of journal keeping,
While standards for learning and demands on except that blogging can share and disseminate
teachers have been increasing, there are changed information and emotions around the world. In
expectations for teachers and growing concerns the blog environment, people ask questions, think
about teacher educators. Research studies evi- about thinking (meta-cognition), and write to the
denced that teachers’ school experience influenced public. The environment is culturally rich and
their belief about teaching and influenced the way educational. Because of its educational value,
they teach (Carter & Doyle, 1996). How teacher blogs deserve a high profile in teacher education.
educators teach pre-service teachers significantly Essentially, blogs are a reflective tool. When
influences the way pre-service teachers teach. people blog, they reflect, and express thoughts
Most of the current teacher educators were edu- through writing. Blog technology provides a
cated at the time when Internet access was not premium platform for reflection. Usually bloggers
available or rarely available, and the information- turn to prior experience, attend to their feelings
communication technologies (ICT) were not as and emotions, and re-evaluate their experience;
user-friendly as they are now. Presently, teacher these three components are exactly what Boud,
educators lack sufficient knowledge of the value Keogh, and Walker (1985) once defined as re-
of the current technologies and hardly think of flection. Schon (1987) distinguished between
innovating teaching through the technologies. reflection on action (reflection after practice has
Teacher educators may continue to educate their been completed) and reflection in action (thinking
students, namely, pre-service teachers, in the that takes place during practice). This distinction
way they themselves were educated. Pre-service highlights the fact that there are cycles to thought,
teachers may either imitate the way their teacher and their links, and their impacts on practice.
educators taught or adopt their intuition to teach Boud, et al. (1985) pointed out, “Reflection does
(Gardner & Williamson, 2007). These outdated not have to be a solitary activity” (p. 16). People
ways may directly or indirectly result in the in- can keep blogs in the form of groups and/or keep
ability of pre-service teachers to thrive as teachers. their own blogs. If blogging in groups, pre-service
To equip young teachers with 21st century skills, teachers can collaborate with their peers and get
teacher educators have to reshape teaching and familiar with the ethics of working in groups.
learning using technology. Through collaboration, pre-service teachers
experience the process of knowledge construc-
The Blog Technology tion in groups and develop collaboration and
interpersonal skills. After all, schools often need
Internet technologies and software applications teachers to work together to accomplish projects.
have become more intuitive, and computer tech- Therefore, it is essential to develop pre-service
nologies and Internet communication tools are teachers’ effective communication skills during
being applied to the education field and integrated the period of teacher preparation. Another reason
into classrooms. One of these tools is the weblog why blogs are recommended in teacher education
(often called blog), which is emerging rapidly in is that blogs can help pre-service teachers become
the context of education, providing an uncompli- aware. Most learners are not aware of how they
cated but powerful organizational form support- construct or attribute meanings to what they see.
ing online expression (Oravec, 2002). Especially Learners often do things habitually. Learners can

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become prisoners of rigid competencies (Candy, learn independently and help them become lifelong
Harri-Augstein, & Thomas, 1985). Blogging can learners (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2002).
help pre-service teachers get out of the shackle of Once developing meta-cognition becomes a real-
habit and develop reflective practice in teaching. ity for pre-service teachers, then expecting K-12
In addition to facilitating the skill development students to be equipped with 21st century skills
of higher-order thinking, keeping blogs can help will be more realistic.
pre-service teachers cultivate technology literacy.
For the last five years, information-communication How to Integrate Blogs in
technology (ICT) has become more and more used Teacher Education
as a tool to enhance the delivery of curriculum and
instruction. Blogs, a type of Web 2.0 technology, All over the world, we hear cries for the improve-
can be regarded as information-communication ment of teacher education. If pre-service teachers
technology (ICT). When blogging is integrated get accustomed to recording their own perfor-
into teacher education, pre-service teachers can mance through portfolios as early as when they
observe teacher educators modeling technology are in teacher education programs, they may be
integration in an instructional setting. Pre-service less resistant to evaluation when they start their
teachers get familiar with the virtual learning en- teaching profession. Thanks to the transparency of
vironment, and are indirectly enabled, equipped blog technology, there is little technical barrier to
with the pedagogical knowledge, technical skills keeping a blog portfolio. Making blogs is as easy
and interplays required for their future teaching. as writing e-mails. Training pre-service teachers
Taking advantage of their accessibility and the to keep their blog portfolios not only prepares
potential for accountability, blogs can be utilized them for evaluation but also encourages them to
as e-portfolios. Blogs record both the process and reflect on their own work while promoting their
products of learning. Blog portfolios can encour- technology literacy. The merits of blogs in educa-
age pre-service teachers to think creatively while tion are multi-dimensional.
considering what content to collect and how to This section will describe how blogs can be
use media to display their content. There have integrated into teacher education programs. The
been numerous research studies investigating the process of teacher preparation is divided into two
significant relationships of individual differences parts: course-work period and teaching practicum
and media modes (eg, Ford, 1985; Ford & Chen, (including a practicum with and without direct
2001; Jonassen & Grabowski, 1993; Liu & Reed, supervision). It is crucial that teaching practice
1994). Diverse media, including text and non-text, is supported by a theoretical foundation (Gross-
can complement individual differences in learning man, 1990). This chapter applies Cognitive Ap-
and can be easily placed in blogs to communicate prenticeship (Collins, Brown, Newman, 1989)
pre-service teachers’ thoughts, display their arti- to the context of the teacher education programs.
facts, and demonstrate learning outcomes. Cognitive Apprenticeship is an instructional model
Furthermore, the process of blogging helps in which teachers try to make thinking visible.
to develop pre-service teachers’ meta-cognitive The model combines elements of apprenticeship
skills, further generating educational value. To and schooling. To transition from a traditional
blog well, pre-service teachers monitor their apprenticeship to a cognitive apprenticeship ap-
own learning and learn when to ask for help proach, teachers should conduct the following
or search for additional information. This type tasks. 1). Identify the task process and make it
of meta-cognition, thinking about one’s own visible to students. 2). Situate abstract tasks in
thoughts, can empower pre-service teachers to authentic contexts, so that students understand the

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relevance of the task. 3). Adjust the diversity of After pre-service teachers finish their course
situations and articulate the commonality of tasks, work and begin their teaching practicum, they can
helping students’ transition from what they know continue to blog, either in groups or individually.
to brave the new and unknown (Collins, Brown, When blogging, pre-service teachers are required
Newman, 1991). Cognitive Apprenticeship (Col- to articulate their thoughts, reflect on their rea-
lins, et al., 1989, 1991) identifies five approaches soning processes, explain or compare their own
to making the blog-integrated activity an integral problem-solving processes with those of an expert
aspect of instruction. They are modeling, coaching, or another participant from their practicum. And it
articulation, reflection, and exploration. Details is crucial to require pre-service teachers to explore
are as follows. how to frame questions and problems (Collins,
During the first two years of pre-service et al., 1989). Pre-service teachers should be as-
teacher training, teacher educators should model signed groups, where they can post questions and
innovative use of technology in their classroom. problems, respond to each other, collaborate and
During that time, teacher educators should reflect together on their approaches to teaching
create opportunities for pre-service teachers and learning in their practicum. Pre-service teach-
to experience and observe innovative uses of ers may sometimes get static with their blogging.
blogs. Teacher educators should make their own Teacher educators need to regularly log in to
teaching journals available in a blog, and dem- their students’ blog sites to provide feedback to
onstrate how to make teaching portfolios. This group and individual blogs, and initiate discus-
makes the process of teacher preparation active sions. In addition to functioning as a e-portfolio
and develops pre-service teachers’ pedagogical and reflective tool, blogs can be used as another
literacy. Teaching portfolios should include ev- form of class interaction. Through Cognitive
erything from how to set up a classroom, to how Apprenticeship, the course work combined with
to deal with unexpected behaviors of students. blog integration, can address the theory-practice
In that way, pre-service teachers can observe divide. And a teaching practicum based on the
and build a conceptual model of the processes innovative use of technology will maximize the
that are required to design, develop, and teach a benefits of the students’ in-school field experi-
course; they will be better able to solve classroom ence. In the process of blogging, pre-service
problems and reflect on their teaching practice. teachers create their own e-portfolios, observe
While observing modeling, pre-service teachers how teacher educators respond and moderate the
can start building their own portfolios by placing asynchronous online discussion, learn to reflect
their artifacts in their own blogs. Teacher educa- on their own practice, and get familiar with the
tors will coach pre-service teachers by observ- Web 2.0 technology.
ing pre-service reflection through blogs. During Google offers a free blog site “Blogger.” With-
coaching, teacher educators should offer hints, out any technical threshold, users do not need any
feedback, reminders, and assistance. They should special skills, teacher educators can go to http://
offer these types of scaffolding, while giving the www.blogger.com to apply for a free account.
reins to pre-service teachers. Moreover, teacher Then pre-service teachers can open their own
educators need to clearly convey their expecta- accounts. Teacher educators maintain the class
tions as pre-service teachers may want to work blog site for class discussion. Teacher educators
hard to meet the requirements of quality work. can post diverse types of media (text, graphics,
(Gathercoal, Crowe, Karayan, McCambridge, photos, video, MP3 and other media) as course
Maliski, Love, & McKean, 2007). supplementation. In addition, teacher educators
should require pre-service teachers to post reflec-

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tions on course content, express emotions and blogs throughout the semester. The course blog
ideas that differ from in-class discussions by being was located at http://spring06p1.blogspot.com/.
more personal. Teacher educators do not need to The students were heterogeneous, sopho-
restrict pre-service teachers about which part of the mores to seniors, from a variety of disciplines.
curriculum content to explore, and should model The course was a requirement for all pre-service
the way to reflect on the learning experience. The teachers. Surveys and interviews were used for the
product, a blog, will give pre-service teachers a investigation of the participants’ attitudes toward
sense of ownership of their explorations. blogs. Overall, the participants’ positive attitudes
When pre-service teachers post reflections on toward blogs were above-average. The descriptive
course content and their prior experiences, they data of a few sample questions on attitude toward
are practicing higher-order thinking skills and blogs are provided in the following paragraphs.
making deeper connections to the material. For More than 70% of participants agreed or strongly
some people, learning is often dull. With blogs, agreed that writing blogs helped them reflect on the
learning becomes reflective and personal. And course, and around 7% of participants disagreed
learning is supposed to be personal, since one has or strongly disagreed with the statement. More
multiple intelligences, as Gardner (1993) advo- details are displayed in Figure 1.
cates. Maintaining blogs in class activities, pre- More than 75% of participants agreed or
service teachers actively participate in thinking strongly agreed that writing blogs helped par-
and knowledge construction. Therefore, teacher ticipants exchange ideas and thoughts with their
educators should encourage pre-service teachers fellows, and less than 10% of participants dis-
to explore the curriculum content, that way pre- agreed or strongly disagreed the statement. See
service teachers have abundant choice to decide Figure 2.
what to reflect on and how to reflect. By creating More than 80% of participants agreed or
blogs, pre-service teachers learn autonomy, and strongly agreed that writing blogs helped par-
develop into self-directed learners. ticipants express emotions, and less than 6% of
participants disagreed or strongly disagreed with
Findings the statement. More details are in Figure 3.

There have been research studies indicating

the importance of opportunities for pre-service
Figure 1. The distribution of participant agree-
teachers to share reflection with each other in
ment on the statement Writing blogs helped me
an environment of trust and respect (Gardner
reflect on the course contents.
& Williamson, 2007). Creating opportunities
for teacher educators to model innovative use
of technology and reflection of their pedagogy
to pre-service teachers is a necessity in today’s
teacher education programs. Based on the guide-
lines for implementation suggested in the previous
section, a teacher education course, Principles of
Instruction was integrated with blogs as a class
assignment. The participants were 155 pre-service
teachers in a national Taiwan university during the
spring of 2006. The course was integrated with

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Integrating Blogs in Teacher Education

Figure 2. The distribution of participant agree- Figure 3. The Distribution of participant agree-
ment on the statement Writing blogs helped me ment on the statement Writing blogs helped me
exchange ideas and thoughts with fellows. express emotions.

Regarding the question: How did writing blogs The participants reported several types of
about the class help you learn the course content, feelings emerging when they read their fellows’
there are several types of learning that occurred blogs. Details of feelings brought up are in Table
during the course. Details analyzed from inter- 2.
views are illustrated in Table 1.

Table 1. How many types of learning took place in the learning context.

Type of learning Participant Response

Attentive “Writing blogs after class made me have to review and digest course content, and forced me to pay more
attention to what the instructor said in class.”
“I have no idea what to write in blogs. But if I pay attention to the lectures, I get more inspiration of what to
blog about.”
Reflective “Writing blogs helps me be aware of how much I learned in class.”
“Before going online, I need to make sure if my understanding of the course contents is correct. I usually
evaluate it by reading the textbook again or reading others’ blogs.”
“Blogging made me think more logically. Because before I blogged, I needed to think it through and make
sure I didn’t write something which I would feel ashamed with.”
Meta-cognitive “I often needed to evaluate and think about my own thoughts before writing blogs. Blogging made me do a
lot of thinking.”
“Each week after class, I wrote blogs, and blogs became a tool for me to understand my learning progress. I
can more regulate my own learning.”
Communicative “Writing blogs creates opportunity for me to exchange ideas with fellows.”
“Conversing” with fellows through blogs stimulates my thoughts and makes me feel a member of a learning
community.”
Connective “Writing blogs reminds me of the theories I learned in class and connects with my learning experience.”
Digital literacy “The blog activity forced me to learn how to use blogs. At first I felt resistant to learning the tool. After using
blogs, I’m glad I got chance exploring the tool. It’s cool.”
Collective “Our personal blogs keep our own work” very well. When I had exams, the blogs collected my review notes
so well that my life got much easier.
Resourceful “There was a lot of useful information on other people’s blogs. Sometimes I can find a lot of goodies there.
For example, web site links to YouTube videos or to podcasts.”

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Table 2. Feelings brought up when participants read other fellows’ blogs.

Feelings Participant Response

Interest “I was impressed with some other fellows’ opinions. They looked at the things in the way I never thought of.”
“Reading others’ blogs is like listening to people singing the same song; you got different interpretation of
the song.”
“When I read different thoughts expressed in blogs, I feel they broadened my views.”
Competition “I’d like to read other people’s blogs and contrast my opinions with theirs.”
“When I read blogs that are written well, I anticipate some day I could reach the level.”
Relaxation “When I read someone has the same opinions with me, I feel good about that.”
“I’d like we shared thoughts with each other. Sharing makes me feel relaxed”.
Lurking “Reading other people’s blogs let me understand them more. I feel I am peeking their privacy.”
Unpleasant feelings “I feel pressured when I read blogs written with good insights and analyses. It makes me feel uncomfort-
able.”
“I’m disgusted with some people who just copied the words from textbook. It wasted my time to read their
blogs.”
“Some blog web sites with messy interface pissed me off!”

The participants disclosed they experienced of the required 21st century skills (NCREL, 2003;
significant emotional response when they read Partnership for 21st Century Skills, 2007).
their own blogs. Details of feelings for reading Reflection in teacher education is not a new
their own blogs are in Table 2. concept, but using blogs to facilitate reflection is
a new area of inquiry that deserves deep explo-
Implications ration. Based on these research findings of blog
integration in a teacher education course, there
The findings demonstrated the pre-service teach- are a few qualitative implications to address.
ers’ attitude towards blogs and the potential educa- First, group blogs and individual blogs func-
tional values of blogs. The evidence showed that tion in different ways and should exist together
pre-service teachers can use blogs to learn course in a learning community. Group blogs provide
content, to foster reflection, to monitor and assess participants with a platform for interaction,
their learning process. These are the basic elements communication, and discussion, and individual

Table 3. Feelings when participants read their own blogs.

Emotions Participant Response

Motivation “When I read my own blogs, I felt impressed with my work. Those blogs were written week by week and ac-
cumulated to such amount. I felt I learned something. I got great sense of achievement!”
“Reading my own blogs helped me monitor my own learning progress and motivated me to write more.”
“I felt proud of myself that I can express myself.”
Self-criticism “Sometimes I felt stupid with my words. I wished I had not written such stupid ideas.”
“Sometimes when I read blogs, I felt I was making progress, because they were thought-provoking. But some-
times my thoughts were empty and full of ignorance.”
Pleasant “I felt great that I can express my emotions freely.”
“It’s pleasant I can recall what happened in class by reading blogs.”
Expectations “I looked forward to people’s responding to my ideas or discussing with me.”
“I’d like to get more feedback from my teacher.”
Critical of the process or “I felt childish with blogs. Blogging is like keeping a diary; a diary is supposed to be private.”
of others “People were so superficial in blogs, showing off ideas or stuff. I’m not going to play the stupid game.”

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blogs provide participants with personal space If necessary, teacher educators can post topics
to keep learning notes, record learning progress, or raise questions, to stimulate pre-service teach-
reflect thoughts and actions, and make personal ers’ thinking. Questions can be used as prompts.
e-portfolios. Through group blogging, pre-service This chapter suggests a framework for reflection
teachers learned that collaborative interaction can and prompts. Prompts vary, depending on the time
create a positive learning experience, and they frame of the learning context. Schon (1987) dis-
took the opportunity to share problems, and to tinguished the time frame of occurrence of reflec-
offer suggestions or support each other. In the pro- tion, as mentioned earlier. Postholm (2008) added
cess of blogging, pre-service teachers addressed another segment, reflection before action, thinking
each other’s concerns, and learned to search for about prior experiences and theories before tak-
solutions collaboratively, different perspectives ing action. Reflection before action, reflection
were shared and ideas sparkled, resulting in more in action, and reflection on action constitute the
positive attitudes toward learning and teaching. complete process of reflection. Regarding what
Through individual blogging, pre-service teachers questions to ask during reflection, Smyth (1989)
learned to reflect and construct their knowledge suggested four questions that can stimulate reflec-
of teaching, become more aware of their thoughts tion: What do I do? What does this mean? How
and action, and make their e-portfolios for future did I come to be this way? How might I do things
career. differently? With the four stimulating questions,
Second, participants need scaffolding for a framework of reflection and questions to guide
reflection. Atkins and Murphy (1993) indicated reflection in learning contexts is recommended in
that the following components are necessary for Figure 4. Notice that asking open-ended questions
reflection: self-awareness, description, critical rather than closed ones is a must.
analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. And Pater- Third, to build a successful blogging com-
son (1995) indicated the following factors affect munity, teacher educators need to participate in
reflection: 1) developmental levels of reflection; the blogs. The participants in this study emphasized
2) perception of trustworthiness of the teacher; 3) that they looked forward to feedback from their
clarity of expectations related to journal writing instructor and peers. To meet the need, teacher
tasks; 4) quantity and quality of teacher feedback. educators should join blog reflection on a regular
Teacher educators need to recognize these fac- basis and leave comments on pre-service teachers’
tors and support pre-service teachers’ progres- blogs. On the other hand, teacher educators can
sion through those different skills of reflection. diversify feedback by assigning pre-service teach-
Starting with personal performance at a practical ers into groups and requiring them to reply to each
level, pre-service teachers learn to justify their other. By doing so, pre-service teachers can acquire
teaching practice, and finally to reflect on values feedback from their peers and a learning com-
and thought-provoking issues (Furlong, 2000). munity is gradually built up. Considering the

Figure 4. Questions to stimulate reflection in the blog context.

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limited time teacher educators can commit to a into consideration to handle ideas or thoughts in
class, it is necessary to make effective use of the blogs (Salmon, 2002).
learning community and re-direct learners’ reli- Finally, the quality of the blogs will influence
ance on the instructor to the learning community. their effect. Some participants complained when
But the instructor must be a part of the commu- they saw fellows not reflecting their thoughts but
nity! To encourage active participation in the blog only copying the words from textbooks, they felt
community, teacher educators need to take re- that reading the blogs was wasting their time. In
sponsibility for moderating online discussions. light of the problem, it is essential that teacher
Salmon developed a five-stage framework educators emphasize and evaluate the quality
for moderating groups and suggestions for con- of blog contents. Blogs provide users with an
sideration (Salmon, 2000). Contextualized in the interactive platform for reflection. Thus, to evalu-
blog environment, the five stages of moderation ate blogs, reflection is a key. There are several
are: 1) Stage of access and motivation: Teacher frameworks for evaluating reflection (Boud, et al.,
educators post welcoming and encouraging blogs 1985; LaBoskey, 1993; Sparks-Langer, Simmons,
to invite pre-service teachers to join the blogging; Pasch, Colton, & Starko, 1991; Valli, 1990). For
and construct the atmosphere in which pre-service example, Boud et al. (1985) categorized critical
teachers feel secure and can talk openly and analysis into four elements: association (con-
honestly about their feelings. 2). Stage of social- necting new data with what is already known),
ization: Teacher educators introduce themselves integration (searching for relationships among
to the class, demonstrate respect for differences data), validation (determining the authenticity of
among class members, and bridge differences of ideas, feelings and emotions that have resulted),
opinion in a non-judgmental manner. 3). Stage and appropriation (making knowledge one’s own).
of information exchange: Teacher educators en- Regarding how to evaluate reflection, Zeichner
courage pre-service teachers to share information and Liston (1987) designed the Reflective Index
and learning materials by, for example, providing to identify student teachers’ reflection in meet-
web site links on blogs. 4). Stage of knowledge ings with their supervisor. The Reflective Index
construction: When blogging, pre-service teachers consists of four categories ranked from lowest
post reflection on course content or post ques- to highest in importance. The four levels can be
tions they have. Teacher educators participate in used to measure the reflection that occurs in a
online discussions with pre-service teachers and blog context. Details are explained with examples
facilitate the process of knowledge construction. as follows.
For teacher educators, the priority is to maintain a
flexible environment for knowledge construction. 1. Factual level: When blogging, pre-service
5). Development: It is at this stage that teacher teachers recall some students’ behavior that
educators respond to questions and monitor the occurred in classrooms; the reflection is at
discussion process. As pre-service teachers reflect the factual level.
on their experiences in schools and their learning, 2. Prudential level: When blogging, pre-
it is necessary to interrogate, test, and challenge service teachers evaluate the effectiveness
pre-service teachers’ experiences to avoid uncon- of conducting objective assessments or e-
scious assumptions, because assumptions may portfolios; the reflection is at the prudential
reduce creativity in trying to understand or resolve level.
a problem. Incidentally, teacher educators should 3. Justificatory level: When blogging, pre-
always take pre-service teachers’ learning styles service teachers focus on the reasons why
collaborative learning activities occurred, or

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why some individual learning activities are develop higher-level skills, such as decision mak-
suitable; the reflection is at the justificatory ing and problem solving in classrooms.
level. During the last decade, while new Internet
4. Critical level: When blogging, pre-service technologies have been continuously emerging,
teachers explore teacher educators’ percep- the popular blog technology has made a significant
tion that underlies the reasons why teacher impact on the dissemination of information and
educators integrate blogs in the learning knowledge. Blogs are “transforming publishing
process; the reflection is at the critical level. and traditional media into more personal and
interactive experiences” in which users become
CONCLUSION active participants, not just passive consumers
(Kennedy, 2004, p, 249). Recognizing the potential
This chapter suggested the implementation how-to and popularity of blogs in education, teacher edu-
and rubrics for assessing reflection in an online cators in teacher education programs must update
blogging environment. To successfully implement their traditional educational practice and connect
blogs in teacher education, the administrative theory with practice to help would-be teachers gain
authorities in teacher education programs may sufficient competence and confidence to thrive in
have to require that teacher educators implement the 21st century classrooms.
blogs throughout the period of teacher preparation
and provide professional development for teacher
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This work was previously published in Adult Learning in the Digital Age: Perspectives on Online Technologies and Outcomes,
edited by Terry T. Kidd and Jared Keengwe, pp. 134-147, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of
IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.8
iPods as Mobile Multimedia
Learning Environments:
Individual Differences and
Instructional Design

Peter E. Doolittle
Virginia Tech, USA

Danielle L. Lusk
Virginia Tech, USA

C. Noel Byrd
Virginia Tech, USA

Gina J. Mariano
Virginia Tech, USA

ABSTRACT use as a mobile multimedia learning environment.

This exploration into applied and basic research
In recent years, educators across the globe have involving the iPod reveals that iPods are being
begun to employ portable, digital media players, used across a variety of content areas, educational
especially iPods, as educational platforms. Unfor- levels and geographic locations, involving a vari-
tunately, while the iPod grows in favor as a mobile ety of pedagogies. However, very little research
multimedia learning environment, relatively little has been conducted to establish the efficacy of the
is empirically known about its educational impact. iPod for fostering learning. To address this need,
This chapter explores the use of the iPod as an the authors conducted a study that examined the
educational platform and reports on a study de- effects of working memory capacity (WMC) on
signed to examine individual differences in iPod learning within an iPod-based mobile multimedia
learning environment.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch308

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
iPods as Mobile Multimedia Learning Environments

INTRODUCTION iPOD RESEARCH

Mobile learning, or m-learning, is typically Over the past several years, research address-
defined as learning with mobile technologies ing the use of the iPod as a mobile multimedia
(see Laouris & Eteokleous, 2005). This type of learning environment has included both applied
definition generally emphasizes the ability to research, which is designed to solve problems,
move beyond place-bound teaching and learning produce products, or fulfill a specific need; and,
environments (Goh & Kinshuk, 2006; Seppala basic research, which is designed to expand the
& Alamaki, 2003) based on the application of current knowledge base regarding learning in iPod-
wireless educational technologies (e.g., mobile based mobile multimedia learning environments.
phones, personal digital assistants, laptop comput- There is, however, a disparity between the depth
ers, portable digital media players). Educational of applied and basic research, with there being
research into the efficacy of mobile learning and much more applied research than basic research.
mobile technologies tends to focus on “their use
embedded in classroom practice, or as part of Applied Research: iPods
a learning experience outside the classroom” in the Classroom
(Naismith, Lonsdale, Vavoula, & Sharples, 2006,
p. 11). One arena in which this is especially the Mobile multimedia learning environments can
case is the use of portable digital media players take on many forms as technological advance-
(e.g., iPods, Zunes, MP3 players). In recent years, ments abound and are being used to supplement
educators across the globe have begun to employ and even replace some forms of formal classroom
portable digital media players, especially iPods, education. The use of iPods and podcasts for
as educational platforms (see Belanger, 2005; educational purposes is a growing trend in the
Cebeci & Tekdal, 2006; Trelease, 2006). realm of education from primary school through
The use of the iPod for educational purposes college. Even the military has incorporated these
has included lecture capture at Duke University educational tools for learning.
(USA), podcasting at Auckland University of The Navy College Program for Afloat College
Technology (New Zealand), foreign language in- Education (NCPACE) teamed with Dallas Tele-
struction at Astley Community High School (U.K), College to institute educational programs using
math instruction at Apollo Parkways Primary the iPod for deployed sailors, thereby reducing
School (Australia), and an entire degree at Sligo the number of computers needed on board ships
Institute of Technology (Ireland), to name only a while still allowing the sailors the opportunity to
few. Unfortunately, while the iPod grows in favor learn (Jay, 2007). In addition, the National Defense
as a mobile multimedia learning environment, University’s Information Resources Management
relatively little is known about its educational (IRM) College not only uses video iPods to de-
impact. How well do students learn from podcasts? liver education but also to allow students to create
How are students using iPods to view or re-view assignments for their courses, such as recording
lectures? Does listening to native speakers on the interviews with officers.
iPod affect learners’ foreign language listening, New Mexico State University (NMSU) offers
writing, or speaking skills? This chapter explores educational programs to the airmen on Holloman
the use of the iPod as an educational platform and Air Force Base so that they can continue to pursue
reports on a study designed to examine individual their education while on deployment (Venegas,
differences in iPod use as a mobile multimedia 2007). Their iPod program begins with “sociology
learning environment. in a sack” in which the iPod is loaded with sociol-

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ogy lectures and includes support materials such as to students via Apple’s iTunes store (Man, 2007).
a syllabus, sample quizzes, and instructions for the This innovative SAT preparatory program allows
program. Upon the end of their offsite operation, students to purchase materials for viewing and
the airmen return the iPods to the school and take practice with timed and untimed tests and the
their exams for course completion. Considering student can even vary the level of difficulty of
distance education courses often utilize the Inter- the programs they choose. Kristen Campbell, the
net for most of their materials and lectures, this national director of SAT and ACT programs for
program can meet the needs of those airmen who Kaplan Test Prep, thinks that students will em-
are deployed in places where Internet connections brace these types of programs because they allow
are scarce and therefore limit the opportunities to students to study in a medium in which they are
continue their education. familiar and comfortable. Currently, Kaplan is
In addition to military use, Apple has reported the only test-prep company offering these types
that there are a plethora of elementary schools, of study programs via the iPod iTunes store.
secondary schools, and universities that have re- The University of Minnesota’s School of Public
ported success with the use of their iPod devices Health (SPH) features podcasts for many different
for educational delivery and production. For ex- uses for students and the general public (University
ample, Bob Sprankle, a teacher at Wells Elemen- of Minnesota School of Public Health, 2007b).
tary School in Maine, has been using iPods and They feature weekly health segments (Public
podcasts with his third and fourth-grade students Health Moment) and public lectures sponsored
to teach research, writing, and presentation skills by SPH (Public Lectures). Their “Public Health
as well as the embedded technology expertise that Matters” section contains student and faculty-
inevitably accompanies projects such as these created podcasts that cover a wide variety of topics
(Apple Education, 2007a). related to current research within the department
Vanderbilt University (2007) has partnered and other public health issues (University of Min-
with Sheridan School District in rural Arkansas nesota School of Public Health, 2007a).
to transform students’ use of a lengthy bus ride The University of Utah (UU) uses podcasts for
into educational time. This project, the Aspirnaut a wide variety of information-sharing endeavors.
Initiative, was formed as a way to elevate the They present podcasts of lectures, interviews,
mathematics and science achievement of the rural speeches, performances, and have developed
community base and one aspect of this project several series of lectures for download (University
includes the use of iPod podcasts for the students of Utah, 2007). UU features five major categories
(Clark, 2007; Vanderbilt University, 2007). This for podcast feeds including humanities, politics
three-year project includes iPods programmed and society, health and wellness, science and
with lessons that focus on science and math and technology, and arts and culture. They also have
as a bonus the students get to keep the iPods if several other podcast program offerings to include
they complete the full study. The school district’s the Genetic Science Learning Center, Hinckley
superintendent states that beyond the focus of the Institute of Politics, Humanities Happy Hour, and
current project, the students may actually receive Sci-Fi Fridays.
course credit for the time they spend learning The University of Wisconsin-Madison began
while commuting to and from school (Paul, 2007). their podcasting integration with iPods in 2005
High school students preparing for college to assist students with language acquisition in a
admissions are also a targeted audience for iPod German language class (Apple Education, 2007b).
use. Kaplan, a college-preparation company, re- Their goals included incorporating class content
cently began to offer customizable iPod programs (language instruction) into the daily lives of their

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students outside of the traditional classroom of 2004, more than 1,600 entering first-year stu-
models and making homework more fun for the dents were given iPods (Duke University, 2005).
student. Instructors report that their project actually Approximately 48 courses implemented iPod
helps students learn the German language more content during the first year of the program. These
easily and increases student motivation because courses included music, foreign languages social
they format some of their podcasts in a fun radio science, and humanities (Duke University, 2005).
show style with fictional callers; thus decreasing Additionally, first-year engineering students used
straight lecture format and time for the students. their iPods in the engineering programs’ required
iPod initiatives at Georgia College and State computational methods course.
University (GCSU) began in 2002 and have As part of the program evaluation conducted
evolved into more than lectures and music to by Duke’s Center for Instructional Technology,
enhance the classroom education of its students data were gathered via several methods: student
(Georgia College and State University, 2006). By and faculty focus groups; a survey of first-year
the 2006-2007 academic year, there were nearly students and faculty; course feedback; and con-
50 iPod-based projects designed to reduce in-class versations with staff, administrators, and campus
lecture time and increase time for students and stakeholder groups. As part of the evaluation,
faculty members to collaborate on experiences and the Center for Instructional Technology wanted
discuss the most important course content areas. to discover how iPods were instructionally used.
These innovative iPod projects have spawned other They found five categories of academic use for
technological advancements for the university the iPod: disseminating course content, record-
as well, such as their iColony project, a virtual ing classroom activities, recording field notes,
learning community for students with similar supporting study of the content, and storing
interests; and iDreamers, a group of faculty and and transferring files (Duke University, 2005).
staff members interested in further developing The evaluation also revealed several benefits in
plans for iPod usage in the future. utilizing the iPods. The overall benefits reported
The University of Virginia’s (UVA) Web after the first year of the program included the
site boasts an enormous amount of iPod-based convenience of portability, easy digital recording,
information available for their students as well flexible location, increased student interest and
as the general public. They list 20 categories of engagement, and enhanced support for individual
information to choose from ranging from aca- learning differences.
demic lectures to science and research (University Despite the benefits of using the iPod in the
of Virginia, 2007). The available podcasts also classroom, Duke students and faculty reported
include recurring series, such as Engaging the several problems (Duke University, 2005). One
Mind, Technology in World History, and others. problem concerned the challenges of integrating
In addition, each school at UVA is represented multiple systems for storing, accessing, sharing,
with links for individual podcasts related to top- and distributing content. Another issue was the
ics of interest for that particular area of expertise limited pre-existing documentation and training
and interest. resources regarding academic uses. Furthermore,
While many higher education institutions are integrating the iPods with Duke’s existing tech-
employing iPod technology, there are few who nology infrastructure was difficult. PC users were
are formally evaluating their iPod and/or podcast- also affected by the limited documentation and
ing programs. Duke University was one of the training. The inadequacy of documentation and
first higher education institutions in the United training may have contributed to another problem:
States to implement an iPod program. In August a lack of awareness and accurate knowledge among

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students and faculty regarding how iPods func- timedia course content in a cost-effective and
tion and their academic applications. A final set timely manner. Additionally, cost was alluded to
of difficulties with the iPods was bulk purchasing in other challenges. Ongoing planning, training,
and licensing issues. and support is an expensive challenge due to how
At the institutional level, Duke University rapidly technology changes. Furthermore, the
reported several benefits from incorporating iPods university lacked the classroom capabilities to
into the classroom. The evaluators found four ma- meet the demand for video recording of classroom
jor institutional impacts (Duke University, 2005). presentations. Upgrading classroom infrastructure
The first was increased collaboration and com- to meet this demand would be an expensive en-
munication between campus technology groups, deavor, although as part of the 2007-2008 Initiative
which resulted in wider planning and improvement infrastructure development is planned.
of Duke’s infrastructure and technology services. Cost was not the only challenge. The evaluators
The second impact was the widespread attention again found that faculty and students need more
resulting from the program. Duke gained new con- training on how to use the iPod and to transition
tacts, partnerships, and collaborations with other classroom pedagogy into the multimedia environ-
institutions of higher education, publishers, and ment (Duke University, 2006). Improvements
technology vendors. Third, the program sparked slated for the 2007-2008 year include more de-
conversations between faculty, administrators, velopment and utilization of support services and
students, and staff about how to best implement teaching strategies in addition to further research
technology in the classroom. Consequently, the of technology in learning and instruction.
2005-2006 Duke Digital Initiative was created Besides Duke University, many other Ameri-
with continued iPod use and further incorporation can colleges and universities have implemented
of other technologies. Finally, the iPod program iPod programs and podcasting as a means to ad-
increased overall awareness of Duke’s commit- vance instruction. The University of Michigan’s
ment to technology. School of Dentistry started a podcasting program
However, there were some problems with in response to first-year dental students’ anxiety
the evaluation, especially regarding the survey regarding the quantity of information presented
response rate. Only 28 percent of first-year stu- in their courses (Brittain, Glowacki, Van Ittersum,
dents involved in the program responded to the & Johnson, 2006). Originally, the students asked
survey, while only 13 percent of first-year student for video recordings, so the School of Dentistry
faculty responded (Duke University, 2005). The asked an advisory group to study the situation
low numbers suggest that perhaps not all benefits and recommend solutions. In the first pilot study,
or problems were accounted for. The program the focus was on what type of media format was
also began with no formal objectives, a limitation best for lecture review. The results revealed that
remedied in the 2005-2006 Duke Digital Initiative. students preferred an audio-only format over video
Finally, cost was not addressed in the evaluation. or audio-synced PowerPoint. The preference was
While the implementation program cost $500,000, due largely to the mobility of the audio files.
there were no data included regarding how much Two more pilot studies were conducted to fully
money the university would have to spend to examine the issue (Brittain et al., 2006). The sec-
continue such a program. ond pilot study focused on the costs involved with
Cost was addressed, however, in the 2005- recording lectures. Recording via the computer,
2006 program evaluation report (Duke University, although more expensive than recording with the
2006). One of the main challenges mentioned in iPod, was deemed more suitable by students and
the report was the difficulty of acquiring mul- faculty due to its superiority in audio recording

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quality. The School of Dentistry decided to use a the podcasts, especially with regard to teamwork,
computer and automated recording, processing, communication, and critiquing others.
and posting tools to reduce staff time, thus decreas- A study at another international institution
ing the overall costs involved with the project. looked at an undergraduate course in commu-
Finally, the third pilot study looked at the nication (Edirisingha, Rizzi, Nie, & Rothwell,
dissemination of recordings, in particular the file 2007). At Kingston University in London, students
format students preferred most (Brittain et al., enrolled in the Introduction to Intercultural Com-
2006). MP3 and AAC files were both found to be munication course served as participants. Students
equally well-liked, so the school decided to post were surveyed and interviewed as part of the
both file types to a centrally located Web site for study. The survey revealed that 50 percent of the
downloads. Due to convenient access, students’ students had not listened to any of the podcasts
usage of the recordings rose from 28 percent to available to them via the virtual learning envi-
57 percent . ronment (VLE). The main reason given for not
In addition to the many American higher listening to the podcasts was a lack of time. Other
education institutions using iPods and podcast- reasons included; they did not know the podcasts
ing, international institutions are also bringing were available, they had technical difficulties ac-
iPod technology into their classrooms. One such cessing the materials, and they did not view the
institution is Charles Stuart University in Australia. podcasts as relevant for learning. Additionally, of
Researchers investigated and evaluated the use of those who did listen to the podcasts, many did not
podcasting in an undergraduate and postgraduate download the podcasts because they could access
class by studying the listeners, producers, and the material any time they wanted. Furthermore,
educators involved in podcasting the course (Chan, 31 percent noted that they preferred their MP3
Lee, & McLoughlin, 2006). Some of the students player to be dedicated to music listening only,
were part of the production team, which created indicating they did not want the podcasts residing
podcasts targeted towards other students in the on their portable players.
class, who served as the listeners. Students were also surveyed regarding their
To evaluate the “listening” students, an online activities while listening to podcasts (Edirisingha
survey was employed to gather data concerning et al., 2007). The majority of respondents (47%)
students’ podcast use, the educational value of reported they only listened and did not participate
the podcasts, and the knowledge and skills gained in other activities, while 33 percent noted that they
through listening to the podcasts (Chan et al., took notes while listening. Only seven percent re-
2006). The researchers had a 42 percent response ported doing other activities while listening to the
rate to their survey. The majority of students used podcasts. These findings suggest that the students,
the available podcasts frequently, felt they were for the most part, engaged with the podcasts.
useful, and helped with assignments. In addition to the previous findings, the re-
To evaluate the “producers,” the researchers searchers asked students about the key learning
used a focus group interview (Chan et al., 2006). objectives related to the podcasts (Edirisingha et
The focus group questioned participants about al., 2007). Students rated the following statements
motivation, benefits related to involvement, skills favorably: (a) Podcasts were useful for me to know
developed, lessons learned, and suggestions for more about the assessed work, (b) Podcasts were
improvement. After coding the transcripts, the useful in preparation for workshops/seminars,
researchers found that the main area the produc- and (c) Podcasts provided a good supplement
ing students elaborated on was the skills they to the other learning material for this module.
developed from participating in the production of Other statements regarding motivational aspects

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were rated highly as well. The students, however, media led to an increase in driver distraction and
did not believe that the podcasts were helpful in a decrease in driver performance.
organizing weekly activities or made good use of O’Hara, Mitchell, and Vorbau (2007) also
their time. A study by Edirisingha, Salmon, and found distraction during mobile technology use in
Fothergill (2007), looking at learners’ attitudes, a study addressing individuals’ daily use of mobile
found similar results. technologies, including iPods. O’Hara et al. (2007)
Although students may remark that the pod- studied the behaviors of established users of mobile
casts are useful and aid their learning, there is technologies and found that the technology was
little empirical evidence to support these claims. being consumed in a variety of places and times
While many institutions are now using podcasts such as at home, work, cafes, gyms, and airport
and iPod technology, more information about lounges, as well as while driving to work, eating
how humans learn from mobile technology is lunch, and going to bed. Reasons for using these
needed before such programs are implemented mobile technologies included avoiding others,
in the curriculum. blocking out the surrounding environment, sharing
videos, using time more effectively, and managing
Basic Research: iPods solitude. During the study, O’Hara et al. also found
as Mobile Multimedia that the use of mobile technologies could lead to
Instructional Environments divided attention; that is, users often needed to
divide their attention between watching a video
Part of the allure of iPod-based mobile technology using the mobile technology and monitoring oth-
is the mobility (being able to use the technology ers around them or being aware of events such as
in multiple and mobile environments). Unfortu- the arrival of a desired bus (2007).
nately, while there is substantial applied research While Salvucci et al. (2007) and O’Hara et al.
involving the use of iPods in education, there is (2007) found that iPod-based mobile technology
very little basic research examining how students is used in a variety of locations, for a variety of
learn from iPods. Due to the paucity of education- reasons, and that iPod use may be distracting,
ally related basic empirical literature on the use Hürst, Lauer, and Nold (2007) focused on screen
of the iPod, the following studies are taken from size or the presentation modality effect on learn-
a wide array of disciplines. ing. Hürst et al. (2007) had participants view an
Salvucci, Markley, Zuber, and Brumby (2007) animation on algorithm application using either an
examined participants’ ability to drive under the iPod, with a 2.5” screen, or a laptop computer. In
distraction of iPod usage. Participants were asked addition Hurst el al. (2007) had participants view
to search for and play music, podcasts, and videos either an animation with on-screen text explana-
while using a driving simulator. Salvucci et al. tions or animation with audio narration. Hürst et
(2007) found that searching for and the selection of al. (2007) deduced that there was no difference in
all three media types had a significant detrimental student learning based on screen size (i.e., iPod
effect on driver performance, measured by lateral versus laptop), but that students who viewed
deviation (drivers ability to maintain a central the animation with audio narration presentation
lane position) and speed change (drivers ability to learned more than students who viewed the ani-
maintain a constant speed). Overall, Salvucci et al. mation with on-screen text presentation. Hurst et
(2007) discovered that simply listening to songs al.’s (2007) findings that learning was improved
or podcasts had no significant effect on driving through the use of animation with audio narration,
performance, but that searching for and selecting as compared to animation with on-screen text, is
in agreement with previous research (Ginns, 2005;

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Mayer & Moreno, 1998). Also, when asked which non-essential sounds, music, or videos (Moreno
of the devices participants preferred for learning, & Mayer, 2000); learning suffers. In addition,
half expressed no preference and the other half Mautone and Mayer (2001) have indicated that
preferred the device they had used to engage the when attention is guided toward instructional
material with audio narration presentation. Ulti- content, learning improves.
mately, Hürst et al. (2007) concluded, “maybe the Given the iPods’ mobility and its 2.5” screen,
most important observation from our experiment is it is reasonable to question whether attention plays
that people actually were able to learn something a special and important role in learning complex
by using mobile devices” (p. 164). mental tasks in an iPod-based multimedia learning
The findings of Hürst et al. (2007) have dem- environment. In general, learning complex mental
onstrated that iPods may be used effectively to tasks has been sensitive to individual differences
foster learning and the findings of Salvucci et al. in attention; specifically, in individual differences
(2007) and O’Hara et al. (2007) lead credence in the ability to control attention (Daneman &
to the question of whether or not attention, or Carpenter, 1980; Oberauer, Süb, Schulze et al.,
distractibility, is a variable of interest in the use 2007; Wilhelm, & Wittmann, 2000). The ability
of iPods in education. With the issues of learning to control attention is a central component of
and attention in iPod-based mobile multimedia working memory capacity (WMC; Kane, Bleckley,
instruction environments in mind, a study was Conway, & Engle, 2001; Kane & Engle, 2003),
conducted. where WMC is defined as the ability to (a) maintain
the current cognitive task in working memory, (b)
maintain task relevant information in working
iPODS AND INDIVIDUAL memory, and (c) retrieve task relevant informa-
DIFFERENCES: A STUDY tion from long-term memory (Feldman Barrett,
OF WORKING MEMORY Tugade, & Engle, 2004). A study was completed
to assess the importance of attentional control,
iPods are currently being used in many primary and low WMC versus high WMC, in stationary and
secondary schools, as well as colleges and univer- mobile multimedia learning environments using
sities, as an educational platform. As the previous the iPod.
discussion of basic research into iPod use demon-
strates, however, little is known regarding how the Working Memory Capacity
iPod-based educational environment interacts with
the learner. One aspect of the learner that may bear Working memory capacity (WMC) represents
on the use of the iPod as an educational platform the ability of an individual to control his or her
is the learner’s attention. Attention has previously attentional resources relative to working memory,
been demonstrated to be an essential component especially in the presence of distraction (Feldman
of learning in desktop multimedia instructional Barrett et al., 2004; Unsworth & Engle, 2007).
environments (Mayer, 2005b; Mayer & Moreno, That is, WMC moves beyond working memory
1998; Moreno & Mayer, 2000). This previous storage capacity (see Miller, 1956) to include both
research has demonstrated that when attention storage and processing capacity (see Daneman
is split between two sets of stimuli, such as an & Carpenter, 1980; Kane & Engle, 2003). Thus,
animation with on-screen narrative text (Mayer & ultimately, WMC is a measure of control: the abil-
Moreno, 1998); or when attention is diverted from ity to control the maintenance of information in
instructional content to non-instructional content, working memory (storage) and the retrieval from
such as when an animation is accompanied by long-term memory of information relevant to a

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current problem or situation (processing). This were taken from a larger population of 294 stu-
control is most evident when there are distrac- dents who were administered the OSPAN working
tions, internal (e.g., thoughts, drives, feelings) or memory span test. The OSPAN test measures
external (e.g., talking, music, motion), challenging working memory capacity and requires students
the attentional system (Unsworth & Engle, 2007). to solve math sentences aloud (e.g., is (2 + 6) – 2
Is this type of attentional control important? = 4?) while also maintaining a list of unrelated
Previous research has indicated that individuals words in working memory (La Point & Engle,
with high WMC outperform individuals with low 1990; Turner & Engle, 1989). Using the OSPAN
WMC on measures of general fluid intelligence test scores, the upper and lower quartiles of the
(Conway, Cowan, Bunting et al., 2002; Kane et original 294 students were designated as high (n
al., 2004), long-term memory activation (Cantor = 38) and low (n = 38) WMC, respectively. These
& Engle, 1993), attentional control (Kane et al., 76 students were then randomly assigned to either
2001; Rosen & Engle, 1997), resistance to proac- the stationary instruction group (n = 38) or the
tive interference (Kane & Engle, 2000; Lustig, mobile instruction group (n = 38).
May, & Hasher, 2001), primary memory mainte- All students, regardless of WMC (high or
nance and secondary memory search (Unsworth low) or instructional group (stationary or mobile)
& Engle, 2007), and resistance to goal neglect engaged in a multimedia tutorial designed to ad-
(Kane & Engle, 2003; Roberts, Hager, & Heron, dress the workings of a car brake. The multimedia
1994). While these studies have indicated a posi- tutorial consisted of a narrated Flash® animation
tive effect for WMC on memory attributes, there is explaining how a car brake works (see Mayer &
also extensive literature indicating that high WMC Anderson, 1992). This explanation included draw-
positively affects more academic pursuits, such as ings of a foot pressing a brake pedal, a piston mov-
reading comprehension (Daneman & Carpenter, ing inside a master cylinder, brake fluid moving
1980), language comprehension (Just & Carpenter, out of the master cylinder, brake fluid expanding
1992), vocabulary learning (Daneman & Green, smaller pistons in the wheel cylinder, and these
1986), reasoning (Conway et al., 2002; Kyllonen smaller pistons pushing the brake shoes against
& Christal, 1990; cf. Buehner, Krumm, & Pick, the brake drum (see Figure 1). The animation from
2005), computer language learning (Shute, 1991), the foot stepping on the brake pedal to the brake
lecture note taking (Kiewra & Benton, 1988), shoes pressing against the brake drum lasted 30
Scholastic Aptitude Test performance (Turner & seconds; however, this 30 second animation was
Engle, 1989), mnemonic strategy effectiveness played three times in order to accommodate the
(Gaultney, Kipp, & Kirk, 2005), and story tell- narration. Thus, each multimedia instructional
ing (Pratt, Boyes, Robins, & Manchester, 1989). episode lasted 90 seconds. Finally, this car brake
This research has demonstrated a strong, positive multimedia tutorial was presented on a 5th genera-
relationship between variations in WMC and tion iPod (i.e., video iPod) with a 2.5” screen and
variations in complex cognitive task performance. Altec Lansing® headphones.
Students in the stationary instruction group
A Study of iPods and viewed the multimedia tutorial on an iPod while
Individual Differences sitting in a chair at a desk in a computer lab.
Students in the mobile instructional group were
To investigate the effects of high and low WMC first provided with a random number from 1 to 3
students’ learning in stationary and mobile iPod- and then asked to walk 25 yards down a hallway,
based multimedia learning environments, 76 and back, repeatedly, until the multimedia tuto-
undergraduate students (52 males and 24 females) rial came to an end. Every five yards along this

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Figure 1. Sample animation screens and accompanying verbal content from the brake tutorial (anima-
tions adapted from and text quoted from Mayer & Anderson, 1992, p. 446)

walk was a two-sided sign on the floor that in- instructional group, they were seated and asked
cluded the numbers 1, 2 and 3, and above each to answer both recall questions assessing students’
number an arrow pointing left or right (see Figure ability to remember the essential knowledge to
2). Participants were instructed to walk to the side which they were exposed and their ability to
of the sign indicated by the arrow above the
number to which they were assigned. This walk-
Figure 2. Directional signs used in the mobile
ing and navigating, while engaging in the multi-
learning environment
media tutorial, simulated the type of mobile en-
vironment one might encounter while trying to
walk across a college campus.
After students finished engaging in the multi-
media tutorial, whether in the stationary or mobile

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express this knowledge, and transfer questions and brake drum; and finally, acceptable answers
assessing students’ ability to apply the knowledge to the fourth transfer question, “Suppose you press
recalled to new, yet similar situations (i.e., near on the brake pedal in your car but the brakes do
transfer). Students’ recall of the car brake tuto- not work. What could have gone wrong?” included
rial was assessed using a single open-ended ques- that there may be a leak in the brake fluid line or
tion: “Please provide an explanation of how a car that the brake pads are worn.
brake works.” Two trained raters evaluated each
student’s recall response (r = .90) and provided Results and Discussion
one point for the inclusion of each of the follow-
ing idea units, regardless of wording: “(a) driver The results of the study addressed high and low
steps on brake pedal, (b) piston moves forward WMC students’ cognitive performance in station-
inside master cylinder, (c) piston forces brake ary and mobile multimedia learning environments.
fluid out to the wheel cylinders, (d) fluid pressure Overall, there was a significant difference in
increase in wheel cylinders, (e) small pistons cognitive performance between participants who
move, (f) small pistons activate brake shoes, (g) learned in a stationary learning environment as
brake shoes press against drum, and (h) drum and compared to participants who learned in a mobile
wheel stop or slow down” (Mayer & Anderson, learning environment. Specifically, participants
1992, p. 450). in the stationary learning environment recalled
Students’ ability to transfer knowledge from more idea units (M = 5.74, SD = 1.75) from the
the car brake tutorial was assessed using four car brake multimedia tutorial than participants in
questions (see Mayer & Anderson, 1992, p. 449): the mobile learning environment (M = 4.92, SD
(a) “Why do brakes get hot?”; (b) “What could = 2.96), F(1,72) = 4.72, MSE = 25.94, Cohen’s
be done to make brakes more reliable, that is, to d = 0.33, p = .03. In addition, participants in the
make sure they would not fail?”; (c) “What could stationary learning environment transferred more
be done to make brakes more effective, that is, car brake knowledge (M = 5.58, SD = 0.59) than
to reduce the distance needed to bring a car to a participants in the mobile learning environment
stop?”; and (d) “Suppose you press on the brake (M = 4.97, SD = 1.21), F(1,72) = 19.02, MSE =
pedal in your car but the brakes do not work. 12.36, Cohen’s d = 0.69, p = .00. These results
What could have gone wrong?” Two trained raters indicated that participants recalled and transferred
evaluated each student’s responses (r = .83) based more information when learning in a stationary
on acceptable answers established by Mayer and versus a mobile learning environment. Specifi-
Anderson (1992). Acceptable answers to the first cally, it was found that students who learned about
transfer question, “Why do brakes get hot?” in- car brakes using a portable digital media player
cluded friction causes brakes to get hot; acceptable (i.e., iPod), while navigating a walking course that
answers to the second transfer question, “What required attention to the path taken, performed
could be done to make brakes more reliable, that significantly more poorly on measures of recall
is, to make sure they would not fail?” included and transfer than students who learned while
maintain a back up system or use a system to cool simply sitting at a desk.
the brakes; acceptable answers to the third transfer In addition to the stationary/mobile learning
question, “What could be done to make brakes results, an analysis of the WMC data indicated
more effective, that is, to reduce the distance that high WMC students recalled more idea units
needed to bring a car to a stop?” included using (M = 5.92, SD = 2.67) that low WMC students
a brake shoe that is more sensitive to friction or (M = 4.74, SD = 2.07), F(1,72) = 7.27, MSE =
providing a smaller gap between the brake shoe 39.94, Cohen’s d = 0.49, p = .00. Similarly, for

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iPods as Mobile Multimedia Learning Environments

transfer, high WMC students generated more valid that if deep learning, as measured by transfer, is
transfer responses (M = 5.61, SD = 0.67) than low the goal of instruction, mobile multimedia learning
WMC students (M = 4.95, SD = 1.16), F(1,72) environments significantly disadvantage students
= 29.96, MSE = 13.63, Cohen’s d = .69, p = .00. with low WMC. Namely, students with the least
These results are consistent with previous find- attentional control and the most susceptibility to
ings regarding a general WMC effect (Doolittle, distraction (low WMC students) performed the
2007; Unsworth & Engle, 2007), that high WMC poorest under conditions that required significant
students outperform low WMC students on recall attentional control: learning while mobile.
and transfer after engaging in a multimedia tutorial.
The preceding results demonstrate that stu-
dents learn more from a short cause-and-effect iPODS AS MOBILE MULTIMEDIA
multimedia tutorial when stationary, as opposed LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS
to when mobile, and that high WMC students
learn more than low WMC students. However, a The preceding discussion and research has indi-
significant question yet to be answered is whether cated that (a) iPods are currently being used as
or not there are individual differences in station- educational platforms; (b) podcasting is the typi-
ary/mobile learning when WMC is taken into cal, although not the only, pedagogy of choice;
account. The answer is mixed. Specifically, there and (c) students can and do learn from engaging
was no interaction between instructional group with the iPod. However, previous research also
(stationary, mobile) and WMC (high, low) for indicates that (d) little basic empirical research is
recall of the car brake tutorial. There was, how- being conducted on the efficacy of the iPod as a
ever, a significant interaction for transfer (see learning platform; but (e) recent empirical research
Table 1), F(1,72) = 11.98, MSE = 7.79, p = .00. has demonstrated that students with low working
An examination of the means indicates that mobile memory capacity perform less well in mobile
learning environments are less advantageous to learning environments than students with high
low WMC students than high WMC students. working memory capacity. These findings begin
This examination was confirmed using a contrast to bring into focus the landscape of iPod-based
analysis comparing the mobile-low WMC group instruction, although a crisp and clear picture is
to the remaining three groups (i.e., mobile-high still distant.
WMC, stationary-low WMC, stationary-high At the most basic level, it is important to note
WMC), F(1,72) = 27.53, MSE = 0.65, Cohen’s d that Hürst et al. (2007) and the study reported
= 1.33, p = .00. These interaction results indicate within this chapter both found that students learn

Table 1. Means and standard deviations of recall and transfer from engaging in a car brake multimedia
tutorial for instructional groups (stationary, mobile) and WMC groups (low, high)

Instructional Environment
Stationary Mobile
Recall Transfer Recall Transfer
M SD M SD M SD M SD
Low WMC 5.33 1.68 5.50 0.51 3.71 2.33 4.00 1.35
High WMC 6.43 1.69 5.71 .072 5.63 3.10 5.54 0.65
Note: Maximum score for recall was 8. Maximum score for application was 7.

631
 iPods as Mobile Multimedia Learning Environments

as the result of engaging in an iPod-based instruc- there is a need to focus on the development of
tional episode. In the case of Hürst et al., students educationally appropriate technology, individually
learned strategic knowledge, a search algorithm, appropriate pedagogy, and the interaction between
while students in the current study learned proce- the technology and the individual.
dural knowledge, how a car brake works. These
foundational findings provide support for the use
of the iPod as an instructional platform. FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
The research of Salvucci et al. (2007) and the
current study, however, also demonstrate that Research and explorations involving mobile mul-
the iPod must be used with caution and that all timedia learning environments utilizing portable
students may not benefit equally from the instruc- digital media players is just beginning. While
tional use of the iPod. Salvucci et al. found that, the initial findings are promising, much is still
generally, using the iPod can require significant unknown. What specific types of pedagogies work
attentional resources in conditions of distraction, best with specific types of mobile technologies
for example, using the iPod while driving. Fur- based on specific areas of instructional content?
ther, the present study revealed that students with What individual difference variables (e.g., spatial
considerable attentional resources—high working ability, reading ability, prior knowledge, working
memory capacity—were unaffected by distrac- memory capacity) affect students’ success when
tions when using the iPod; however, students learning in mobile multimedia learning environ-
with fewer attentional resources—low working ments? How can mobile multimedia learning
memory capacity—were negatively affected by environments be made more accessible to students
distractions while using the iPod. These findings with special needs? How can, or should, the use
demonstrate that students’ attentional control has of mobile multimedia learning environments be
a significant impact on the efficacy of the iPod as integrated into the daily educational environments
an instructional platform. of students?
As mobile learning opportunities have become Currently, educators are forced to create mobile
ubiquitous with the advent of portable, lightweight multimedia learning environments within mobile
devices (e.g., mp3 players, mobile phones, PDAs) devices that were not originally designed to foster
it is imperative that educators, instructional de- learning; cell phones, MP3 players, and PDAs
signers and instructional technologists maintain were designed more as communication tools than
a 360o view of the educational playing field. At educational tools. Given that these communication
this nexus of pedagogy, design and technology tools are being adapted for educational purposes,
“there is a tension… that comes from the fact it is essential that educators share their adapta-
that most mobile devices in current use are not tions so that others may benefit from and expand
designed specifically for education or training these initial efforts. In addition, however, these
but rather for personal information management case studies of adaptation must include rigorous
or personal communication” (Kukulska-Hume & evaluation and assessment so that there is evidence
Taxler, 2005, p. 3). Kukulska-Hume and Taxler from which to make educated decisions. Without
goes on to state that “future projects ought to rigorous evaluation and assessment the field of
address learning gains more directly, to gather mobile learning runs the risk of devolving into a
evidence of what can be learnt using these [mobile] faddish application of technological flash without
devices” (p. 189). These comments emphasize that substance.
for mobile learning to be educationally successful

632
iPods as Mobile Multimedia Learning Environments

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Mayer, R. E., Heiser, J., & Lonn, S. (2001). Pedersen, J. E., & Marek, E. A. (2007). Technology
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This work was previously published in Innovative Mobile Learning: Techniques and Technologies, edited by Hokyoung Ryu
and David Parsons, pp. 83-101, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.9
Telementoring and Project-
Based Learning:
An Integrated Model for 21st Century Skills

Joyce Yukawa
St. Catherine University, USA

ABSTRACT and information, media, and technology skills.

Brief overviews of inquiry learning approaches,
While common models of telementoring (ask-an- information literacy, and digital media literacy
expert services, tutoring, and academic and career are described in relation to telementoring. Design
telementoring) can serve a variety of learning considerations, the benefits and challenges of the
objectives, these models are limited with respect model, and broader implications for educational
to sustained inquiry learning such as project-based change are also discussed. Using the integrated
learning (PBL). To reach the full potential of PBL telementoring model, the PBL team exemplifies
with telementoring, this chapter proposes a tele- the interdisciplinary collaboration and new literacy
mentoring model that integrates inquiry learning, skills that students need in today’s workplaces
information literacy, and digital media literacy and communities.
and is implemented by a team of experts – subject
matter experts as telementors, classroom teachers,
school librarians, and instructional technology INTRODUCTION
specialists. The model provides for multifaceted
learning experiences for students that involve Often associated with apprenticeships in a com-
disciplinary knowledge and habits of mind, munity of practice, mentoring is the age-old
critical thinking, collaborative problem solving, process of wiser, more experienced persons tak-
ing younger protégés under their wing. As role
models, mentors guide their young initiates into
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch309

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

the art, craft, ways of thinking, and values of their Effective Practice” (http://www.mentoring.org/
community, helping to shape not only knowledge find_resources/elements_of_effective_practice/)
and skills but also the identity and personal and identifies these five types of contemporary group
professional maturity of their protégés. Mentoring mentoring: (1) traditional mentoring (one adult to
is rewarding for both the mentee and the mentor. one young person); (2) group mentoring (one adult
The mentee has a deepening relationship with a to up to four young people); (3) team mentoring
special person in his/her life - not a parent, teacher, (several adults working with small groups of
or friend, but a wise guide who listens, cares, young people, in which the adult to youth ratio is
encourages, and gives advice. For the mentor, not greater than 1:4); (4) peer mentoring (caring
this is a unique opportunity to make a difference youth mentoring other youth); and (5) e-mentoring
in a young person’s life and give back to one’s (mentoring via e-mail and the internet).
profession and community. Expert support online comes in many forms
Since the rise of the World Wide Web in the – ask-an-expert services for one-time, discipline-
1990s, a variety of online tools has been available based questions; tutoring for supplementary or
to support mentoring beyond the barriers of time remedial study; telementoring for career guidance
and place. Telementoring, also known as online and academic advice; and telementoring for in-
mentoring and e-mentoring, can be defined as: quiry learning. Examples of each of these types,
as well as their strengths and limitations, will be
… using telecommunications technology (includ- discussed later in the chapter.
ing e-mail, conferencing systems, or telephones) This chapter’s main focus is on telementoring
to develop and sustain mentoring relationships for sustained inquiry in the classroom through
where face-to-face ones would be impractical. project-based learning (i.e., project-based tele-
In the field of education, telementoring often mentoring). It is written at a time of extraordinary
involves linking students up with knowledgeable economic and technological changes and associ-
adult volunteers who have an interest in foster- ated challenges to the U.S. educational system.
ing their development. This sort of arrangement The Partnership for 21st Century Skills, a group
allows the participants to take part in intellectual of leading education, business, community, and
partnerships that would not otherwise take place. government organizations, has identified essential
(O’Neill, 2000, p. iii) skills beyond reading, mathematics, and science
that students need to “increase their marketabil-
While communicating online makes tele- ity, employability and readiness for citizenship”
mentoring different from traditional face-to-face (Partnership, 2008, p. 10):
mentoring, telementoring offers some distinct
benefits. Mentors are not limited to the local com- • Thinking critically and making judgments
munity and can be drawn from any profession, about the barrage of information that
organization, or geographic location around the comes their way every day – on the Web,
world where adults are willing to help a young in the media, in homes, workplaces and ev-
person develop. And mentors and mentees can erywhere else.
communicate at any time, using a wide range of • Solving complex, multidisciplinary, open-
online tools. ended problems that all workers, in every
Telementoring uses various mentor group kind of workplace, encounter routinely.
configurations to provide different kinds of ex- • Creativity and entrepreneurial thinking – a
pert support to students seeking help. MENTOR/ skill set highly associated with job creation
National Mentoring Partnership’s “Elements of (Pink 2005; Robinson 2006; Sternberg,

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Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

1996). Many of the fastest-growing jobs is resistant to any profound change in practice
and emerging industries rely on workers’ (Johnson, Levine, Smith, & Smythe, 2009, p. 7-8).
creative capacity – the ability to think un- These trends indicate not only the challenges that
conventionally, question the herd, imagine schools face, but also the potential of project-based
new scenarios and produce astonishing telementoring to contribute to needed changes in
work. structure, teaching practice, and a more relevant
• Communicating and collaborating with educational experience for students.
teams of people across cultural, geograph- The next sections of this chapter provide
ic and language boundaries – a necessity in brief overviews of inquiry learning approaches,
diverse and multinational workplaces and information literacy (including mastery of infor-
communities. mation technology), and digital media literacy
• Making innovative use of knowledge, in- (particularly with communication and collabora-
formation and opportunities to create new tion technologies), as they relate to telementoring.
services, processes and products. The This is followed by an assessment of strengths and
global marketplace rewards organizations weaknesses of common models of telementor-
that rapidly and routinely find better ways ing. To reach the full potential of project-based
of doing things. Companies want workers learning, I propose a telementoring model that
who can contribute in this environment. integrates inquiry learning, information literacy,
and digital media literacy and involves a team of
Project-based telementoring has the potential specialists – subject matter experts as telemen-
to address many of these important skills. Due tors, classroom teachers, school librarians, and
to the widespread use of the internet and the instructional technology specialists. Because of
plethora of free or low-cost technologies for online the diverse expertise of this project-based learning
communication and collaboration, the possibili- (PBL) team, the model provides for multifaceted
ties for innovative telementoring programs are learning experiences for students that involve
unprecedented. disciplinary knowledge and habits of mind, criti-
Providing the environment and structural sup- cal thinking, collaborative problem solving, and
port for new types of telementoring is a significant information, media, and technology skills. Design
challenge. The New Media Consortium (NMC), considerations, the benefits and challenges of the
a community of hundreds of leading universities, model, and broader implications for educational
colleges, museums, and research centers, sees the change are also discussed. Using the integrated
following as the most critical challenges schools telementoring model, the PBL team exemplifies
will face as they integrate new technologies and for students the interdisciplinary collaboration and
reshape the educational experience in the next five new literacy skills that are increasingly valued in
years: (1) There is a need for formal instruction today’s workplaces and communities.
in key new skills. (2) Educational practice and
materials are changing too slowly to support cur-
rent student needs. (3) Learning that incorporates INQUIRY LEARNING APPROACHES
real life experiences is not occurring enough and AND TELEMENTORING
is undervalued when it does take place. (4) New
technologies must be adopted and used as an Other chapters in this book explore in depth the
everyday part of classroom activities, but effect- use of telementoring in inquiry, problem-based,
ing this change is difficult. (5) The fundamental and project-based learning. The goal of this sec-
structure of the K-12 education establishment tion is to provide an overview of these approaches

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as the foundation for a discussion of how well Identifying a scientific problem and testing one’s
different models of telementoring can meet the ideas through communication, collaboration, and
learning challenges and address the new media peer review are critical aspects of inquiry often
literacy skills needed today. missing from the student’s classroom experi-
Scientific inquiry in the classroom is often ence. Through the partnerships and collaboration
simplified to a linear process of asking a ques- enabled through telementoring, a subject matter
tion, formulating a hypothesis, performing an expert can be one of the most valuable members
experiment, collecting data, and drawing conclu- of the classroom’s community of inquiry.
sions. The University of California Museum of The Telementor’s Guidebook (O’Neill, 2000)
Paleontology’s website, Understanding Science describes and analyzes a number of telementoring
(http://www.understandingscience.org), aims relationships with project groups from a 9th grade
to accurately communicate “the real process of class that illustrate the types of guidance subject
science” – not only a process of exploration, matter experts can provide. For example, two
discovery, and testing ideas, but also of scientific students doing a research project on earthquakes
growth based on community analysis and feedback were matched with a geology graduate student
that is shaped by the benefits and outcomes for who provided both intellectual and emotional
individuals and society. Science is a process that support to help them reach their project goals.
is dynamic and intensely human: Other examples of telementoring by community
experts can be found in the project summaries
[S]cientists often begin an investigation by plain provided on The Electronic Emissary K-12
old poking around: tinkering, brainstorming, try- Telementoring website (http://emissary.wm.edu/
ing to make some new observations, chatting with project_public.php).
colleagues about an idea, or doing some reading. Inquiry learning approaches such as problem-
Scientific testing is at the heart of the process. In based learning and project-based learning extend
science, all ideas are tested with evidence from the problem beyond a single lesson or two and
the natural world. … You can’t move through bring to the classroom some of the complexity,
the process of science without examining how curiosity, creativity, serendipity, and communal
that evidence reflects on your ideas about how effort that more accurately reflect the nature of
the world works — even if that means giving up scientific inquiry. The Illinois Mathematics and
a favorite hypothesis. The scientific community Science Academy’s PBLNetwork (http://pbln.
helps ensure science’s accuracy. Members of the imsa.edu/model/intro/index.html) provides this
scientific community … play many roles in the definition of problem-based learning:
process of science, but are especially important in
generating ideas, scrutinizing ideas, and weighing Problem-based learning (PBL) is focused experi-
the evidence for and against them. Through the ential learning organized around the investigation
action of this community, science is self-correcting. and resolution of messy, real-world problems.
… The process of science is intertwined with soci- PBL engages students as stakeholders immersed
ety. The process of science both influences society in a messy, ill-structured, problematic situation.
… and is influenced by society. (“A blueprint for PBL organizes curriculum around this holistic
scientific investigations,” http://undsci.berkeley. problem, enabling student learning in relevant
edu/article/0_0_0/howscienceworks_03) and connected ways. PBL creates a learning
environment in which teachers coach student
Scientific inquiry is clearly a social process as thinking and guide student inquiry, facilitating
well as a rigorous procedure for testing hypotheses.

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learning toward deeper levels of understanding methods, such as continuous, consistent observa-
while entering the inquiry as a co-investigator. tion and keep a journal of your research plan, how
the plan has been carried out, and whether any
A challenging issue in problem-based learning revisions to your research plan are needed after
is ascertaining problem difficulty in ill-structured a period of doing your research.
problems, with respect to learners’ ability to solve
such problems. Jonassen (2000; Jonassen & Hung, Similarly, project-based learning attempts to
2008) identifies a number of factors that contribute infuse authenticity, complexity, and community
to problem difficulty. Factors related to the learner into the learning process. The Buck Institute for
are level of domain knowledge, experience in Education (BIE, n.d., p. 4) defines project-based
solving problems, and reasoning skills. Factors learning as “a systematic teaching method that
inherent in the problem are level of abstraction, engages students in learning knowledge and skills
stability of problem attributes over time, complex- through an extended inquiry process structured
ity, and how well- or ill-structured the problem is. around complex, authentic questions and carefully
Jonassen and Hung (2008, p. 16) recommend that designed products and tasks.” BIE (p. 4-5) criteria
problems should be open ended, moderately ill for exemplary PBL projects include:
structured, and with a degree of complexity that
is challenging and motivating to students. Ap- • Recognize students’ inherent drive to learn,
propriate ill-structured problems should “provide their capability to do important work, and
opportunities for students to examine the problem their need to be taken seriously by putting
from multiple perspectives or disciplines; [be] them at the center of the learning process.
adapted to students’ prior knowledge; [and be] • Engage students in the central concepts
adapted to students’ cognitive development and and principles of a discipline.
readiness” (p. 16). • Highlight provocative issues or questions
An example of a problem statement for el- that lead students to in-depth exploration
ementary students who role play being entomolo- of authentic and important topics.
gists shows how problem-based learning can be • Require the use of essential tools and skills,
approached (Goodnough & Hung, 2008, p. 90): including technology, for learning, self-
management, and project management.
Every summer, Mrs. Bartlett likes to sit in a chair • Specify products that solve problems, ex-
and enjoy her beautiful garden where she has lots plain dilemmas, or present information
of plants and flowers with butterflies flying from generated through investigation, research,
one to another. However, before Mrs. Bartlett or reasoning.
can enjoy her peaceful summers, she always has • Include multiple products that permit fre-
to fight with hungry caterpillars who love to eat quent feedback and consistent opportuni-
the leaves of her plants in the spring. … You and ties for students to learn from experience.
your teammate are entomologists (bug experts) in • Use performance-based assessments that
training. … What can your team tell Mrs. Bartlett communicate high expectations, present
about caterpillars? What can your team do to help rigorous challenges, and require a range of
Mrs. Bartlett with her problem without destroying skills and knowledge.
her garden? Mrs. Bartlett will choose the best • Encourage collaboration in some form, ei-
solution to her problem from all the proposals. ther through small groups, student-led pre-
In order to produce an effective and trustworthy sentations, or whole-class evaluations of
solution proposal, your team should use scientific project results.

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What does project-based learning look like in extensive content knowledge than the teacher, the
the classroom? Planning any educational effort teacher has a unique knowledge base needed for
begins with the desired outcomes in mind, known PBL: pedagogical knowledge, knowledge of the
as “backward mapping” (Wiggins & McTighe, students, and pedagogical content knowledge –
1998). A PBL project begins with developing a “the blending of content and pedagogy into an
project idea, deciding the scope of the project, se- understanding of how particular topics, problems,
lecting curriculum standards, working from project or issues are organized, represented, and adapted
design criteria, and creating the optimal learning to the diverse interests and abilities of learner,
environment (BIE & Boise State University, 2005). and presented for instruction” (Shulman, 2004, p.
Most projects last several weeks but some can 227). PBL projects require teachers to be learning
last much longer. Information/data collection that facilitators, drawing on their pedagogical content
involves library research or active research in the knowledge. O’Neill (2000, p. 37) provides an
field, such as interviews and community inquiry, example of how the teacher’s unique knowledge
can extend the length of the projects. Successful helps ensure telementoring success:
projects usually involve adults, either experts or
community representatives, as partners or men- While teachers may not participate directly in
tors in a project, necessitating more time. Some telementoring relationships, they can do a number
projects address broad, open-ended questions with of other things indirectly, to help them flourish.
many different solutions, resembling problem- To begin with, Mr. Wagner [the teacher] set
based learning. Complex projects need sufficient requirements for the students’ investigation that
time for preparation and student research. Student gave Dan [the telementor] an appropriate role to
autonomy is one of the characteristics of PBL, and play. If the students’ assignment had been a more
students can be involved in the project design. traditional book report, or an investigation of
Examples of successful PBL projects at the much shorter duration, Dan may have had very
high school level can be found on the website of little opportunity to become richly involved. Mr.
High Tech High in San Diego, California (http:// Wagner didn’t simply match his students with their
www.hightechhigh.org/pbl/index.html). The mentor and let them go, either: he was there to
descriptions of such projects as how drugs affect make decisions about whether or not the students’
your body, how human habitation affects the envi- research proposal was solid enough to go forward,
ronment, and how math and science affect artistic so that Dan was not forced to do this on his own.
expression generally include a project overview, While Dan had ideas about what the students
standards addressed, a timeline and narrative of might be capable of doing, and to what level of
activities, lesson plans, assessment rubrics, and perfection, only the teacher had intimate enough
teacher and student reflections. Other examples of knowledge of the students to make a confident
PBL projects are found in the additional resources decision about this. Finally, during Andy, Cori
listed in Additional Reading. and Bill’s [the students] correspondence with
PBL projects center on driving questions that Dan, Mr. Wagner offered the students a substantial
are “open-ended, go to the heart of a discipline or amount of behind-the-scenes guidance and sup-
topic, are challenging, can arise from real world di- port himself. This included helping the students
lemmas that students find interesting, and are con- to interpret some of Dan’s messages, which they
sistent with curricular standards and frameworks” weren’t always able to understand easily. Even
(BIE & Boise State University, 2005). While the the very best telementor sometimes talks over
subject matter specialist may have deeper and more mentees’ heads unintentionally.

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In PBL, teachers are also project managers In addition to teachers and subject matter ex-
who structure and guide a project to a success- perts, other experts contribute to inquiry learning
ful conclusion while supporting students as they – helping students think critically and creatively,
move through an open-ended process of discovery access and evaluate information, investigate
and reflection. complex problems, and effectively express their
A key consideration is student readiness. ideas. The school librarian and the instructional
Do students have sufficient content knowledge technology specialist are two of these experts.
and skills to handle the project successfully?
Can they take independent initiative and work
collaboratively? Do they have the necessary INFORMATION LITERACY
skills with technology and access to the required AND TELEMENTORING
tools? Technological resources can be powerful
and engaging for students, but they must also be While school librarians are often viewed mainly
essential tools for learning. Teachers also need as the managers of the school library resources,
fluency with these resources so that the learning they are much more than that. With credentials
can focus on the central content and investiga- and experience in library and information science
tion rather than managing and troubleshooting as well as teaching, school librarians are experts
the technology. While there is no evidence that in information literacy and knowing how people
tools such as virtual learning environments, social seek information. As the complexity of informa-
software, and other information and communica- tion resources and technologies increases, they are
tion technologies are being extensively used for called upon to use their unique skills as learning
project-based learning (Dede, 2007, p. 21), new specialists to help students develop 21st century
guides are appearing for how to implement PBL skills (Zmuda & Harada, 2008). Their roles in PBL
with digital tools, the internet, and Web 2.0 (Boss, are as an instructional partner, a connector with
Krauss, & Conery, 2008). a holistic view of the curriculum who facilitates
Problem-based learning and project-based integration across content areas, and an integrator
learning are similar in their emphasis on student who links disciplinary concepts with informa-
autonomy, a shared goal, authentic problems, tion resources and helps incorporate information
evidence-based investigations and solutions, collab- literacy skills at various phases of the project
orative learning, and reflection (Savery, 2006). The (Harada, Kirio, & Yamamoto, 2008b).
primary differences are the goals and the structuring The American Association of School Librar-
of the activity. Problem-based learning focuses on ians (AASL) has developed new standards that
solving ill-structured problems that require learners address many of the much-needed skills identified
to set their own parameters. Project-based learning by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills and the
focuses on an end product. Clear design criteria are New Media Consortium discussed in this chapter’s
essential, with teachers and other adults serving as introduction. The Standards for the 21st-Century
instructors, coaches, mentors, or project collabora- Learner are based on a set of fundamental beliefs
tors who provide expert feedback in a timely man- (AASL, 2007):
ner. Ravitz (2009, p. 6) notes that although there are
differences among problem-based, project-based, • Reading is a window to the world.
inquiry-based, design-based, and challenge-based • Inquiry provides a framework for learning.
learning, “the similarities are more significant, al- • Ethical behavior in the use of information
lowing them to be viewed as ‘close cousins’ with must be taught.
many similar characteristics.”

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• Technology skills are crucial for future em- • Demonstrate confidence and self-direction
ployment needs. by making independent choices in the se-
• Equitable access is a key component for lection of resources and information.
education. • Demonstrate creativity by using multiple
• The definition of information literacy has resources and formats.
become more complex as resources and • Maintain a critical stance by questioning
technologies have changed. the validity and accuracy of all information.
• The continuing expansion of information • Demonstrate adaptability by changing
demands that all individuals acquire the the inquiry focus, questions, resources,
thinking skills that will enable them to or strategies when necessary to achieve
learn on their own. success.
• Learning has a social context. • Display emotional resilience by persist-
• School libraries are essential to the devel- ing in information searching despite
opment of learning skills. challenges.
• Use both divergent and convergent think-
Within the inquiry learning framework, school ing to formulate alternative conclusions
librarians aim to assist students with the follow- and test them against the evidence.
ing skills, dispositions, responsibilities, and self- Responsibilities:
assessment strategies (AASL, 2007). • Respect copyright/intellectual property
rights of creators and producers.
Skills: • Seek divergent perspectives during infor-
• Develop and refine a range of questions to mation gathering and assessment.
frame the search for new understanding. • Follow ethical and legal guidelines in gath-
• Find, evaluate, and select appropriate ering and using information.
sources to answer questions. • Use information technology responsibly.
• Evaluate information on the basis of ac- • Connect understanding to the real world.
curacy, validity, appropriateness for needs, • Consider diverse and global perspectives
importance, and social and cultural context. in drawing conclusions.
• Make sense of information gathered from • Use valid information and reasoned con-
diverse sources (e.g., textual, visual, me- clusions to make ethical decisions.
dia, digital) by identifying misconceptions, Self-Assessment Strategies:
main and supporting ideas, conflicting in- • Monitor own information-seeking pro-
formation, and point of view or bias. cesses for effectiveness and progress, and
• Apply critical-thinking skills to informa- adapt as necessary.
tion and knowledge in order to construct • Monitor gathered information, and assess
new understandings, draw conclusions, for gaps or weaknesses.
and create new knowledge. • Seek appropriate help when it is needed.
• Use technology tools to access, analyze, • Determine how to act on information (ac-
and organize information in the pursuit of cept, reject, modify).
inquiry. • Reflect on systematic process, and assess
Dispositions: for completeness of investigation.
• Display initiative and engagement by pos- • Recognize new knowledge and
ing questions and investigating the answers understanding.
beyond the collection of superficial facts. • Develop directions for future investigations.

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Guided by these standards and the impera- studies, creative writing, photographs, and histo-
tive to connect learning to student needs, school ries of human development, industry, environmen-
librarians are taking a larger role in curriculum tal measures, mapping and other changes to Bay.”
planning and instructional design. They are part- The interdisciplinary project (biology, humanities,
nering with teachers to support inquiry learning mathematics) is implemented by a subject matter
(Harada & Yoshina, 2004) and project-based learn- specialist and two high school teachers, but school
ing (Harada, Kirio, & Yamamoto, 2008a). In the librarians do not appear to have a role in guiding
school context, the need for these collaborations the information seeking and research processes.
is not always self-evident, and the development School librarians have a deep understanding
of partnerships is a challenge under the heavy of the guidance and instruction that students
constraints on time and budget. Two of the bases need to become information literate, a holistic
for successful librarian-teacher partnerships are perspective on the school and curriculum, and
professional development support and the creation extensive knowledge of information resources
of communities of practice over time (Yukawa, and information technology. In collaboration with
Harada, & Suthers, 2007). When teachers and other experts on the PBL team, they can provide
school librarians participate jointly in sustained, students with essential project-based learning
practice-based professional development, sig- experiences and resources.
nificant improvements can occur in the design of
inquiry-focused learning and student performance
(Yukawa & Harada, 2009). DIGITAL MEDIA LITERACY
School and public librarians are increasingly AND TELEMENTORING
offering chat reference services to students that
generally provide factual answers, information While there is increased use of new technologies
resources, and limited research help, much like for classroom learning (e.g., Moller, Huett, &
ask-an-expert services. Among the few studies Harvey, 2008), distance education (e.g., Huett
of librarians as telementors, Yukawa (2005) et al., 2008), and library services (e.g., Burger,
examined two library and information science 2007; Casey & Savastinuk, 2006), there is little
graduate students who telementored two high evidence that information and communication
school students doing yearlong senior projects technologies are being used for project-based
and found that building rapport and relationships learning or telementoring. Email has been the
were critical for sustaining telementoring. dominant mode of telementoring communication
In published examples and research, it is rare since the 1990s. The selected K-12 telementoring
to find PBL projects that are collaboratively de- programs listed in Appendix B indicate that most
signed and implemented with school librarians, of these programs use email or discussion lists.
despite the fact that the information and technol- Newer forms of online communication such as
ogy resources of the library are often essential for web-based synchronous communication (instant
background knowledge, research, and the develop- messaging, text messaging, online chat, and video-
ment of final products. For example, High Tech conferencing) and asynchronous communication
High’s San Diego Field Guide project (http://www. (e.g., using wikis and blogs) have the potential
hightechhigh.org/pbl/sd-field-guide/) is a 16-week to expand telementoring and help reshape learn-
project in which 11th grade students “conduct an ing to meet 21st century educational challenges
environmental assessment of the fauna along the (Dede, 2007). The instructional technology spe-
intertidal zone of San Diego Bay. They publish a cialist is the member of the PBL team with the
comprehensive Field Guide including scientific best understanding of how to use and manage

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these technologies for learning, communication, Collaborative environments are virtual work-
productivity, and creativity. places where students, teachers, telementors, and
As noted in the introduction, The Partnership others can communicate, share information, and
for 21st Century Skills has implicated information, work together. Collaborative online spaces come in
communication, and collaboration technologies many forms, from online office suites for document
in the innovative, entrepreneurial thinking that sharing (for examples of these and other tools, see
students will need for future success. Attaining Table 1), online document collaboration, personal
literacy with these technologies is thus essential. publishing, social networking tools to connect
The New Media Consortium defines 21st century people and collect resources, flexible learning
literacy as “the set of abilities and skills where management systems, personal web portals, to
aural, visual and digital literacy overlap. These classrooms in virtual environments. As well as
include the ability to understand the power of enabling collaboration, the online spaces leave
images and sounds, to recognize and use that persistent conversations that remain for self reflec-
power, to manipulate and transform digital me- tion and peer critique. These spaces can be used
dia, to distribute them pervasively, and to easily synchronously or asynchronously at a distance,
adapt them to new forms” (NMC, 2005, p. 2). or to support and document collaborative work
Technology is implicated in all of the top trends done in class.
the NMC has identified as likely to affect teach- Full-featured wikis such as PBworks (http://
ing, learning, and creativity in the next five years: pbworks.com) and WetPaint (http://www.wet-
(1) Technology continues to profoundly affect paint.com) are powerful tools for telementoring.
the way we work, collaborate, communicate, In addition to supporting the collaborative creation
and succeed. (2) Technology is increasingly a of web pages, these wikis also provide productiv-
means for empowering students, a method for ity and communication plug-ins such as calendars,
communication and socializing, and a ubiquitous, spreadsheets, Google gadgets, chat rooms, photo
transparent part of their lives. (3) The web is an and video integration, and page level discussion
increasingly personal experience. (4) Learning threads. Students working on problems or projects
environments are increasingly virtual rather than can gather resources, post plans, exchange ideas,
physical spaces. (5) The perceived value of in- and write drafts of papers and presentations on
novation and creativity is increasing (Johnson et wiki pages. Telementors can monitor student
al., 2009, p. 6). progress as it evolves and provide feedback on
Among the technologies likely to have a sig- these wiki pages. Studies have shown that wikis
nificant impact on schools within the next five promote collaboration, encourage negotiation,
years are collaborative environments, online com- and familiarize students with new technology
munication tools, mobile devices, and the personal tools (Elgort, Smith, & Toland, 2008; Hazari,
web (Johnson et al., 2009, p. 6). While research North, & Moreland, 2009). They are also an ef-
on the learning impact of newer technologies is fective tool for collaborative project planning and
still emerging, a number of guides for classroom documentation (Parker & Chao, 2007), informa-
use are available (e.g., Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & tion or data gathering and organization, and or-
Malenoski, 2007; Richardson, 2008; Solomon ganizing a personal or team research library (Walsh
& Schrum, 2007). These technologies have the & Hollister, 2009).
potential to be powerful tools for inquiry-, prob- Online communication tools such as instant
lem-, and project-based learning in the hands of messaging and online chats via desktop video
technologically fluent telementors and motivated, conferencing are a popular way for students to
tech savvy, creative students. interact with family and friends online. These

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familiar tools can also be used to extend learn-

tors and mentees, providing

overhead, and preventing mentor

opportunities for just-in-time
learning, limiting administrative
Building and describing a
mentor pool, matching men-
Telementoring Software
Telementoring Orchestrator
ing through telementoring. Desktop videocon-
ferencing, instant messaging services, personal
publishing like blogging and micro-blogging, and
voice-over-IP enable one-to-one, one-to-many, or
many-to-many synchronous communication. As

overload.
one example, YackPack (http://www.yackpack.
com) utilizes voice, video, and text messaging that
Tagging (Delicious, Diigo), RSS

FeedDemon, Google Reader,

updated on student work, en-

feed aggregators (Bloglines,

Netvibes, Pageflakes), simple,

all around personal web tools

hanced email communication

in a telementoring relationship,
Resource collections, keeping
can also be recorded. This enables one-to-one or
one-to-many communication that allows students
Personal Web

and telementors to see and hear each other in real

(Tumblr, Posterous)

time or via archived messages. Students can use

blogging tools to set up multimedia journals to
portfolios.

share their opinions, ideas, and research. Telemen-

tors, teachers, and peers can provide feedback
using the comments feature.
Range of communication op-
tions: telephone, email, text
messaging, internet faxing, web
browsing, multimedia. Third-
party applications to support

Mobiles devices such as the iPhone and the

BlackBerry are increasingly being used by young
Mobile Devices

learning and research.

people (Johnson et al., 2009, p. 16). These pro-

iPhone, BlackBerry

vide a range of communication options: mobile

telephone, email, text messaging, internet faxing,
and web browsing. They support multimedia, with
a camera and the ability to play music and video.
They also incorporate productivity tools such as
many-to-many communication;
video conferencing (Skype),
Google Talk), online chat (AIM,
Google Talk, Skype), desktop

(Twitter), voice-over-IP (AIM,

One-to-one, one-to-many, and

sations; multimedia journals;

Instant messaging (AIM, Meebo,

blogging, micro-blogging

Google Talk, Skype), combina-

archiving messages and conver-

voice, video, and text com-

tion voice-video-text messaging

an address book, calendar, and calculator. Mobile

Communication Tools

devices have strong potential for educational uses

because of the ability to run third-party applica-
tions such as GPS and collaborative document
munication.
(YackPack)

software. As of early June 2009, there were ap-

proximately 50,000 third-party applications of all
types available for the iPhone. It is easy to imagine
a wide range of applications being developed for
Wikis (PBworks, Wetpaint), blogs

YouTube), virtual environments

sharing, collaborative writing,

portfolios, online classrooms,

nal), office suites (Google Docs,

ment systems (Moodle, Sakai),

personal web portals (NetVibes,
(WordPress, Blogger, LiveJour-

Zoho), flexible learning manage-

Pageflakes, iGoogle), social net-

personal publishing, social net-

feedback from teachers, experts,

working tools (Flickr, SlideShare,

Project planning, document

working, resource collections,

Table 1. Technologies for telementoring

Collaborative Environments

fieldwork, data capture, information organization

and analysis, visualization, data sharing, and other
research and productivity aids that could support
inquiry learning and result in products shared
(Second Life)

with telementors.
and peers.

The personal web refers to how we manage

the way we view and use the internet, based on
“a growing set of free and simple tools and ap-
plications that let us create customized, personal
Examples

Uses

web-based environments that explicitly support

our social, professional, learning, and other activi-
ties” (Johnson et al., 2009, p. 25). The internet has

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been a major contributor to information overload. overload (O’Neill, Weiler, & Sha, 2005, p. 114-
Finding, organizing, and evaluating online con- 115). TMO supports these roles and functions:
tent are critical for research and learning. Just as
researchers and librarians are doing, students can Telementoring Orchestrator assumes three roles:
tag and organize web links by subject. Another (1) mentors, who volunteer by filling out a recruit-
valuable personal web tool is the feed aggrega- ing form; (2) coordinators, who solicit the assis-
tor, a web application that gathers syndicated tance of one or more mentors from the volunteer
web content in one place for easy viewing. News pool, assign them to mentees, and provide over-
sites, blogs, podcasts, wikis, social networking sight for the relationships until they are closed;
sites, library websites, and many others provide and (3) an administrator, who configures the TMO
RSS feeds that automatically appear in personal software for a particular program or initiative,
aggregator content. With the tools of the personal and creates accounts for coordinators. … At a
web, teachers, students, and telementors can tag, minimum, configuring the installation involves:
categorize, annotate, publish, and review work (1) Setting up an e-mail routing account that can
online and build resource collections using web be used by mentors and mentees to exchange
feeds and resources tagged by others. Teachers, messages. (2) Specifying a Knowledge Forum
students, and mentors can keep track of student ‘database’ (workspace) in which mentors and
work using RSS feeds to import updates of student their mentees can work together. (3) Defining the
publishing on the web. varieties of expertise or interests that volunteers
One example of a free, very easy to use personal might share with their mentees. (O’Neill et al.,
web tool that can serve a variety of communica- 2005, p. 115-117)
tion and learning functions in telementoring is
Posterous (http://www.posterous.com). By simply Freely available, this software currently works
sending email with attachments to Posterous or only on Mac OS X.
grabbing content from the web, one can create a To make effective use of these technologies,
blog with text, video, photos, and music. Poster- schools and classrooms need a reliable technol-
ous provides for privacy, group sites, and email ogy infrastructure, as well as high-speed internet
subscriptions to inform each group member of new access. Instructional technology specialists un-
postings. Posterous could be an effortless way to derstand how and why technology can be used
conduct one-to-one or one-to-many telementor- effectively for learning, communication, and
ing communication via email, with text enhanced productivity. In collaboration with other experts
by multimedia in a chronological, open record of on the PBL team, they guide students toward
the exchanges. achieving better digital media literacy and provide
Specialized software may be needed for tools for creative expression and the development
those who wish to launch their own large-scale of innovative, personally meaningful products.
telementoring projects and services. One of the As discussed in this chapter’s introduction,
best developed is the Telementoring Orchestrator schools also face more fundamental and far-
(TMO) from Simon Fraser University’s On-line reaching challenges as they integrate new infor-
Learning Relationships Lab (http://www.learnin- mation and communication technologies (ICT)
grelationslab.org/). TMO streamlines the tasks of and reshape the educational experience. As Dede
building and describing a mentor pool, matching (2007, p. 35) notes:
mentors and mentees, and providing opportuni-
ties for just-in-time learning, as well as reducing At this point in history, the primary barriers to
administrative overhead and preventing mentor altering curricular, pedagogical, and assessment

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practices toward the transformative vision of ICT the learning context. Factual information does
in education … are not conceptual, technical, or not in itself help students develop critical and
economic, but instead psychological, political, creative thinking skills. Moreover, the one-time
and cultural. We now have all the means neces- nature of the process does not help them develop
sary to implement alternative models of education disciplinary knowledge over time.
that truly prepare all students for a future very Online tutoring and homework help services
different from the immediate past. Whether we provide supplementary or remedial study that
have the professional commitment and societal supports well-focused learning needs and guides
will to actualize such a vision remains to be seen. the student in solving well-structured problems.
Often these services are a combination of self-
paced tutorials and 24/7 help from live tutors,
TELEMENTORING MODELS such as the fee-based services, Tutor.com (http://
www.tutor.com/) and Homeworkhelp.com (http://
This chapter began with a brief mention of the www.homeworkhelp.com/). Free homework help
types of expert advice being provided online – ask- sites are also available, many of them developed
an-expert services for one-time, discipline-based or sponsored by school and public libraries. The
questions; tutoring for supplementary or remedial Internet Public Library’s Homework Help page
study; and telementoring for career guidance, (http://www.ipl.org/kidspace/browse/ref8000)
academic advice, or sustained inquiry learning lists a number of free sites. The disadvantage of
in the classroom. With the exception of the last, online tutoring is that the questions and problems
these types of advice address three learning needs: are provided mostly by the service, not driven
the need for disciplinary knowledge, the need for by student inquiry. Online tutoring does not help
academic advice, and the need for career guidance. students develop critical and creative thinking
Our exploration of inquiry learning, information skills by solving authentic, ill-structured problems
literacy, and digital media literacy provides a relevant to their own lives and interests.
backdrop for assessing the strengths and limita-
tions of these types of online expert advice. Academic Advice and
Career Guidance
Disciplinary Knowledge
Academic advice and career guidance are often
Ask-an-expert services provide answers to one- combined in programs that are aimed at vulner-
time, discipline-based questions such as “What able and at-risk students. This type of mentoring
are simple, complex, and compound fractions?” resembles the traditional mentor model of wise
or “What is the Pythagorean theorem?” Examples counselor to a young protégé. For example,
of these services are Drexel University’s Ask Dr. icouldbe.org (http://www.icouldbe.org/standard/
Math (http://mathforum.org/dr.math/), U.S. Geo- public/lm_index.asp) targets at-risk students from
logical Survey’s Ask A Geologist (http://walrus. low-income communities. Connecting to Success
wr.usgs.gov/ask-a-geologist/), and NASA’s Ask (http://ici.umn.edu/ementoring/default.html) aims
an Astrophysicist (http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/ “to promote successful transition of youth with
docs/ask_astro/ask_an_astronomer.html). Stu- disabilities to adult life.” In these types of tele-
dents can ask experts questions that they could mentoring programs, mentors encourage students
not ask of others, and receive answers in a timely to stay in school and work toward career goals and
manner. However, these services can only provide further education. They provide care and concern,
answers to factual questions that are isolated from helping with homework and study skills, plans for

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college, and how to seek and keep jobs. They also • School librarians guide students to be-
help youth improve their communication skills, come information literate and help them
raise their self-esteem, and change negative and navigate the increasingly complex terrain
damaging behaviors. of information resources.
Other telementoring programs are aimed at • Instructional technology specialists help
closing the gender gap in science, technology, students achieve better digital media liter-
engineering, and mathematics (STEM) profes- acy and provide opportunities for creative
sions. Programs such as Zoey’s Room (http:// expression using a wide array of techno-
www.zoeysroom.com/), an online community logical tools.
for middle school girls that fosters interest in
STEM subjects, feature chat rooms where girls Table 2 summarizes the complementary sets of
can interact with professional women with careers skills and expertise the team brings to PBL. The
in STEM fields. model provides a framework for rich learning
These programs provide valuable mentoring to experiences for students and supports scaffolding
specially targeted sectors of students but are not of disciplinary knowledge and ways of thinking,
focused on inquiry learning for the development project-based learning, information literacy, and
of critical and creative thinking skills. (For those digital media literacy. This model is further dis-
interested in selected programs of these types, cussed in the next section.
Appendix B provides further information).

Integrated Telementoring Model DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS FOR AN

for Project-Based Learning INTEGRATED TELEMENTORING
MODEL
While ask-an-expert services and academic and
career telementoring address important student For the development of 21st century skills, I
needs such as the need for factual knowledge, have proposed that an integrated model of tele-
general study skills, career information, and guid- mentoring implemented by a PBL team has the
ance for at-risk students, they are each limited potential to be more effective than current forms
with respect to sustained inquiry learning focused of telementoring. This section discusses how the
on authentic problems. To reach the full potential model could be implemented, based on findings
of project-based learning, I propose an integrated from previous studies of telementoring and/or
telementoring model that involves a team of spe- problem-based learning. The main studies referred
cialists – teachers, subject matter experts, school to are: (1) an examination of the Portals project,
librarians, and instructional technology specialists. funded by the National Science Foundation to
support telementoring relationships in project-
• Classroom teachers manage PBL projects based computational sciences classes, involving
and facilitate learning on many levels – the 40 high school students, five teachers, and 12
process of project-based learning, the team mentors (Tsikalas, McMillan-Culp, Friedman, &
process, community building, individual Honey, 2000); (2) Abbott’s (2005) study of eight
learning, and the achievement of the learn- teachers whose students participated in online
ing outcomes. learning projects hosted by five established online
• Subject matter experts as telementors en- PBL programs (The Electronic Emissary, iEARN,
courage, guide, instruct, and model disci- KidLink, ThinkQuest, and ThinkQuest Jr.); (3) a
plinary practices and ways of thinking. study by Hmelo-Silver and Barrows (2006) that

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Table 2. Integrated telementoring model for project-based learning (PBL)

Instructional Technology
PBL Team Teacher Telementor School Librarian
Specialist
Primary Role Pedagogy, Project Man- Disciplinary Inquiry Information Literacy Digital Media Literacy
agement • Exploration & discovery • Accessing information • Technology tools
• Pedagogical content • Testing ideas – Gather- • Evaluating information • Uses of tools for learning
knowledge ing data • Critical thinking to • Uses of tools for com-
• Knowledge of learners • Testing ideas – Interpret- analyze, organize & use munication
• PBL coordination & ing data information for decision • Uses of tools for produc-
facilitation • Community analysis & making tivity
• Project design feedback • Information ethics • Uses of tools for creative
• Project planning • Broader perspectives on • Reflecting on the infor- expression
• Project management the benefits of inquiry to mation seeking process
• Fostering community society
building

analyzed the facilitation of a student-centered Commitment

problem-based learning group in higher educa-
tion; and (4) Project INSITE, a four-year profes- Project-based learning takes much time to plan
sional development program to prepare teachers and sustained effort to complete (Abbott, 2005).
to use problem-centered, inquiry-based science The first and most important factor to consider
(Lehman, George, Buchanan, & Rush, 2006). is the desire and willingness of the school-based
As discussed previously, several components team members to tackle project-based learning
of this model – project-based learning, teacher- using this model. Another important factor is the
librarian collaboration, and the use of information school climate and readiness – whether school
and communications technologies for learning – administrators and peers welcome innovative uses
are in themselves challenging to implement. As of technology or not. Access to and funding for
an integration of these components, this model is new technology may also be key considerations.
even more challenging, as it involves collabora-
tion among all of the PBL team members and Learning Goals
the potential use of a variety of online tools. The
model requires careful planning, coordination, These are some of the typical goals teachers set
ongoing collaboration, and negotiation of roles and for project-based learning with telementoring (Ab-
responsibilities among members of the PBL team. bott, 2005; BIE, n.d.; Hmelo-Silver & Barrows,
The planning is done by the school-based 2006; Lehman et al., 2006; Tsikalas et al., 2000):
members of the team. During the implementation
of the project, the teacher’s role is both project • Students engage in the central concepts and
manager and learning facilitator. Important factors principles of a discipline and develop rea-
to consider when designing a project using the soning skills appropriate to the discipline.
integrated telementoring model are commitment to • Students do in-depth exploration of au-
the project, learning goals, roles and functions of thentic and important topics.
participants, the online learning environment, and • Students solve complex, multidisciplinary,
participant readiness for project-based learning. open-ended problems.
• Students create products that solve prob-
lems, explain dilemmas, or present infor-

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mation generated through investigation, and when? In their study of the Portals proj-
research, or reasoning. ect, Tsikalas et al. (2000) found that structural
• Students engage in self-directed learning. strategies and functions are generally set by the
• Students acquire, evaluate, and use infor- teachers and mentors. Teachers specify student
mation effectively. roles and also set the activity structure in which
• Students use essential tools and skills, in- the telementoring occurs, tied to a set of project
cluding technology, for learning, self-man- deliverables. Mentors often structure the process
agement, and project management. of project development, advising students on what
• Students effectively communicate and col- steps need to be taken to complete the deliverables
laborate with each other in teams, and on- by the deadline. In the integrated telementoring
line with adult experts. model, school-based PBL team members would
• Students reflect on their own work and pro- collaborate on these activities and make decisions
vide effective feedback to peers. about how to integrate information literacy and
digital media literacy skills in a timely manner.
During planning, the school-based team mem- Process strategies and functions refer to ex-
bers align learning goals with various content pectations related to the learning conversations
standards, technology standards, and life skills over time. Tsikalas et al. (2000) found that these
standards (e.g., McCREL, 2009), as well as infor- are often set by students, who decide on what role
mation literacy standards (AASL, 2007). These the mentor will take, set expectations, ask good
learning goals are also associated with the 21st questions, build personal relationships with the
century student outcomes outlined by Partnership mentor, and manage the communication (such as
for 21st Century Skills (2008), namely, knowledge selecting the type of media to use to communi-
in core subjects; learning and innovation skills; cate about certain topics). Mentors also perform
information, media and technology skills; and life process functions – assessing and anticipating
and career skills. student needs, providing information, stimulating
students through questioning, directing action,
Roles and Functions extending students’ vision of their projects, and
exercising quality control.
The complex, interdisciplinary, and open-ended Facilitation strategies and functions refer to
nature of project-based learning requires a clear the means of guiding, supervising, and support-
view of general functions and roles, as these ing the learning and communication processes.
maybe taken on flexibly by different members of Facilitation strategies can be considered a form of
the team over time. Functions generally fall into modeling done by the PBL team. Such strategies
four areas: (1) structure, (2) process, (3) facilita- include pushing for explanations; restatement;
tion, and (4) community building (Tsikalas et al., summarizing; encouraging students to generate
2000). Strategies and functions related to each hypotheses; mediating content by reviewing, di-
of these areas may be assumed by any member gesting, and re-teaching; and redirecting commu-
of the PBL team or by the students themselves, nication from impasses (Hmelo-Silver & Barrows,
depending on their readiness for PBL. 2006; Tsikalas et al., 2000). Teachers are critical
Structural strategies and functions refer to facilitators in the mentoring groups (Lehman et al.,
how activities, communication, and the process 2006; Tsikalas et al., 2000). They create structures
of project development are structured. What tasks to facilitate mentoring, mediate students’ interac-
and activities will be done, when, and by whom? tions with others, and build community. Some
Who will communicate with whom, about what, help students rehearse important conversations

654
Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

and provide opportunities for students to teach and mentors; and how to organize resources and
or mentor. When teachers are involved, student individual and group spaces.
communication with mentors is often richer with Choices about modes of communication and
ideas, opinions, and emotions (Harris & Jones, technology tools should be integrated into the
1999). In some cases, teachers take on the role regular project planning process – determination
of co-mentor (Tsikalas & McMillan-Culp, 2000). of the learning goals, how the learning will be
Community building strategies and functions assessed, the skills and understandings expected
refer to sharing materials, activities, or messages as outcomes, and the activities that will enable
to promote a shared sense of purpose and benefit students to achieve those outcomes. For example,
from participation in the online community. Tsika- if a learning goal is that students understand the
las et al. (2000) found that these are undertaken by structure of a subject, students can organize in-
students, teachers, and mentors alike. For students, formation in databases (Jonassen, Carr, & Yueh,
this means primarily collaboration within their 1998) or online repositories in wikis and tag each
team. Teachers help build community by foster- item. Students can then discuss and develop their
ing a climate of collaboration in their classrooms. understanding of conceptual relationships among
Mentors support community building by helping the tags using a concept map and receive feedback
students to socialize into particular cultures; treat- from the PBL team.
ing students as colleagues; providing acceptance In general, the use of separate online tools can
and encouragement; and referring students to be confusing for new users of technology, so the
other people for assistance. use of a single comprehensive tool (e.g., a full-
The work of teachers as facilitators and project featured wiki or flexible learning management
managers is often unknown to mentors. Making system) as the main communication center is
this work visible to telementors can provide them advisable. The advantage of a wiki over a learning
with valuable insights into students’ knowledge, management system is that it can be edited and new
skills, learning styles, and communication styles. pages can be added by any member of a private
When relevant PBL team communication and wiki. At the start of a project, it is important to
collaborative work are conducted or documented post goals, project criteria, selected resources, and
in the online spaces, these four types of strate- templates that are accessible to all members of the
gies and functions can be better coordinated and PBL team, students, and telementors. During the
duplication of efforts avoided. project, wikis are an effective tool for collaborative
project planning and documentation (Parker &
Online Learning Environment Chao, 2007). They are also effective for informa-
tion or data gathering and organization, as well
The use of online tools should be carefully as organizing a personal or team research library
planned to meet learning goals, ensure ease of that tracks the research process and showcases
use, and accommodate potentially differing levels final products (Walsh & Hollister, 2009). Here,
of technological fluency among the participants. the school librarian plays the major role.
Factors to consider in structuring the online learn- Wiki pages are designed primarily for col-
ing environment include whether online commu- laborative writing. Asynchronous discussion and
nication will be synchronous, asynchronous, or feedback about wiki pages can be done through
a combination of both (and which tools to use); the page comments or page discussion features
whether communication between participants available on most wikis. Synchronous discussions
will be private or open to other project teams may be preferable for brainstorming and other
activities that require immediate response. For

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 Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

these, chat plug-ins are available on most wikis. ogy both within school and without? Can they take
The recorded communication can be used for independent initiative and work collaboratively?
further collaborative writing, self-assessment, Tsikalas et al. (2000) found that students who could
and critique by peers and the PBL team. At the communicate and collaborate well with each other
completion of the project, wiki pages and other tended to do this more effectively with telemen-
online spaces can be used for presentations and tors. They also found that mentoring relationships
portfolios. were more successful when students were aware
Telementor-student communication can be of their needs and proactive about seeking specific
done privately and asynchronously via email or assistance. The PBL team can prepare students for
synchronously via instant messaging. For group the telementoring experience by: (1) encouraging
mentoring, O’Neill (2004, p. 182) argues for the them to be open and honest with their mentors
importance of “mentoring in the open,” where about what they do not understand; (2) providing
telementoring conversations are visible to other opportunities to practice describing what they do
groups and experiences are shared. This provides and do not understand; (3) providing peer and
an opportunity for students to see exemplary tele- teacher feedback about their communication;
mentoring relationships at work and learn from and (4) educating them about the various roles
such vicarious, peripheral participation (Lave & and functions mentors may take (Tsikalas et al.,
Wenger, 1991). Public mentoring discussions can 2000, p. 10).
take place asynchronously via discussion forums The school-based members of the PBL team
and synchronously via chat plug-ins in the wiki. need a common understanding of the philosophy,
These open conversations allow telementors to principles, and practice of PBL and preferably
use the experiences of other groups to guide and some experience either as facilitators or learners.
scaffold learning, as well as to initiate peer sup- Because implementing PBL online adds complex-
port. When members of the school-based team ity, experience with implementing it first face-
also participate online or post summaries of face- to-face is beneficial (Savin-Baden, 2007, p. 39).
to-face work in the online spaces, collaboration Collaboration requires significant time and effort
is strengthened. but also brings rewards in personal learning, pro-
Issues and challenges related to mentoring in fessional development, and student achievement.
an online environment are: (1) miscommunica- In a study of a yearlong professional development
tion, due in part to the lack of nonverbal cues; course involving teacher-librarian partners who
(2) slower development of relationships online collaborated on curriculum, Yukawa and Harada
than face-to-face; (3) the need for competency (2009, p. 13-14) found that:
in written communication and technical skills;
(4) a reliable technology infrastructure; and (5) Participants characterized the relationship as
protection of privacy (McLoughlin, Brady, Lee, a partnership of equals, with teachers provid-
& Russell, 2007, p. 4). ing subject expertise and intimate knowledge of
their students and librarians providing informa-
Participant Readiness tion literacy expertise, knowledge of resources,
technology expertise, and guidance to students
The importance of student readiness cannot be through the conceptual and emotional challenges
overemphasized. Do students have sufficient of the research process. Participants appreciated
content knowledge and skills to handle the project using each other as sounding boards in deepening
successfully? Do they have the necessary skills conversations about unit and lesson planning,
with technology and access to the required technol- standards, essential questions, assessment tools,

656
Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

and information literacy instruction. A key change expect students to demonstrate as a result of their
in roles was the degree to which librarians were PBL experiences.
integral to the entire process of planning, imple-
mentation, and assessment, with joint responsibil-
ity and accountability. A valuable theme was the BENEFITS AND CHALLENGES OF
way the partnerships extended to other faculty PROJECT-BASED TELEMENTORING
at the school.
Although PBL with telementoring is time consum-
Telementors who join the PBL team from ing, many teachers feel it is worthwhile because
private and public sector organizations outside of the benefits to their students. Student benefits
of the education sector often find it a challenge include: (1) increased student engagement and
to understand how telementoring works in the motivation, (2) improved writing and speaking
school culture, which may be quite different skills, (3) improved information gathering skills,
from their organizational cultures (O’Neill et al., (4), improved reasoning and problem-solving
2005, p. 111). The role of the telementors can be skills, (5) learning science and scientific processes,
diverse and encompassing. They encourage, offer (6) learning about technology, (7) the transfer of
advice, coach, help students clarify their values learning into student performance, (8) self-directed
or goals, provide information, act as role models, learning skills, (9) improved collaboration and
help students socialize into particular cultures, cooperative learning skills, (10) opportunities
and stimulate students to acquire new knowledge to teach their peers, and (11), self-evaluation
(Tsikalas et al., 2000, p. 10-11). The most likely techniques (Abbott, 2005; Lehman et al., 2006;
mentor group configuration for PBL is one tele- Ravitz, 2009).
mentor to a small group of students, although a Interviews with volunteer telementors indicate
telementor may work with a single student or an the self-perceived benefits of telementoring: (1)
entire class. At the start of a project, telemen- doing outreach for their employers, (2) culti-
tors may need an orientation to inquiry learning, vating interest in their field, (3) increasing the
project goals and expectations, student learning representation of women and minorities in their
needs, their role as consultants, the roles of the field, (4) engaging in the pursuit of challenging
other members of the team, the school context, inquiry, (5) learning more about teaching and about
technology and software to be used, and tips on themselves, (6) giving back, and (7) realizing the
how to communicate with the students online (Ben- potential of the internet (O’Neill, 2000, p. 11-15).
nett, Heinze, Hupert, & Meade, n.d.). Advice to PBL with telementoring also brings benefits
telementors should continue as needed throughout to teachers, who value: (1) learning new teaching
the telementoring relationship. methods and strategies to increase student moti-
Using the integrated telementoring model, the vation, (2) learning more about a discipline, (3)
PBL team serves as a model for students of the learning new technologies and gaining increased
interdisciplinary teamwork that is increasingly technological competence, (4) becoming less
valued in today’s workplaces and communities. directive and more facilitative to promote student-
As the PBL team members plan, implement, centered learning, (5) seeing students’ success, (6)
manage, and facilitate project-based learning for collaboration with others, (7) increased satisfac-
students, they model the skills in collaborative tion from teaching, and (8) improved personal
problem solving, information literacy, technologi- confidence (Abbott, 2005; Friedman, Zibit, &
cal fluency, innovation, and leadership that they Coote, 2005; Lehman et al., 2006).

657
 Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

The disadvantages of PBL with telementoring for project-based learning in the context of the
include: (1) heavy demands of time and effort, (2) urgent need to help students develop new skills
problems with technology and access to technology, and literacies, and (2) to provide the framework
(3) disparity in student technology access or skills, for an integrated telementoring model to be tested
(4) classroom management problems, (5) lack of by new telementoring projects. Using this model,
sufficient materials and supplies, (6) difficulties an interdisciplinary PBL team of experts – the
with group dynamics, (7) problems covering content subject matter expert serving as telementor, the
when PBL interferes with the regular curriculum, classroom teacher, the school librarian, and the
and (8) poor collaboration and lack of support from instructional technology specialist – can provide
team members (Garcia & Rose, 2007; Lehman et students with new opportunities for holistic,
al., 2006). authentic, personally meaningful learning using
Another significant challenge is effective fa- emerging technology.
cilitation. Although facilitation is generally seen Subject matter experts as telementors en-
as one of the most important dimensions of PBL, courage, guide, instruct, and model disciplinary
Savin-Baden (2007) points out that “there has still practices and ways of thinking. Teachers manage
been relatively little discussion about what is being PBL projects and facilitate learning on many
facilitated – whether it is students’ understanding levels – the process of project-based learning,
and enactment of problem-based learning, the team the team process, community building, individual
process, the process of learning, individual learn- learning, and the achievement of the learning out-
ing, or the achievement of the learning outcomes, comes. School librarians guide students to become
and to what extent the tutor’s ability to facilitate information literate and help them navigate the
affects all these” (p. 41). increasingly complex terrain of information re-
While the process of planning, implementa- sources. Instructional technology specialists help
tion, and assessment of a telementoring project is students achieve better digital media literacy and
an important type of professional development in provide opportunities for creative expression using
itself, more structured educational opportunities for a wide array of technological tools. As a team,
learning about PBL may also be necessary. One of these experts model the skills in collaborative
the best ways to understand PBL and telementor- problem solving, information literacy, techno-
ing is for educators to experience these processes logical fluency, innovation, and leadership that
for themselves (Gareis & Nussbaum-Beach, 2007; are needed in the workplaces and communities
Hitchcock & Mylona, 2000; Weizman et al. 2008). of today and tomorrow.
Experience with telementoring, project-based and This model requires careful planning, coordi-
problem-based learning, and technology integration nation, ongoing collaboration, and a clear view
should begin with pre-service teacher education of general roles and functions with flexibility in
(Garcia & Rose, 2007; McLoughlin et al., 2007; assuming them. Important factors to consider
Price & Chen, 2003) and be extended with in-service when designing a project using the integrated
professional development (Dede, 2006; Yukawa & telementoring model are commitment to the
Harada, 2009; Weizman et al., 2008). project, learning goals, roles and functions of
participants, the online learning environment, and
participant readiness for project-based learning.
CONCLUSION While collaboration requires significant time and
effort, the rewards in personal learning, profes-
The purpose of this chapter has been two-fold: sional development, and student achievement
(1) to explore the rich potential of telementoring can be great.

658
Telementoring and Project-Based Learning

Implementation of the model cannot be Boss, S., Krauss, J., & Conery, L. (2008). Rein-
divorced from broader educational issues and venting project-based learning: Your field guide to
challenges – the need for formal instruction in real-world projects in the digital age. Eugene, OR:
new literacy skills for students and educators, International Society for Technology in Education.
professional development on learner-centered
Boud, D., & Prosser, M. (2002). Appraising new
approaches like PBL, developing and sustaining
technologies for learning: A framework for devel-
school-wide and community-based communities
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237–245. doi:10.1080/09523980210166026
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challenges are also opportunities for project-based based learning handbook. Novato, CA . Buck
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educational structure, transformations of teaching
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University, Department of Educational Technol-
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 Programs are free unless otherwise indicated

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Mentor
Learning Goal Program Target Groups Duration Mode of communication Facili-tation
Training
Project based learning The Electronic Emissary K-12 students 6 weeks to school Email, forum, chat, teleconfer- Yes Yes
One mentor per class http://emissary.wm.edu/ year encing
Project based learning International Telementor K-12 students Flexible Secure, online messaging Yes
One-to-one mentoring Program http://www.tele- system
mentor.org/index.cfm
Academic & career IBM’s MentorPlace http:// Grades 3-12 School year Face-to-face at beginning and Yes Yes
mentoring ibm.mentorplace.epals. end of school year; online
One-to-one mentoring org/WhatIs.htm messaging
Academic & career Zoey’s Room Girls age 10-14; math, Indefinite Online only via discussion list Yes
mentoring (fee-based) http://www.zoeysroom. science, technology
Many-to-many com/
Career mentoring Connecting to Success High school students at- School year Only email and school-spon- Yes Yes
One-to-one mentoring (Minnesota) http://ici. risk & with disabilities sored activities
umn.edu/ementoring/de-
fault.html
Career mentoring icouldbe http://www. Middle & high school School year Email, discussion board Yes Yes
3 mentors for each icouldbe.org/standard/ students at-risk, inner city (anonymous)
student public/lm_index.asp
Online tutoring (fee- Tutor.com Grades 4-12 homework 24/7 live homework Instant messaging
based) http://www.tutor.com/ help help
One-to-one tutoring
Online tutoring (fee- Homeworkhelp.com Grades 4-12 homework Tutorials, live home- Audio dialogue, text messaging
based) http://www.homework- help work help
One-to-one tutoring help.com/
Ask an expert GEM-SET Girls aged 13-18 Short term Discussion list (students known Yes
Career advice in sci- http://www.uic.edu/orgs/ by first name only)
APPENDIX: SELECTED K-12 TELEMENTORING PROGRAMS

ence, engineering, gem-set/index.htm

technology
Ask an expert NASA Ask an Astrophysi- General One-time question- Email
Astrophysics cist http://imagine.gsfc. and-answer
nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/
ask_an_astronomer.html
Ask an expert Drexel University, Math K-12 students One-time question- Email
Math Forum, Ask Dr. Math and-answer
http://mathforum.org/
dr.math/

ing, edited by Deborah A. Scigliano, pp. 31-56, copyright 2011 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).
This work was previously published in Telementoring in the K-12 Classroom: OnlineCommunication Technologies for Learn-
Telementoring and Project-Based Learning
 665

Chapter 3.10
Developing Educational
Screencasts:
A Practitioner’s Perspective

Damien Raftery
Institute of Technology Carlow, Ireland

ABSTRACT amined, including pedagogical and instructional

design issues. Next a four-step process for creating
YouTube to iTunes, company to college web- a screencast will be presented: prepare, capture,
sites, there is a seemingly exponential explosion produce and publish. Prior to conclusions and
in creating screencasts. A screencast is a digital final reflections, future research directions will
recording of computer screen activity, often with be examined.
an audio commentary. Short and engaging, scre-
encasts have the potential to enable learning in
new and exciting ways. They are becoming easier INTRODUCTION
to create and, as a teacher in higher education, I
have gradually increased my use of screencasts, The other day I wanted to embed a YouTube
learning with experience and from the generally video into a PowerPoint presentation: to link and
positive feedback from students. view directly a video on YouTube, rather than
Drawing on existing research and personal hyperlink out to an internet browser or embed
experience, this chapter will introduce screencasts the downloaded video file. I didn’t know how
and discuss their potential. The importance of to do this, so I searched YouTube and hey presto
integrating screencasts thoughtfully and carefully a series of videos appeared. Selecting the first
into the teaching and learning process will be ex- video, I watched a screencast showing how to
do the task I wanted to do myself. I was able to
watch it, pausing at places and switching to my
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch310

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Developing Educational Screencasts

presentation to embed the video I wanted. As with examining in more detail what a screencast
well as the basic process, the screencast gave a is and sharing some personal experiences of using
number of tips. Less than ten minutes later I had screencasts with students.
completed my task.
A screencast is often used to capture how-to-
do-something, for example how to use particular EDUCATIONAL SCREENCASTS
software. In the vignette above, I learnt and
practiced a new skill: I had an immediate need, I A screencast is a digital recording of computer
found help in a form that was immediate, under- screen activity, often containing audio narration.
standable and engaging, and I used that help to It is sometimes referred to as a video podcast
complete my task. or simply a video, and also as a scrast (verbally
Increasingly educators are blending more shortening the word screencast to one syllable).1
online elements with traditional face-to-face A screencast gives a look over my shoulder effect
teaching, often by simply using a virtual learn- similar to one-on-one instruction and can be ac-
ing environment (VLE) to provide notes and cessed whenever and wherever it is convenient
other documentation as well as to communicate (Educause, 2006). Students particularly value
with students. As part of a multimedia approach this, flexibly using screencasts to support their
(combinations of video, animations, images, text learning and thereby allowing for greater learner
and sound) to blended learning, screencasts of- independence. A screencast usually has control
fer a multimedia-rich option to support student buttons, enabling it to be paused and particular
learning in particular contexts (such as learning sections to be replayed: this level of learner control
a new skill as above). Thus a screencast can be over pace is important (Oud, 2009, p. 169). The
a standalone multimedia learning object or can combination of video and audio appeals to different
be part of a series that together comprise a fuller learning styles (as an alternative to predominantly
learning resource, or indeed be part of a learning text-based learning materials) and, as it is produced
object that integrates a screencast(s) with other locally, it may be more approachable than glitzy
hypermedia elements. Screencasts are becoming packaged instructional videos (Kanter, 2008).
easier to create: a computer, some software and Short, sharply focused screencasts can be very
a microphone is enough. At the simplest, it could useful in supporting students, working at their own
be adding a voiceover to a presentation, perhaps pace, to achieve learning outcomes. Screencasts
by using the narration feature within Microsoft are particularly useful for teaching software ap-
PowerPoint. A little more complicated is record- plications and showing how to use online tools
ing on-screen activity with explanatory labels or such as websites and library catalogues, having
a voiceover. With more effort, a screencast can the following benefits over reading step-by-step
integrate some interactivity, including clickable instructions, as identified by Mount and Chambers
zones and quizzes. The time, resources and ex- (2008): ‘improving student cognition through im-
pertise required increases with the complexity of proved information integration, reduced informa-
the screencast. tion redundancy and an improved representation
So what exactly is a screencast? How does of the dynamics of software operation’ (p. 49).
one go about creating a screencast? What are the They can provide engaging revision materials
pedagogical and instructional design, technical and and, like other learning materials, are particularly
practical issues involved? And, of course, why do valued by students if focused on preparing for as-
it? What are the benefits for learners? The rest of sessments. Screencasts can be used to give short
the chapter will explore these questions, starting presentations (mini-lectures of voiceovers over

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Developing Educational Screencasts

images or PowerPoint slides). These short teach- a student to watch the screencast exactly when
ing episodes are best used for topic overviews, needed, as often as they wanted with full control
difficult concepts and guidelines for the module, to pause and replay particular sections. Thus
projects and assessments as well as for just-in-time students could spend more time on task, as well
support for project- or problem-based approaches. as freeing more time for me to assist individual
Other potential uses include explaining model so- students. Together with a number of screencasts
lutions, correcting and giving feedback, answering showing how to do a sample assessment, this
frequently asked questions (FAQs) and website series of screencasts formed a reference bank that
testing. Using a tablet and wireless pen together students could draw upon as and when needed,
with software for writing on the screen, mathcasts including when revising.
(screencasts where the solution to a maths problem Screencasts showing a suggested approach
is hand-written to an accompanying voiceover to completing the tasks of a sample assessment
explanation (see Budgett, Cumming, & Miller, are, like everything explicitly linked to assess-
2007; Bonnington, Oates, Parnell, Paterson, & ment, very popular with students. Useful also
Stratton, 2007; Fahlberg, Fahlberg-Stojanovska, are screencasts of solutions to assessments, es-
& MacNeil, 2007) and other screencasts incor- pecially if released prior to results: they provide
porating writing, drawings and highlighting can valuable feedback (and also can be used in future
be created. iterations of the module as further sample assess-
ments). Moreover, a reference bank of screencasts
Personal Experiences introducing a topic, such as the ‘introduction to
spreadsheets’ screencasts as described in the vi-
A number of years ago, as part of a quantitative gnette above, can subsequently be used in more
techniques module, I introduced first-year students advanced courses as a quick revision for students
to spreadsheets and then looked at their applica- to go through prior to classes; this has the benefit
tions to financial mathematics and statistics. In a of encouraging students to engage prior to the first
computer lab, students first worked through some class as well as establishing a minimum starting
generic introductory exercises focused on basic level. Groups of screencasts can also be used as
skills and then progressed to applying these skills a first point of reference for former students who
and learning new ones by tackling subject-specific make contact asking for help on using software
exercises. I would often explain new spreadsheet applications, which usually enables them to resolve
features using a digital projector, requiring the their difficulties by themselves.
entire class to stop and watch, irrespective of Initial feedback from students has been very
their progress. The disadvantage of these helpful positive (similar to Bush, 2008; Peterson, 2007;
interruptions was that the timing did not suit all Winterbottom, 2007). Consistently for the past five
the students and thus some would fail to get the years, in end-of-module evaluations for computer
full benefit of these explanations. lab-based subjects, most students indicate that the
Changing to an alternative approach, I created available screencasts have been very useful and,
a series of short screencasts (using the four-step that for future iterations of the module, more should
process explained later in this chapter) that intro- be produced. Accessed through the college’s vir-
duced the basic features of spreadsheets as needed tual learning environment, the screencasts provide
by the introductory exercises (each exercise listed students with rich, multimedia online content to
the relevant screencasts). Students were now complement face-to-face classes. The VLE also
free to work through the exercises, watching the provides a platform for the integration of scre-
relevant screencast(s) as required. This allowed

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 Developing Educational Screencasts

encasts into the module, so that they naturally Screencasts need to be integrated into the teaching
support other activities and materials. and learning process, with attention to their design
Recently, one week prior to a test, I uploaded and use so as to avoid passivity and encourage
to the VLE a series of four mathcasts (two to three engagement: students doing tasks, thinking and
minutes each) showing the handwritten develop- solving problems.
ment of the solution to a number of mathematics The profusion of screencasts on the internet,
problems. The screencasts were presented with the on YouTube and on specific websites such as
questions, so that prior to viewing the screencast www.teachertrainingvideos.com (a collection of
the student could read and indeed was encouraged screencasts for teachers to help them to incorpo-
to attempt the question. In the week prior to the rate technology into their teaching) and www.
test, over half the students in the class accessed demogirl.com (a blog with short screencasts ex-
the resource and nearly a quarter on two or three plaining new internet applications and services),
different days. A small number of students watched links to a dilemma that faces a teacher considering
the screencasts over the weekend, with the heaviest using screencasts: should you just link to useful
use in the day before and the morning of the exam. screencasts you find on the internet, or create
The screencasts were viewed both during the day your own? Creating screencasts involves time,
and into the late evening. Feedback from students pedagogy and technology, with an important
a week after the exam (via a short anonymous in- trade-off between final screencast quality and
class survey) showed a positive and enthusiastic sophistication, and the time taken to develop it.
attitude, indicating that almost all students would Getting the balance right can be difficult, but may
like to see more of this type of support and that be answered by keeping the benefits to students
using it helps to get a higher grade, with about clearly in mind: sometimes it’s better to link to
three quarters of students thinking that this type of a screencast produced elsewhere, other times
online solution is very useful for them personally. preferable to create your own. Prior to presenting
Students used the online solutions in a variety of a four-step process for creating a screencast, the
ways, from just quickly watching them, through next section will consider some pedagogical and
thinking carefully about the question before instructional design issues.
watching, to trying the question and then watch-
ing the solution (or fast-forwarding to the end to Integrating Screencasts into the
check their answer). Some students study together Teaching and Learning Process
in groups, only resorting to the mathcasts if the
group cannot solve the problem. A reservation that All teaching starts with a learner’s need. Screen-
surfaced among a substantial minority, particularly casts are created by teachers to assist the learning
from those who did not use the mathcasts, was process of students, to help students achieve learn-
the inability to print the solutions. ing outcomes. As the goal is to support student
This vignette illustrates the potential of scre- learning, it should always first be asked whether
encasts: students engaging with revision materi- a screencast approach is the most appropriate
als prior to an assessment. They did not all use and effective way to accomplish this. Only after
the online solution, and those that did used the reflecting on this should screencasts be created.
mathcasts in a variety of ways, a way that suited Thus screencasts should be pedagogically led
them. It raises the importance of being aware of rather than technology led: in short, when creating
individual differences and preferences for differ- a screencast, think about the learner. It is advis-
ent ways of engaging with the materials. How able, like with other teaching innovations, to start
screencasts are presented to students is important.

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small and build on initial successes, learning what Careful preparation is crucial to the creation
works best for your students. of high quality educational screencasts of high
Create bite-sized screencasts: it is better for value to students. When creating a screencast,
students to choose from a series of short, clearly balance the time and effort involved against the
focused screencasts than to have to navigate potential benefits for learners. Also consider
a smaller number of longer ones: two to four whether the screencast is to be of limited use, by
minutes, definitely less than ten minutes (see a small number of students for a short period of
Cann, 2007). Shorter screencasts are more flex- time? Or should you expend more time and effort
ible for reusing with other learners and can be to create a screencast of higher quality that can
updated more easily. Each screencast should have be productively used by a variety of learners over
a specific, clear purpose (ideally focused on one a longer time-span across different modules and
learning outcome), such as contexts? This extra effort may be rewarded if
screencasts can be shared, either internally within
• introducing a module a college or externally via YouTube or a national
• providing guidelines or giving an overview repository of learning objects.
• reviewing a difficult concept A potential and real criticism of screencasts
• previewing a forthcoming lecture, review- is that they can have a teacher focus rather than
ing or summarising a previous lecture student focus and can lack interactivity (Edu-
• illustrating the steps to solve a problem cause, 2006), and thus may encourage passivity
• explaining a technical diagram or picture in learners, an attitude of just sit back and watch.
• demonstrating a software or website fea- To counteract this, think carefully how students
ture (particularly useful for software that can be encouraged to be active when using scre-
students have limited access to) encasts (a criticism and response that was also
• supporting an activity or project considered by Franciszkowicz (2008) when using
• revising for a test screencasts to teach problem-solving skills and
• answering frequently asked questions conceptual understanding in a general chemistry
• correcting or giving feedback module). If possible, add some interactions. These
could be some quiz elements, such as answering
Combined together, a series of screencasts multiple-choice questions or dragging and drop-
can form a reference bank (as discussed earlier) ping. It could be the addition of clickable zones,
that can be used as a comprehensive resource for example where a student must click on the
for independent study and revision, a support correct button to get a software demonstration to
for project work and a starting point for more continue. At the most basic, it could simply be a
advanced modules. Note that for students viewing requirement to click a button to continue, paired
on campus, particularly in computer labs, consid- with an instruction or exhortation to think or do
eration of whether to use audio is required: Will something before continuing. For example, if
all students have headsets or should an alternative illustrating how to solve a question, such as an
no-audio screencast with captions also be pro- accounting or engineering problem, the screencast
duced? Veronikas and Maushak (2005) concluded, could display the question and then pause, instruct-
from a small research study, that students learning ing the student to read it carefully and consider
software applications prefer audio and text, rather how to proceed. The student could then click to
than text only despite no statistically significant view how to approach the question, with an audio
evidence that audio improves test scores (p. 204). explanation linked to underlining or highlighting
on screen the key terms and numbers. Then the

669
 Developing Educational Screencasts

student might be requested to attempt the question, development of educational multimedia, specifi-
only viewing when having completed their solu- cally screencasts, is based upon the application
tion as best they can. As the learner can forward of appropriate research, such as the psychology
and rewind, they can focus on specific areas of research on cognitive load theory summarised
difficulty, watching these sections a number of above. Instructional design is the use of systematic
times. The solution could be partitioned into design procedures, thereby making, according to
stages, with pauses at each transition. Gustafson and Branch (2002), ‘instruction more
There is an element of ‘watch what I do’ in a effective, efficient and relevant than less rigor-
screencast: this can be useful, enabling the stu- ous approaches to planning instruction’ (p. 18).
dent to watch an expert at work, thereby offering Fundamental to all systematic design approaches
a scaffold for undertaking the activity herself/ are the following elements: analysis, design, de-
himself. Some interactivity giving feedback velopment, implementation and evaluation (often
may be incorporated into the screencast itself, referred to by their acronym ADDIE). (Readers
as discussed above. This increases the complex- interested in instructional design are directed to
ity of the screencast, requiring greater time and the References and Additional Reading sections.)
expertise to create it; indeed many screen capture In the next section, the four-step model proposed
softwares may not support this, or it may be easier for creating a screencast broadly corresponds to
to create a simple screencast and build the other the middle three elements of the ADDIE model.
elements separately. This latter approach is where
screencasts may bring audio-visually rich media Creating a Screencast
to an online learning activity, a form of reusable
learning object (RLO). Alternatively, it may be The motivation for creating a screencast is to
better to create simple screencasts and then care- support learning. The process builds naturally on
fully consider how these can support learning in existing teaching expertise, often using low thresh-
conjunction with activities designed for students old applications (i.e. technology with a relatively
to undertake. short learning curve, Gilbert 2002). As shown in
Oud (2009) presents a useful summary of the Figure 1 the process to create a screencast can be
implications stemming from the limited capacity envisioned in four steps:
of short-term or working memory and how this The process starts with preparation, careful
limits learners’ capacities for information process- consideration of a teaching activity and learning
ing. When too much information is presented, opportunity. With a computer, screen capture
learners’ ‘working memory is overloaded and software and a microphone, educational screen-
they cannot process anything well, which leads casts can quickly be created that are of immediate
to poor understanding, retention and learning’ use and value. Voiceovers can be captured when
(p. 166). Thus when creating a screencast, it is recording the screencast or added later during the
important to minimise the cognitive load. This production process. The production process can
leads to practical recommendations (see below in be elaborate, including the addition of captions
the Capture section). Of particular importance is and other visual cues, additional voiceovers and
chunking, the splitting of longer or more complex interactive elements such as quiz questions. Al-
content into small sections (p. 167). ternatively, given usual time pressures, this pre-
Instructional design approaches are valu- deployment step can be minimised to simply
able for informing the screencast development publishing the screencast in the required technical
process. An instructional design approach to the format (Costello, 2008). Then the screencast can

670
Developing Educational Screencasts

Figure 1. Four-step screen capture process (with a summary of each step)

be deployed via a virtual learning environment, as well as the importance of particular features,
a blog, an intranet or the Internet. Although Fig- such as being able to add quiz elements, modify
ure 1 presents the four steps as a linear process, menu options, accessibility features and publish-
the boundaries are fuzzy and, similar to the AD- ing format options.
DIE model, there may be jumps back and forth In the following four sections, each of the four
and reiterations. steps will be discussed in terms of instructions and
For capturing a screencast, there are both hard- tips for creating educational screencasts.
ware and software requirements. The computer
needs to be sufficiently powerful to run the capture Prepare
software plus any target applications that you
are recording. The same general issues apply to Plan your recording carefully. Know what you
sound quality as when producing a podcast and an want to show, to do and what you want to say.
inexpensive microphone headset usually suffices. Be aware of what your students already know.
For capturing handwriting on the screen, such as It may be useful to create a storyboard, a ‘vi-
for mathcasts, a tablet laptop is likely to result in sual representation which illustrates the content,
much clearer handwriting than an external USB navigation and structure of the learning materials’
tablet and it is easier to use for annotations as you (Clarke, 2001, p. 173). Use the storyboard to help
are writing on the actual screen. Software that is the chunking of complex sections into simpler
useful here includes Microsoft OneNote, PDF pieces. For short, simple screencasts, the story-
Annotator and Microsoft PowerPoint, as well as board can be an overview of the major elements.
drawing tools such as Microsoft Paint. For longer screencasts, the storyboard may be
There are many capture software options more elaborate, detailing each major element or
available, from sophisticated packages with pow- screen display. If the storyboard indicates a long
erful capture and editing features such as Adobe screencast, consider whether it is possible to break
Captivate and Camtasia to simple, free options it into a series of two or more shorter screencasts.
that simply publish what you capture without any Remember at this stage to think carefully how
editing such as Jing and Screenr.com.2 These four students are likely to use the screencast and what
software options all include screencasts show- cues you can incorporate to encourage them to be
ing how to use the particular software to create active when using the screencast.
screencasts (see links in Additional Reading). Decide when to record the audio. For short
Your choice of software should be dictated by the simple screencasts you may decide to record
extent to which you wish to edit your screencasts, narration as you capture the screen activity. For

671
 Developing Educational Screencasts

longer screencasts, it may be easier to record the and end with a summary; split content into small
audio separately after capturing the screen activ- segments/chunks; sequence content logically; use
ity. For example, if demonstrating how to use a words (text or audio, not both) with graphics; pro-
website, it may be better to first edit out any time vide clear interface, navigation and instructions;
waiting for pages to load and any glitches before remove unnecessary graphics, text and audio; and,
adding the voiceover. Also recording the audio focus attention on important areas with visual or
afterwards allows you when screen capturing to verbal cues.
focus on doing clear screen actions. Consider us- A pragmatic approach is to record a rough run-
ing a script: the trade-off is between spontaneity through, review it and then record the main version.
and naturalness versus a professional, confident For a short screencast, if you make a mistake you
narration mostly free of ums and ahs. An added could just restart recording rather than having to
benefit of a script is that it can be used as a tran- edit. For longer screencasts, errors can be edited
script or for closed captions. out during the produce stage.
To summarise, a teacher creates screencasts to
help learning happen. Creating good screencasts Produce
depends on ‘planning a session with an eye to-
ward its being recorded and on thoughtful editing The produce stage may be extensive, short or omit-
afterwards’ (Educause, 2006). Careful planning ted entirely (especially in the case of screencasts
and thoughtful reflection can assist in translating that are not to be used extensively). Start with
teaching activities into useful screencasts: indeed editing the video, removing glitches and unneeded
this preparation is key to the capture stage in the elements such as video showing the loading of
creation of educational screencasts. webpages. Edit the audio, removing ums and ahs
(or record the narration at this point). Make the
Capture modifications decided upon in the prepare stage:
add captions as appropriate (or edit captions that
After your planning, you should know exactly what have been automatically created by your screen
you are going to record. If recording audio, use capture software), whilst remembering not to
a quiet room with telephones turned off. Ensure overburden the viewer with too many simultane-
that any other applications will not interfere with ous elements; use text animation, highlighting
the recording, for example an email application and zoom effects to focus attention and reinforce
beeping or otherwise alerting that a new email has important points; and, add interactivity such as
arrived. Indeed you should close any unneeded clickable zones and buttons, quiz elements or
applications. A tip when recording is to record only simply pauses with exhortations to think.
the application window or a defined area, and to If your screen software capture allows, modify
consider recording at low screen resolution (such the default menu (player) options to your desired
as 800x600). It is important to be aware of any configuration, ensuring to allow learners substan-
quirks of your screen capture software that may tial control. Now the screencast should be ready
result in glitches in your recording. For software to publish.
demonstrations, make clear mouse movements
at a pace that is suitable for learners to follow. Publish
Be conscious of instructional design principles.
In particular use strategies to minimise cognitive The publish stage of the screencast creation pro-
load such as the following guidelines suggested cess involves creating the final screencast file(s)
by Oud (2009, pp. 176–177): start with an outline in a technical format suitable for use by learners.

672
Developing Educational Screencasts

Depending on the software used to capture and be questions as to the effectiveness of screencasts
process the screencast, there may be a variety of op- in improving learning for students; for example
tions, such as Macromedia Flash (swf), Windows Lee, Pradhan, and Dalgarno, (2008) report on a
Media Video (wmv), Audio Video Interleave (AVI) research project in which screencasts were used to
or executable (exe). Screencasts can be delivered support the teaching of programming, finding ‘no
on a variety of platforms, primarily streamed significant effect of the provision of screencasts
via the internet for watching via a browser with during learning’ (p. 75). The level of complexity
suitable media player, but also downloadable for of the task or subject matter for the screencast is
later viewing on a computer or portable device important, with Bhowmick, Khasawnehb, Bowl-
capable of playing video (although note that the ing, Gramopadhyea, and Melloya (2007) finding
small display size of some portable devices may that for complex procedural tasks ‘a combination
be insufficient to display certain screencasts in of audio, video and synchronized text yields the
sufficient detail). For example, Adobe Captivate best results both in terms of learning performance
creates Flash files to be viewed via a browser, and process efficiency’ (p. 615). Given the devel-
also creating the HTML code for launching the opment of national repositories for reusable learn-
screencast.3 It can also create Windows executable ing objects (RLOs) such as the National Digital
files (not requiring any other software) and AVI Learning Repository Project (NDLR) in Ireland,
(which can be further processed for uploading to Jorum in the United Kingdom and MERLOT in
YouTube). the USA, it is appropriate to consider the develop-
It is straightforward to upload these files to a ment of quality screencasts that are reusable by
VLE, a blog, an intranet or the Internet. Decide students on a variety of programmes, in different
whether to only allow the screencasts to be viewed ways and contexts.
online, or to permit downloading for offline A potential criticism of the four-step screen
viewing. Some issues may arise regarding file capture process presented above is that, unlike the
size and server space if uploading a large number ADDIE model, it does not explicitly include an
of screencasts (particularly within a VLE where evaluation stage. There is a need for the evaluation
each file must be uploaded separately to differ- of the use and effectiveness of screencasts in a
ent courses). A solution is to host separately and variety of intents and contexts. These evaluations
to post links to the VLE. For students viewing and related research should inform the develop-
screencasts from home, large file sizes necessitate ment of evidence-based recommendations for
having broadband. A separate issue is how students good practice in the creation and use of educational
should be notified of new screencasts. Within a screencasts.
VLE, they may be uploaded to the relevant sec- It is incumbent on teachers who develop scre-
tion, possibly accompanied by an announcement encasts to become proficient with the technology.
or email notification. However those who create screencasts also need
to become familiar and draw upon research in
areas such as instructional design, pedagogy, edu-
FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS cational psychology and accessibility. This should
be viewed within the context of major change in
Screencasts are very popular with students and higher education underpinned by technology and
many teachers in higher education are exploring the attending change in the role of the academic
their use. Although most practitioner-reported (see Davidson-Shivers, 2002).
experience views screencasts positively, there may

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 Developing Educational Screencasts

CONCLUSION AND REFLECTIONS to rethink the use of classroom time, to create space
for implementing more active learning strategies.
Simple, short screencasts are quick and easy Screencasts indeed have the potential to enable
to produce, popular with students and can help learning in new and exciting ways. Screencasts
learning happen. The combination of text, audio can be used to support greater learner indepen-
and video is engaging. Screencasts can be used dence and may allow for a change in how lectures,
for many purposes, for instance to introduce a tutorials and lab sessions are used, with less time
module, give an overview or review a difficult spent presenting and more time spent on students
concept, illustrate how to solve a problem, explain doing things. It is important to reflect on the
a technical diagram or picture, show how to use strengths and weaknesses of screencasts to be able
software or a website, and give feedback. Students to harness their potential, as well as to draw upon
can flexibly use short, sharply focused screencasts pedagogical and instructional design principles in
how, when and where they want. their development. In particular, it is essential to
To create a screencast, you need a computer, carefully integrate screencasts into the teaching
some software and a microphone. There are many and learning process to support students’ active
software choices, with more powerful options engagement with their learning.
having a steeper learning curve. Time is often the
major issue, whether to capture a simple screencast
and publish with little editing or to expend greater REFERENCES
effort in creating a screencast together with inter-
active elements that is of use by a greater number Bhowmicka, A., Khasawnehb, M. T., Bowling,
of students in a wider context. S. R., Gramopadhyea, A. K., & Melloya, B. J.
When introducing screencasts into a module, (2007). Evaluation of alternate multimedia for
there are some personal considerations. Screen- web-based asynchronous learning. International
casts, like full digital recordings of lectures, are Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 37, 615–629.
a more public form of teaching. This combined doi:10.1016/j.ergon.2007.04.004
with the possibility of the digital recording of Bonnington, C. P., Oates, G., Parnell, S., Paterson,
mistakes (Do you want to appear on YouTube? J., & Stratton, W. (2007). A report on the use of
See Young, 2009) may enable possible misuse tablet technology and screen recording software
by students and criticism of presentation style by in tertiary mathematics courses. In A. D’Arcy-
colleagues (see Budgett et al., 2007). This open- Warmington, V. Martinez Luaces, G. Oates, & C.
ness is broadly positive, but requires a certain Varsavsky (Eds.), Vision and change for a new
level of confidence. Another issue may arise: if century, Proceedings of Calafate Delta’07: 6th
recording mini-lectures, software demonstrations Southern Hemisphere Conference on Mathemat-
and explanations for model solutions of questions, ics and Statistics Teaching and Learning (pp.
will students stop coming to class? No, I would 19-32). Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://www.
tentatively suggest; it is likely that screencast bonnington.org/publications/TabletLectureRe-
use and class attendance are positively corre- cording.pdf
lated, consistent with the findings of Grabe and
Christopherson (2007) who found that the use of Budgett, S., Cumming, J., & Miller, C. (2007). The
online lecture resources, lecture attendance and role of Screencasting in statistics courses. Paper
examination performance were positively related. presented at the International Statistical Institute
Screencasts do need to be thoughtfully integrated conference, Lisbon.
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Bush, M. (2008). Screencasting as a vehicle for Grabe, M., & Christopherson, K. (2007). Optional
learning & teaching. Project application, London: student use of online lecture resources: Resource
South Bank University. Retrieved April 1, 2009, preferences, performance and lecture attendance.
from http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/lteu/documents/ Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 24(1),
ltip0809/LTiPInd0809MBush.pdf 1–10.
Cann, A. J. (2007). Podcasting is dead. Long live Gustafson, K. L., & Branch, R. M. (2002). What is
video! Bioscience Education ejournal, 10. Re- instructional design? In Reiser, R. A., & Dempsey,
trieved April 1, 2009, from http://www.bioscience. J. V. (Eds.), Trends and issues in instructional
heacademy.ac.uk/journal/vol10/beej-10-C1.pdf design and technology (pp. 16–25). New Jersey:
Merrill Prentice Hall.
Clarke, A. (2001). Designing computer-based
learning materials. Aldershot: Gower. Kanter, B. (2008). Screencasting primer. Webpage.
Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://screencast-
Costello, E. (2008). Developing educational re-
ingprimer.wikispaces.com/primer
sources using Camtasia Studio. National Digital
Learning Repository Project (NDLR) workshop Lee, M. J. W., Pradhan, S., & Dalgarno, B. (2008).
presentation. Retrieved March 20, 2008, from The effectiveness of screencasts and cognitive
http://www.ndlr.ie/mshe tools as scaffolding for novice object-oriented
programmers. Journal of Information Technology
Davidson-Shivers, G. V. (2002). Instructional
Education, 7, 61–80.
technology in higher education . In Reiser, R. A.,
& Dempsey, J. V. (Eds.), Trends and issues in in- Mount, N., & Chambers, C. (2008). Podcasting
structional design and technology (pp. 256–268). and practicals. In G. Salmon, & P. Edirisingha
New Jersey: Merrill Prentice Hall. (Eds.), Podcasting for learning in universities
(pp. 43-56). Berkshire: Open University Press.
Educause (2006). 7 things you should know about
... Screencasting. EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative Oud, J. (2009). Guidelines for effective online in-
Brief. Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://net. struction using multimedia screencasts. Reference
educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7003.pdf Services Review, 37(2), 164-177. Retrieved June
19, 2009, from http://www.ingentaconnect.com/
Educause (2007). 7 things you should know about
content/mcb/240/2009/00000037/00000002/
... RSS. EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative Brief.
art00004
Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://net.educause.
edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7024.pdf Peterson, E. (2007). Incorporating screencasts
in online teaching. The International Review of
Fahlberg, T., Fahlberg-Stojanovska, L., & Mac-
Research in Open and Distance Learning, 8(3).
Neil, G. (2007). Whiteboard math movies. Teach-
Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://www.irrodl.
ing Mathematics and Its Applications, 26(1),
org/index.php/irrodl/article/viewArticle/495/935
17–22. doi:10.1093/teamat/hrl012
Veronikas, S. W., & Maushak, N. (2005). Ef-
Franciszkowicz, M. (2008). Video-based ad-
fectiveness of audio on screen captures in soft-
ditional instruction. Journal of the Research
ware application instruction. [from http://www.
Center for Educational Technology, 4(2), 5-14.
proquest.com.eresources.shef.ac.uk]. Journal of
Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://www.rcetj.
Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 14(2),
org/?type=art&id=90059& Gilbert, S. (2002).
199–205. Retrieved July 20, 2009.
Low threshold applications. Webpage. Retrieved
July 5, 2002, from http://www.tltgroup.org/re-
sources/rltas.html

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 Developing Educational Screencasts

Winterbottom, S. (2007). Virtual lecturing: Deliv- http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com: Russell

ering lectures using screencasting and podcasting Stannard’s website is a collection of screencasts
technology. Planet, 8. Retrieved April 1, 2009, to help teachers incorporate technology into
from http://www.gees.ac.uk/planet/p18/sw.pdf their teaching. It demonstrates the usefulness of
screencasts, and has a series of screencasts on
Young, J. R. (2009). Caught (unfortunately) on
using Camtasia.
tape. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 55(28),
A17. Retrieved April 1, 2009, from http://chroni- Salmon, G., & Edirisingha, P. (Eds.). (2008). Pod-
cle.com/free/v55/i28/28a01701.htm casting for Learning in Universities. Berkshire:
Open University Press. Comprehensive book on
podcasting, including a useful chapter by Mount
and Chambers on their research on screencasting
ADDITIONAL READING
for software practicals.
a website of a professional screencast creation http://www.mathcasts.org: Tim Fahlberg’s website
company, including examples, a blog and a short is a useful starting point for those interested in
screencast overview of the company approach creating mathcasts (or simply recording writing
to creating screencasts (http://scraster.com/82/ and drawing on a screen). He also showcases
scraster-professional-screencasting-a-3-minute- pencasts, created using the Pulse SmartPen which
introduction-2)http://scraster.com digitally records writing and your voice as you
http://screenr.com: a website that allows you to write on paper.
create screencasts directly from your browser with Twitter. http://demogirl.com: a blog with short
no software to install. For free, you can create screencasts explaining new internet applications
your screencast, preview it (no editing) and then and services, useful to see some good screencasts
upload for hosting on screenr.com, download as and Molly McDonald explains how she makes
MP4 or upload to YouTube. It integrates with a screencast (http://demogirl.com/2008/01/14/
http://www.screencast.com: a website that allows want-to-see-how-i-make-a-screencast)
you to upload and share screencasts, presentations, http://www.adobe.com: website for Adobe Capti-
documents and images. Integrates with Jing and vate, where you can download a fully functioning
Camtasia. trial, get help and tips from the Developer Center,
Branch, R. M. (2009). Instructional design: The watch example screencasts and visit the blog.
ADDIE approach. London: Springer. A general http://www.techsmith.com: website for Camtasia,
instructional design primer focused on fundamen- where you can download a fully functioning trial,
tal ADDIE principles. go on a product tour, watch tutorials and visit a
Oud, J. (2009). Guidelines for effective online section on using Camtasia in education.
instruction using multimedia screencasts. Refer- http://www.jingproject.com: website for Jing,
ence Services Review, 37(2). Written from an where you can download Jing or upgrade to Jing
academic library instruction perspective, this Pro, read about Jing’s features, watch screencasts
journal article presents a summary of research in demonstrating how to use Jing and visit the Help
cognitive psychology, education and librarian- Center.
ship from which useful guidelines for designing
educational screencasts are derived.

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Developing Educational Screencasts

http://www.lynda.com: website of provider of sound, adding captions, clickable zones and

educational materials on using technology. Many buttons, highlighting and much more) as well
of their courses comprise of a series of screencasts as the development of e-learning objects
and the site provides an opportunity to review with quizzes and branching scenarios. It is
some high quality screencasts. part of a suite of e-learning tools. Captivate
incorporates a good text-to-speech con-
http://www.rlo-cetl.ac.uk: website of the Centre
verter and supports accessibility features like
for Excellence in the design, development and use
closed captioning. Like Camtasia, it has a
of learning objects. They define an RLO as ‘a web-
presentation feature seamlessly enabling the
based interactive chunk of e-learning designed to
narration of a PowerPoint presentation. The
explain a stand-alone learning objective’. RLOs
power of Captivate does come with a learning
can contain screencasts and this website has many
curve, especially for those less technically
good examples.
literate. Both Captivate and Camtasia have
fully functioning trial versions that can be
used for 30 days, with integrated screencasts
ENDNOTES demonstrating how to use the main features.
A simpler option that can be used to quickly
1
Note Educause’s (2006) definition of a scre- produce screencasts, especially throwaway
encast as ‘a screen capture of the actions on (one-use) or limited-use ones, is Jing. Jing
a user’s computer screen, typically with ac- makes the capture very straightforward. The
companying audio, distributed through RSS’ free version allows screen captures of up to
(p.1); thus a student will have subscribed to five minutes to be recorded, with audio if
the teacher’s RSS feed which will automati- desired. Jing, in conjunction with Screencast.
cally highlight any new screencasts that have com (www.screencast.com), makes it easy
been added since the student last logged in to upload your screencast to the internet, in
(Educause, 2007). the process generating a unique URL to link
2
I have used a variety of software, starting to and the HTML code to embed it within
with Viewletbuilder (www.qarbon.com), your VLE, blog or other webpages (similar to
then switching to Adobe Captivate (www. the options for linking to a YouTube video).
adobe.com) and most recently testing Jing Disadvantages however include, as well as
(www.jingproject.com). Another very popu- the five minute limit, not being able to add
lar screen capture software, particularly in captions, indeed not to edit the screencast
higher education, is Camtasia (www.tech- at all nor to add audio after screen capture,
smith.com). Note that there are many soft- as well as the commercial branding of Jing
ware options to choose from. The choice of at the end of screencasts produced. These
software is a balance between sophistication can be partly overcome by moving to the
of features, ease of use and financial cost. professional version (which allows removal
If you want to create a professional screen- of commercial branding as well as an easy
cast, usable over time by many students and upload to YouTube) or by bringing the SWF
reusable by others, using a professional tool file generated by Jing into Camtasia for ed-
such as Captivate or Camtasia is advisable. iting. At this early stage of my experience
Captivate, which I am more familiar with, of working with Jing, it seems a promising
has many features enabling full editing of option for colleagues who wish to produce
your screencast (editing of recording and the occasional screencast for use by their

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 Developing Educational Screencasts

own students and I can see myself increas- 3

It is sometimes useful to create a simple
ingly using it for limited-use screencasts (or webpage with links to a series of screencasts
alternatively Screenr.com, a new web-based that students can open as full screen in a
option offering similar features). However separate browser window. These files can
the editing power of Captivate means it be put into one zipped file and uploaded as
likely that I will continue to use it or simi- a package file (for example, when uploading
larly powerful screen-capture software for content in Blackboard choose ‘Unpackage
producing screencasts that will be used more this file’ to allow the online display of the
widely. zipped material, pointing to the index page
from which the screencasts will be launched).

This work was previously published in Critical Design and Effective Tools for E-Learning in Higher Education: Theory into
Practice, edited by Roisin Donnelly, Jen Harvey and Kevin O’Rourke, pp. 213-226, copyright 2010 by Information Science
Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 679

Chapter 3.11
Teaching IT Through
Learning Communities in
a 3D Immersive World:
The Evolution of Online Instruction
Richard E. Riedl Amy Cheney
Appalachian State University, USA Appalachian State University, USA

Regis M. Gilman Robert Sanders

Appalachian State University, USA Appalachian State University, USA

John H. Tashner Roma Angel

Appalachian State University, USA Appalachian State University, USA

Stephen C. Bronack
Appalachian State University, USA

ABSTRACT with current learning communities that form in

a 3D immersive world designed for education.
The development of learning communities has Faculty at Appalachian State University (ASU)
become an acknowledged goal of educators at have developed and taught the graduate instruc-
all levels. As education continues to move into tional technology program in an award-winning
online environments, virtual learning communi- 3D world setting for several years. Additional
ties develop for several reasons, including social ASU faculty and program areas are currently
networking, small group task completions, and transitioning into this environment. Further, col-
authentic discussions for topics of mutual profes- leagues from major universities in other countries
sional interest. The sense of presence and copres- are using this environment for their students to
ence with others is also found to be significant work and to collaborate across time and distance.
in developing Internet-based learning commu- Telecommunications technologies in education
nities. This chapter illustrates the experiences (exposing the graduate students to the breadth of
IT experiences and knowledge required), hyper-
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch311
media, and advanced Web design are examples

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

of IT-related courses offered in the graduate pro- students, instructors, and other invited guests to
gram. The results of these experiences highlight meet and to work together in ways not found in
the efficacy of this tool toward the formation of other learning environments currently available.
authentic communities within 3D Internet-based AET Zone may be characterized by significant
worlds as online distance education environments components of space, movement, physical pres-
continue to evolve. ence and copresence, conversational tools with
small and large group shared workspaces, and
metaphors and artifacts that assist with collabora-
INTRODUCTION tion and learning online in unique and powerful
ways. Students, faculty, and guests, graphically
New technologies for collaboration have gener- represented by avatars, move through the 3D
ated increasing interest in the formation of various world spaces interacting with each other and with
kinds of online learning communities for distance artifacts within the worlds. These artifacts may
education. A wide range of distributed learning be linked to different resources, Web pages, and
communities are currently involved in training, tools necessary to provide content and support for
education, gaming, social networking, and other various kinds of synchronous and asynchronous
emerging online endeavors. These distributed interactions. Small and large group shared work-
learning communities are available in different space tools enable interactive conversations in
forms and demonstrate underlying frameworks text chats, threaded discussion boards, and audio
that include collaborative text-based environ- chats. Group sharing of documents, Web pages,
ments, Web-based text and graphical multiuser and other types of application software also are
domains, and the more sophisticated CAVEs available within the virtual world.
(projection-based automatic virtual environ- Typical students in this graduate program
ments). Each of the above presents its own unique are mid-career K-12 classroom teachers who
technologies and possibilities for online distrib- want to learn more in-depth ways to integrate
uted collaboration and learning. Each presents technology into their curriculum, or who want
opportunities for group interactions in different to become instructional technology specialists in
ways that bring a sense of community to the their schools or chief technology officers (CTO)
task. This chapter will focus on the findings and at the district level. Many of the students in the
experiences of various communities of learners program teach within a 100-mile radius of the
formed within a 3D immersive Internet-based institution. However, recent initiatives have ex-
virtual world developed for graduate education. panded opportunities to enroll K-12 teachers in
Descriptions of a 3D Internet-based learning a totally online experience. For example, several
environment—called Appalachian Educational Mexican teachers from the D’Amicis School
Technology Zone (AET Zone)—used by the in Puebla, Mexico, and faculty and students in
instructional technology program in the Depart- Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia, are
ment of Leadership and Educational Studies at working within AET Zone. Without the ability to
Appalachian State University have been noted in depend on face-to-face contact, these international
other research (e.g., Bronack, Riedl, & Tashner, collaborations are challenging us to rethink the
in press; Riedl, Bronack, & Tashner, 2005; Tash- way we develop and enhance the sense of com-
ner, Bronack, & Riedl, 2005). An Active Worlds munity in distance educational settings.
universe server (http://www.activeworlds.com/) The instructional technology program at
serves as the current platform for AET Zone, Appalachian State University uses a cohort
and provides a means to build virtual worlds for model, where students enroll and move though

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Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

the program together through a specific sequence • Learners proceed through stages of devel-
of courses. Students and faculty currently meet opment from novice to expert under the
face-to-face regularly at the beginning of the guidance of more experienced and knowl-
program, with reduced numbers and frequency edgeable mentors in the community of
of meetings as the members of a cohort become practice
more comfortable working within the virtual world • An identifiable knowledge base that is both
and gain understanding of course structures and general in nature and also specific to spe-
expectations. While the virtual world is used for cialties emerges from the community of
each class, the number of face-to-face meetings practice
rapidly decreases after the first several courses to • All professional educators develop a set
only an orientation class at the beginning and a of dispositions reflecting attitudes, beliefs,
final class session for student presentations at the and values common to the community of
end. A handful of courses during the final phase practice
of the program are conducted completely within
the virtual world, with no concurrent face-to-face AET Zone reflects these assumptions about
meetings. teaching and learning, and provides a powerful
A set of four cohorts, consisting of 80 students space through which effective learning communi-
who had experienced at least 2 years in the pro- ties are formed and nurtured. Students know and
gram, were asked several questions concerning can see when their colleagues are logged into
ways they would describe their experiences as the world. They can approach other students and
learners in this immersive 3D world. An informal talk to them about life, work, or the latest news.
qualitative analysis was conducted for the com- Through these interactions, both planned and
mon themes expressed through the aggregated serendipitous, students begin to create knowledge
responses. These are presented and discussed together. They talk about the work they are doing
below. in class, they share ideas, processes, and resources
with one another, and they contribute to the base
of knowledge that exists in their field. Throughout
BASIC TENET this process, they move from novice to expert,
both in terms of knowledge and skills, but also
Conceptual Framework in terms of their abilities to work collaboratively
within a virtual learning environment using tools
A conceptual framework (Reich College of Edu- previously unknown to them. Their beliefs about
cation, 2005), based upon social constructivism teaching and learning are challenged, refined, and
(Vygotsky, 1978), was developed by the College shaped by the process of learning together in an
of Education and provides a clear foundation that authentic social world of dialogue and discovery
guides teaching and learning within AET Zone. (Sanders & McKeown, 2007).
These basic concepts are:
Differences Between
• Learning occurs through participation in a Conventional Classrooms,
community of practice Traditional Distance Education
• Knowledge is socially constructed and and Emerging Environments
learning is social in nature in a community
of practice Table 1 describes the differences between conven-
tional classrooms, traditional forms of distance

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 Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

education, and emerging educational environ- to some, are groups formed to increase their un-
ments such as AET Zone. These characteristics derstandings or knowledge base in specific areas.
are based on observations of what occurs in each Jonnasen (1997) cites the following necessary
environment. One key factor is the continu- components for a learning community: active,
ity and persistence of the AET Zone setting in constructive, collaborative, intentional, complex,
which students and faculty run into each other contextual, conversational, and reflective. Others
during all times of the day and night regardless use the term “community of practice” which seems
of physical location. While one can argue that to indicate communities of similar practitioners
similar persistence and continuity can and does who are currently exploring various aspects of
occur on traditional campuses, it should be noted their endeavors together. Wenger (1998) states that
that there is a distinct discontinuity between the communities of practice include: “a joint enter-
confines of the classroom setting and the rest of prise as understood and continually renegotiated
the campus setting. In AET Zone, the learning by its members…, mutual engagement that bind
environment and the social environment are one members together into a social entity…. and the
and the same. Thus, the community of practice is shared repertoire of communal resources (rou-
more explicit and becomes a more obvious factor tines, sensibilities, artifacts, vocabulary, styles,
in the experiences of students and faculty. etc.) that members have developed over time.”
Others use the terms “learning communities”
Learning Communities and “communities of practice” interchangeably.

Learning communities have been characterized in Developing Online Communities

many ways, and some division exists in current
literature on the actual meaning of learning com- In either case, the literature suggests several main
munities. “Communities of learners,” according themes that emerge as useful guides for developing

Table 1. Analysis of the principles of the RCOE conceptual framework

Conventional Instruction1 Current Distance Education2 AET Zone3

Knowledge is socially constructed and Usually only within the context Rarely and if so within the Within the entire virtual world
learning is social in nature of each individual class context of an individual class community
Learning occurs through participation Usually only within the context Rarely and if so within the Regularly throughout the entire
in a community of practice of each individual class context of an individual class virtual world community
The development of educators pro- Rarely; contact with mentors Rarely; contact with mentors Exposure to and interaction
ceeds through stages from novice to usually limited to the course usually limited to the course with a wide range of mentors
expert under the guidance of more instructor instructor throughout the virtual world
experienced and knowledgeable community
mentors in the community of practice
An identifiable knowledge base Limited by lack of exposure Limited by lack of exposure Regular contact with the broader
emerges out of the community of to the broader community of to the broader community of community of practice develops
practice that is both general for all practice practice a full and shared knowledge base
educators and specific to specialties
and content areas
All professional educators develop a Limited by lack of exposure Limited by lack of exposure Regular contact with the broader
set of dispositions reflecting attitudes, to the broader community of to the broader community of community of practice leads to
beliefs, and values common to the practice practice sharing of beliefs and values
community of practice leading to dispositions that
are part of that community of
practice

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Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

online virtual communities. An overview from a The communities forming between and among
recent conference on building learning communi- students are beginning to resemble what Wilson
ties states that such communities: and Ryder (2006) describe as “dynamic learning
communities.” Such communities are defined as
Foster peer-to-peer collaboration, communica- “groups of people who form a learning community
tion, interaction, resource sharing, negotiation generally characterized by the following: distrib-
and social construction of meaning, and expres- uted control; commitment to the generation and
sions of support of encouragement among students. sharing of new knowledge; flexible and negoti-
A blended or online learning community must have ated learning activities; autonomous community
its own meeting or gathering space, as well as a members; high levels of dialogue, interaction,
defined set of members’ roles and norms for re- and collaboration; a shared goal, problem, or
solving disputes. (“Academic Impressions,” 2006) project that brings a common focus and incentive
to work together.” These dynamic communities
A key element in the development of the com- of learners are the ultimate goal in the process of
munity in AET Zone is that faculty members who applying social constructivist theory in the design
teach in this environment stop thinking of students and development of tools and spaces to support
in one section of a class as “their” students but effective Internet-based communities for learning.
instead they interact with all students across sec-
tions and across classes. The “flattening” of their Common Themes in
thinking is trickling down to students as well. Learning Communities
Students are meeting each other online, learning
what they have in common and how they differ, Several common themes consistently emerge
and then forming effective online partnerships from these descriptions of learning communities.
and communities around real-world projects and Communication, collaboration, and support are
activities (Sanders, Bronack, Cheney, Tashner, central to their development and maintenance.
Reidl, & Gilman, 2007). Students just beginning Other factors include shared resources and au-
in programs are interacting with students who are thentic reasons to join together. Recently emerging
nearing graduation. Students in school administra- research and the emergence of 3D Internet-based
tion, library science, higher education, and reading environments for teaching and learning suggest
programs are interacting with each other and with the importance of the sense of presence and
instructional technology majors. Virtual worlds copresence in the development and evolution of
such as AET Zone are moving distance education online communities (Schroeder, Steed, Axelsson,
efforts toward realizing the full potential of what Heldal, Abelin, Widestrom, et al., 2001). Using
distance learning might become. The virtual world such characteristics as both a vision and a guide,
serves as a catalyst for a learning community the instructional technology graduate program has
that reaches far beyond what normal classroom been studying ways to develop an environment that
settings have been able to accomplish. Zhao and continues to foster and to support a wide variety
Kuh (2004) support this goal, asserting, “Learn- of learning communities that may be identified
ing communities are associated with enhanced with these characteristics.
academic performance, integration of academic Development and support of communities
and social experiences, gains in multiple areas of within 3D immersive worlds used for learning
skill, competence, and knowledge, and overall require consideration of how students will move
satisfaction with the college experience” (p. 130). through the course environments in collabora-

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 Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

tive ways, how to provide means to enhance the know that the course resources (including fellow
communication between students, guests, and students and faculty) will remain available to them
instructors, and how to ensure participants will through the AET Zone following completion of
interact with the various resources in the envi- the course, and for graduates, even after comple-
ronment that contribute to building meaningful tion of the degree program. They are free to visit
communities of learners. other courses, to access various resources, and to
engage students in other courses as resources in
Collaboration the learning process.

Participants in courses and other activities within

AET Zone express a strong sense of collaboration COMMUNICATION
by those engaged in learning within the virtual
world. This collaboration exists between students Learning is a social process which reveals a conflict
in a specific cohort as well as between students between what is already known and what is being
from different cohorts. In fact, students from one observed (Brooks & Brooks, 1993). To resolve
section of a course often collaborate on specific this conflict, an effective learning process requires
tasks with students from other cohorts enrolled interaction between learners and content, between
in sections of the same course, thereby increasing learners and their peers, and between learners and
their collaborative resources exponentially. those more expert than they (Levin & Ben-Jacob,
Additionally, students cite many instances of 1998). Tools for communication, topics about
working with other students from different pro- which to communicate, and an authentic need to
gram areas who were also taking different courses communicate are requisite factors for effective
within the virtual world. It was indicated that stu- communication to be sustained within learning
dents felt a strong collaboration with instructors, communities or communities of practice.
who served as knowledge guides rather than sole
sources of expertise, as well. Additionally, students

Figure 1. A community of learners collaborating in AET Zone

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Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

Figure 2.

Synchronous Communication Both formal and informal communication oc-

curs in AET Zone and throughout the IT courses.
In 3D immersive worlds, several kinds of com- Analysis further suggests that the informal com-
munication tools are found to be necessary to munication is a powerful contributor to effective
support ongoing tasks and community building. learning within 3D immersive worlds. Informal
Synchronous tools such as text-based and audio communication may spring up casually as faculty
chat capabilities are critical parts of the infrastruc- and students move around together in the world.
ture necessary for creating learning communities. Just as students on campus are thought to learn a
Such tools provide a means of working together great deal of content outside of structured class-
at the same time in ways not otherwise possible. room environments, so too, informal discussions
According to a recent analysis (Tashner et al., in 3D immersive worlds may provide similar
2005), participants are able to develop and work results. For example, students may join an audio
together on authentic projects and topics because chat room while simultaneously walking through
of the communication tools provided. the virtual world exploring together the artifacts
that are present. Participants also may explore
Asynchronous Communication other topics of mutual interest that may or may
not be part of their formal curriculum or agenda,
Asynchronous tools, however, also are impor- but may still be tangentially relevant. This is an
tant to the participants as ways of sharing ideas, essential element of collaboration, communica-
research, and practice over time. For instance, a tion, and community building.
well-defined threaded discussion board provides
opportunities for participants to share ideas, opin-
ions, practices, and research. This communication SENSE OF PRESENCE
tool also provides for the element of reflection AND COPRESENCE
that is not immediately available in synchronous
environments. It is noted that the blend of these Much contemporary Web-based instruction is
two communication tools within virtual worlds characterized by “essentialists” view of teaching
such as AET Zone enable a greater opportunity and learning. That is, certain “essential” things
for interactions between and among participants. are to be learned as set forth by the instructor.

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Information flows in one direction, from the generated display that allows or compels the user
instructor and auxiliary materials to the student. (or users) to have a feeling of being present in an
Interactions that occur in such environments gener- environment other than the one they are actually
ally are limited to those between a single student in and to interact with that environment” (p. 2).
and the student’s instructor or in limited cases,
between students enrolled in the same class. The Presence
student then shows the instructor by summative
assessments that learning has occurred. When Schroeder (2002) argues that shared virtual en-
done online such environments lack many of the vironments “combine a high degree of presence
interactions and social aspects of learning that with a high degree of co-presence because the
characterize communications within 3D immer- sense of being in another place and of being there
sive worlds. Emerging constructivist paradigms as with another person reinforces each other” (p.
noted above can be used as guiding principles in 5). Furthermore, “presence and co-presence will
designing environments in which students engage be affected by the extent of experience with the
in discussions with others across sections of the medium” (Schroeder, 2006, p. 439). The more fa-
same class, different classes, and even different miliar and comfortable users are with the medium
programs to deal with and to solve problems of and the social norms of the virtual environment,
interest from different perspectives. Such interac- the more their sense of presence and copresence
tions include different forms of student to student, will be heightened. However, regardless of the
groups of students, instructors, and other experts users’ competence and proficiency working in a
interacting in various configurations to develop virtual environment, two users’ “connected pres-
perspectives, to solve tasks, or to explore issues ence” in that environment will have an impact on
of mutual interest. the overall experience for both users, simply as
As 3D multiplayer games emerged in the late a result of being in the environment together (in
1990s, researchers became interested in exploring a similar way to how ethnographers have noted
these types of richer participant interactions tak- that the act of observing influences that which is
ing place within gaming environments. Research being observed).
suggests that social networks are powerful com- As an immersive 3D environment, AET
ponents of online multiplayer games (Jakobsson Zone allows participants to “see” each other via
& Taylor, 2003). Drawing from ethnographical representative avatars. Each participant moves
and constructivist approaches, Manninen (2001) his or her avatar through the virtual world using
offers a taxonomy to conceptualize these forms a keyboard or a mouse. As one moves, one’s
of interactions based on components such as perspective changes; thus what the environment
language-based communications, avatar appear- looks like changes. This change in perspective
ance, body language (subconscious), and physical as one moves creates a sense of “presence.” A
contact. Research has also focused on roles that participant has the perception of being somewhere
presence and copresence may play in enhancing else. In addition, as one observes others in the
participant interactions within virtual worlds environment, one has a feeling of being some-
(Schroeder, 2002). While the term “virtual” has where else with someone else or “copresence.”
recently been applied to many different types of These concepts lead one to experience a connected
technologies and mediated environments, Schro- presence or mutual awareness of others. As the
eder’s definition of “virtual reality” focuses on the mutual awareness increases, so does the desire
common elements linking these technologies and for and feeling of heightened engagement in the
environments together, specifically, “a computer- world and in the activities conducted within the

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Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

world. Emerging from these feelings is a strong Role of Presence and Copresence
theme of the importance of both presence and in Online Communities
copresence in developing learning communities.
Students report that the feeling of isolation and The sense of presence and copresence are criti-
working alone diminished as they become ac- cal factors in creating and maintaining deeply
customed to working in the environment. This engaging online communities. As participants
was of particular import to both retention and to gain more of a sense of being somewhere and
the individual successes of students toward their with somebody else, communication and col-
educational goals (Tashner et al., 2005). laboration are dramatically enhanced. Accord-
Interestingly, presence is evidenced in several ing to Ahuna (2006), when constructs such as
ways. The foremost is sensing that you are actually communication and collaboration combine to
somewhere different than your physical location. support the formation of community, “a semantic
As you move through the world and you sense world of sharing knowledge, solving problems,
the movement, your perspective changes and you working as a team, playing, building, quarreling,
become “there” as well as “here.” Some students cooperating, planning and forming relationships
will desire to change their personas on a frequent develop.” The following screen shot illustrates
basis by changing their avatar. When asked why, an overview of the Network Basics building. Stu-
they state that they were “feeling different.[sic]” dents move through the building, walking across
On the other hand, some students do not see the various components, clicking on components
“themselves” in the same way. to access descriptions and resource information.
For a slightly different perspective, students may
Copresence choose to float above the floor. Various tools to
enhance the cognitive awareness and understand-
Copresence is characterized as being “there” with ing of the concepts and constructs are available
“someone else,” though the “someone else” is to the learners. Group interaction is encouraged
represented by an avatar. We have noticed that as an important piece of the learning process, in
adults take into the 3D world some parts of their developing the learning communities, increasing
personalities and cultural more that they exhibit collaboration, and to increase levels of content
in the outside world. For instance, if one avatar understanding. The combination of communica-
gets too close to another, the second one will move tion and small group shared collaboration tools
in order to preserve “personal space.” Novice with a sense of presence and copresence provides
students must learn to minimize windows so that opportunities for developing authentic learning
they can “see” when others are trying to com- environments for Internet-based learning that
municate with them. Some become disheartened goes far beyond attempts to replicate traditional
when they speak to another avatar and the “other” classroom instruction using typical Web-based
ignores them. Yet, we have also seen a reluctance applications.
to meet “others” outside their class, to converse Our experiences with graduate students in
with “strangers” in the 3D world. Such issues are the AET Zone suggest that many forms of com-
worked through by assignments to meet others, munities evolve as needed. Some will develop
explore courses together with “persons” you do for specific tasks and time periods and then dis-
not know, and many other techniques as needed. solve. These include task oriented communities,
However, these examples demonstrate the impor- for example, where students will form groups to
tance of understanding the concepts of presence read and to discuss specific books and to inform
and copresence in immersive worlds. other larger groups of what they are learning in

687
 Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

various discussion formats. Hence, a group of four possibilities emerge. The result is a vibrant, ac-
students may find themselves in discussions on tive, participatory, and engaging environment
ideas with eighty other students. Another example developed for community members to build new
might be a task involving the development and knowledge based upon the foundation presented
implementation of certain projects that include by the group.
ideas, knowledge and resources shared among a
larger group who have similar interests. Others
will remain intact for longer periods of time. For METAPHORICAL GRAPHICAL USER
instance, different forms of social groups also have INTERFACES
been noted in AET Zone that are more persistent.
One group who met online each week to work on One striking feature of AET Zone is its extensive
assignments decided to meet together at a differ- use of metaphors in the design of the graphical
ent time for dinner. They cooked the same dinner, user interface. As students move through the world,
drank the same wine and met, not face-to-face, but they find themselves in plazas, gardens, frontiers,
connected inside the 3D world in an audio chat and suburbia. Every space in the 3D world is built
room to enjoy each other’s company for a while. upon a metaphor or a series of metaphors to provide
Certainly, our experiences in thinking about students with access to content, context, and tools
the roles of presence and copresence in AET Zone for navigation. We have been very deliberate in our
help us understand the importance of these sensory selection of metaphors in our designs and believe
inputs in Internet-based instruction. However, we that thoughtful and reflective choices about the
are deeply aware that we are dealing with very metaphors to use are important to the success our
complex variables. We are exploring new ques- students have working within the virtual world.
tions that emerge from our observations. How Cates (1994) cites Lakoff and Johnson in defin-
might we develop a deeper sense of belonging- ing a metaphor as “understanding and experiencing
ness to these communities? Are there pedagogical one kind of thing in terms of another.” One thing,
ways to provide social networking within a series often familiar, is a figurative representation of the
of courses or is it even desirable? other, often abstract or unfamiliar. According to
Instead of information flow in one direction Nicholson and Sarker (2002), Aristotle understood
only from a source to a receiver, many other the value of a metaphor when he said, “Ordinary

Figure 3.

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Teaching IT Through Learning Communities in a 3D Immersive World

words convey only what we know already; it further suggest that through the utilization of these
is from metaphor that we can best get hold of metaphorical graphical user interfaces (MGUI),
something fresh.” “a sense of community is presented to the learner,
Some suggest that simply a virtual representa- and in turn, a collaborative e-learning environ-
tion of a physical space or artifact is not metaphori- ment is well on its way towards realization.”(p.
cal, but rather, the virtual representation must be 4) This community emerges out of an immersive
different in its representation (e.g., Cates, 1996). environment in which students “collaborate on
According to Cates (1996), a graphical user in- projects, work in teams, and create material and
terface (GUI) that is metaphorical must be based artifacts together… Students assume a variety of
on either an explicit or implicit metaphor, but it roles…and students must negotiate as they will
makes little difference as to whether the metaphor have to negotiate in the adult world” (Marshall,
is obvious to the user or not. The important aspect 2000, p. 5). For this to occur, auxiliary metaphors
is that the metaphor works to provide some insight selected must be complementary to the underlying
into or aid in understanding of that idea, concept, metaphor employed.
or thing it represents. The effective use of metaphors in an online
According to Black and later expanded upon by learning environment can be valuable in offering
Cates (1994), there are two types of metaphors: un- students a model to assist in understanding more
derlying or primary and auxiliary or secondary. An abstract concepts in more familiar, concrete terms
underlying metaphor is the main metaphor used. and can help students understand a concept and
For example, in one of the courses taught in the content more quickly than without the use of the
instructional technology program, the underlying metaphor by helping students learn and under-
metaphor of the Wild West was used as the main stand how things should work (Bishop & Cates,
metaphor throughout the course space within the 1996; Cates, 1994). Bishop and Cates (1996) note
virtual world. An auxiliary metaphor is one that existing literature that supports the position that
is consistent with the underlying metaphor and is content can be better learned through the interac-
used to support or enhance this main metaphor. In tion with metaphorical graphical user interfaces by
the case of the aforementioned course, examples providing both “superficial and deep similarities
of auxiliary metaphors might include a “saloon” between familiar and novel situations.” Ultimately,
for meeting and conversing, a “general store” for it is the finding of these and other studies that the
finding useful content, and a “haystack” that links use of metaphors helps students build knowledge,
to useful search engines. develop higher level thinking skills, build com-
munity, and gain a more universal understanding
Complimentary Metaphors of the subject matter being taught (Bishop & Cates,
1996; Henry & Crawford, 2001).
Complimentary metaphors are those that enhance The goal in the use of underlying metaphors
the online teaching and learning environment. is to enhance the students’ learning experience
These are complementarily aligned with one an- by providing a device that allows each to interact
other to assist learners in developing a “conceptual with the instruction and the content in ways more
framework of understanding through which the familiar, and, as a result, more accessible, to them.
learner can further enhance prior knowledge and Well-crafted auxiliary metaphors complement
conceptualize a higher level of understanding the underlying metaphor and the overall learning
towards the knowledge being obtained” (Henry experience.
& Crawford, 2001, p. 3). Henry and Crawford

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Confounding Metaphors such as virtual worlds (e.g., Rosendahl-Kreitman,

1990; Semper, 1990; Vertelney, Arent, & Lieber-
It should be noted, however, that the ineffective man, 1990). Misalignment or inappropriate link-
use of metaphors can have a deleterious effect on age between metaphors and expectations may
even the most well-designed and well-intended result in a debilitating tension for learners (Burge
learning environments. Some have suggested & Carter, 1997). Barrie (1996) explains this ten-
that gratuitous or fantastical metaphors can be sion as created out of a “pause in the cadence of
in conflict with the tenets that ground effective the composition…producing a reaction of tension
meaning-making (e.g., Nicholson & Sarker, 2002). and anticipation” and notes an emotional reaction
While this assertion is in stark contrast with the occurs when this pause or interruption occurs,
value of metaphor discussed above, it does provide often resulting in frustration or even feelings of
an important reminder that problems can arise in incompetence. Rohrer (1995) offers a different
the use of metaphors, especially those that are twist, suggesting that there is also a tension taking
auxiliary to the underlying metaphor. place between the literal and figurative, or “magi-
Form should follow function, and the selec- cal,” qualities of the metaphors being used, and
tion of underlying and auxiliary metaphors (form) this tension extends to the a tension between the
should enhance and complement the teaching and user and the computer itself, which is viewed as
learning tools and activities (function) embedded an “other—a sentient being with a consciousness
in a virtual world. One challenge in the inclusion of its own (and usually a malevolent conscious-
of metaphors is the overdependence on their use ness at that).”
within the interface design (Cates, 1996; Nelson, When it comes to metaphors, it seems, num-
1990). There are times when the poor choice of bers count. Incorporating too few or too many
metaphors overshadows the instructional design metaphors can pose problems for users as well.
of the content and the virtual world in which the Learners may not have enough to make sense of
content is presented. When this happens, students the interface nor to understand the content to be
must reconstruct what they think they know and learned if there are too few metaphors employed.
understand about the content and virtual world On the other hand, too many metaphors can be
with which they are working. Again, according overwhelming to a learner and lead to cognitive
to Cates (1994, p. 103), “When users are faced overload (Cates, 1994). Regardless, any use of
with such an auxiliary metaphor [confounding] metaphor has the potential of requiring learners to
they are required to reconstruct the environment translate not only the content and instruction being
radically, envisioning a book [for example] that is delivered into more familiar and understandable
unlike any that the user has ever seen. Users seem terms, but also to force them to work through
unlikely to make such radical reconstructions…. another cognitive layer posed by the use of the
When users come to this conclusion, the benefits metaphor. When the layers overload, the use of
of the underlying metaphor are greatly reduced.” metaphors may hinder—rather than help—learn-
It is even possible that students may reject and ers make sense of the information at hand (Lohr
disengage from the virtual world completely if the & Heng-Yu, 2003). As previously mentioned,
cognitive dissonance created by the confounding the poor use of metaphors can ultimately cause
metaphor is too great. learners to abandon the metaphor altogether
Multiple studies warn that metaphors used in- (Rohrer, 1995).
correctly or out of context can make it difficult for What is the lesson for designers of user inter-
learners to engage effectively within environments faces for virtual worlds, then? The lesson is clear.

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To design an effective virtual world for learning, themselves becoming leaders and identifying with
it is essential to use complementary metaphorical leadership roles. The leadership theme emerges
strategies that foster the development of com- as personal as well as organizational leadership.
munity and to avoid becoming enamored with Working collaboratively and communicating
the metaphors themselves. together in learning communities enhances the
leadership skills and comfort levels of participants,
with self-reported transfer to their own teaching
SUPPORT and learning environments. Students who spend
time in AET Zone, for example, report a heightened
An additional theme that has emerged from our sense of awareness of their own expertise arising
work with virtual worlds for learning is that of from interactions and participation in the various
“support.” Support is expressed in many forms communities in which they work and learn. They
but in this case, the concept is of peer and instruc- express an increase in personal and professional
tor support. It is often expressed as assistance self-confidence, which they indicate is transferred
that is usually available whenever one requested into their professional practices.
it. Whether the online library resources, an in- In addition to leadership dynamics that emerge
dividual course, or even professional assistance naturally from participation in 3D immersive com-
is needed, there is an instructor or peer ready to munities of learners, deliberate leadership-focused
offer support. In social constructivist learning prompts, such as case studies, provide problem-
communities, such as AET Zone, participants based learning situations in cross-disciplinary
move along a developmental continuum from contexts that foster deeper levels of development.
novice to expert. Indeed, in each course and In AET Zone, for example, participants are im-
throughout the program, students represent vari- mersed in authentic circumstances requiring the
ous aspects of this continuum at various points development of leadership “voice” in the “safety”
in each individual’s personal development. As of the virtual community. Participants are given
each becomes more aware of others through opportunities to “try out” various responses to
planned and serendipitous interactions, and as situations in an effort to solve problems within
each becomes increasingly comfortable with organizational communities. In the virtual envi-
others, their collective working relationships ronment mistakes can be made, consequences
weave a complex support network for and by examined, and corrections tried without fear of
all participants. Bender (2003) suggests that a real consequence or penalty. This type of natural
feeling of belonging within a chosen community yet safe learning is necessary for developing better
of practice is requisite for effective learning. leaders. Thus, experimenting with shared leader-
Both feeling supported and feeling supportive ship skills can become a natural consequence of
play an integral role in this important construct learning within the 3D community and, as well, can
of belonging. be a result of responding to deliberately conceived
situations requiring leadership thought and deci-
sions (Angel, Sanders, & Tashner, 2005; Sanders
LEADERSHIP & Angel, 2005). In short, the 3D environment is a
rich context for learning personal leadership skills
It is in these same 3D communities that participants and, as well, for applying those skills in real work
find themselves alternately leading and being led situations outside this environment.
and where some participants unexpectedly find

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FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS by the use of tools and processes whose purpose
is to enhance synchronous and asynchronous col-
The convergence of sophisticated gaming plat- laborations and communications in the context
forms, communications technologies, social of social constructivist learning environments.
networking trends, and educational needs provide Specific research questions to be asked include:
rich opportunities for future research. In this time What constitutes online learning communities and
of global transition, we are changing paradigms how might they be developed and expanded? To
of what it means to teach and to learn. Rather what extent do learning communities enhance
than trying to address old problems with new online learning? What is the added value of the
questions, we must begin to ask new questions participants’ sense of presence and copresence in
about new problems. online environments? What tools are needed to
Online educational environments started by assist them in high level functioning? Additionally,
attempting to recreate the four-wall classroom one might ask: What kinds of skills and attitudes
that had been successful in the past. Should are needed by educational leaders to move and to
online learning continue to try to be the same as support students and teachers as their organizations
its face-to-face counterpart? Can it be unique in move into 21st century learning environments?
its approach, using different methods and tools How might current educational leaders develop
for teaching and learning? How might a newer such needed skills and attitudes?
generation of online learning platforms contain- Finally, the need for new assessment methods
ing more immersive and engaging environments and tools is critical if we are serious about teach-
add value to learning? Furthermore, should we be ing toward higher levels of “critical thinking”
asking additional questions about how specific and performance. The current testing movement
technologies allow us to expand beyond the four in the United States is geared toward measur-
walls of a traditional classroom and transcend ing lower level cognitive skills, thus creating a
borders, cultures, and perspectives to create active mismatch between what is measured and what is
participatory groups of learners? The development stated as goals for 21st century success. Teaching
of online pedagogies to create the teaching and and learning in online environments, especially
learning models needed for a 21st century educa- those that are built upon a foundation of social
tion is a field ripe for research. constructivism, will require new assessment tools
Especially important in future research may be and measures in order to know and understand
the applications of social constructivism pedago- the learning that takes place in these 21st century
gies to online environments. Social constructivism learning communities. Basic research must con-
is fundamentally about the social construction of sider what an educated person looks like in the 21st
knowledge through participation in communities century. What kinds of educational experiences are
of practice. Through interaction and communica- needed to develop 21st century individuals? In a
tion, collaboration and mentoring, learners become world where the same knowledge base is accessible
a part of and contribute to this community of by everyone, what does “knowing,” mean? What
practice. Researchers have just begun to explore skills and knowledge are needed by individuals
the effects of various kinds of online collaboration to be deemed “educated”? The answers to these
and communications between students, instruc- questions will assist researchers in the develop-
tors, and colleagues in developing these communi- ment of valid and reliable assessment tools that
ties of practice. Questions subsequently begin to are more consistent with a social constructivist
emerge regarding the value that might be added approach to online teaching and learning.

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ADDITIONAL READING ENDNOTES

Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2001). Lessons from 1

Typical context is one teacher with many
the cyberspace classroom: The realities of online students meeting in a classroom for a finite
teaching. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. amount of time and in a class that is not
necessarily connected with other classes or
Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2003). The virtual
other experiences.
student: A profile and guide to working with online 2
Typical context is one teacher with many
learners. San Francisco: Jossey- Bass.
students who are in many different loca-
Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2004). Collaborating tions and in a class that is not necessarily
online: Learning together in community. San connected with other classes or experiences.
Francisco: Jossey-Bass. 3
Students and instructors of many classes
intermingle at many different times and
Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2007). Building online
locations... Alumni and other experts are
learning communities: Effective strategies for
available throughout the virtual world and
the virtual classroom. Building learning com-
at many different times.
munities in cyberspace (2nd ed.). San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Distance Learning for Real-Time and Asynchronous Information Technology
Education, edited by Solomon Negash, Michael Whitman, Amy Woszczynski, Ken Hoganson and Herbert Mattord, pp. 65-82,
copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.12
The MOT+Visual Language
for Knowledge-Based
Instructional Design
Gilbert Paquette
Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada

Michel Léonard
Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada

Karin Lundgren-Cayrol
Télé-université Université du Quebec à Montréal, Canada

ABSTRACT within our taxonomy of knowledge models respec-

tively as a multi-actor collaborative process and
This chapter states and explains that a learning a domain theory. The association between these
design is the result of a knowledge engineering “content” models and learning design components
process where knowledge and competencies, is seen as the essential task in an instructional
learning design, media and delivery models are design methodology, to guide the construction of
constructed in an integrated framework. Conse- high quality learning environments.
quently, we present our MOT+ general graphical
language and editor that help construct structured
interrelated visual models. The MOT+LD editor INTRODUCTION
is the newly added specialization of this editor for
learning designs, producing IMS-LD compliant Building high quality learning designs is a very
Units of Learning. The MOT+OWL editor is an- important and demanding task. It is also a difficult
other specialization of the general visual language task that we started to address already a decade
for knowledge and competency models based on ago by progressively building an instructional
the OWL specification. We situate both models engineering method (Paquette et al., 1994, 2005a;
Paquette, 2003), a delivery system (Paquette et
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch312

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

al., 2005b) and a graphical knowledge modeling INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN BASED

editor (Paquette, 1996, 2002). ON VISUAL MODELING
In this on-going work and for the present dis-
cussion, the point of view is taken that a learning In this section, we present a synthesis of the
design is the result of a knowledge engineering MISA 4.0 instructional engineering method main
process, where knowledge and competencies, components and concepts. A knowledge model-
learning design, media and delivery models are ing approach using the MOT editor was used to
constructed in an integrated framework. In the define the instructional engineering method itself,
first section of this chapter, we present the MISA1 its concepts, processes and principles. And thus,
instructional design method based on these four this method can also be seen as a visual modeling
models and their relationships to each other. The application.
second section presents the MOT (modeling with This R&D initiative, started in 1992, has led
object types) visual language and the specialized to the MISA 4.0 version (Paquette, 2001a, 2002a)
editing tools that have been used in numerous ap- and to its support tool, called ADISA2 (Paquette
plications. We summarize the theoretical basis of et al., 2001). The editor MOT+ is embedded in
the language, its syntax and semantic. Moreover the ADISA system and accessible through a Web
examples within the MISA instructional design browser from workstations linked to the Internet.
method will be presented. It can also be used without ADISA together with
The third and fourth sections address the forms provided by the MISA documentation.
standardization issues and how the MOT+ soft- Since 2001, the method has been adapted to the
ware is adapted to provide visual aid to designers huge standardization work that has occurred in
building knowledge and/or pedagogical models. the e-learning sector; we will address this aspect
The third section focuses on the learning design in later sections of this chapter.
models, the IMS-LD specification and the special-
ized MOT+LD editor that helps designers build Overview of the Method
IMS-LD compliant and interoperable units of
learning. The fourth section presents the ontol- The MISA learning engineering process produces
ogy web language (OWL) and the specialized specifications of learning environment grouped in
MOT+OWL visual editor. We use it to represent documents called documentation elements (DE).
domain knowledge models and target competency Table 1 presents these DEs.
that can be used to plan, support staff roles and Each DE results from tasks distributed into
evaluate the quality of learning designs. In the six phases. Within phase 2, 3, 4 and 6, these DE
fifth section we discuss the association between can also be viewed according to four axes or di-
LD models and OWL models to support what we mensions of an e-learning environment: knowl-
believe is the central task for knowledge-based edge, pedagogy, media and delivery. Presently,
instructional design aiming to support learning MISA 4.0 comprises 35 basic sub-tasks, each
environments within the Semantic Web. producing one DE, numbered, as shown in Table
Finally, the concluding section will summarize 1, from 100 to 640. The first digit denotes the
the properties of representation languages that we phase, the second, the axis, and the third, the
have found most useful while designing and using sequence number within the axis. A DE is either
the various specializations of the MOT+ software a visual model, identified in bold italic in Table
through its evolution from a general knowledge 1, or a text-based form describing guidelines for
modeling tool to a standardized tool at the heart a model or properties of objects in the model.
of the instructional design methodology.

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Table 1. MISA 4.0 documentation elements: Phases and axes

Phase 1: Definition 100 Organization’s Training System 102 Training Objectives 104 Learners’ properties
106 Present Situation 108 Reference Documents
Knowledge Axis Pedagogy Axis Media Axis Delivery Axis
Phase 2: Initial solu- 210 Knowledge Model 220 Instructional Prin- 230 Media Principles 240 Delivery Principles
tion Orientation Principles ciples 242 Cost-Benefit
212 Knowledge Model 222 Learning Events Analysis
214 Target Competencies Network
224 Learning Unit
Properties
Phase 3: LE archi- 310 Learning Unit 320 Learning Scenarios 330 Development Infra- 340 Delivery Planning
tecture Content 322 Activity Properties structure
Phase 4: LE detailed 410 Learning Resource 420 Learning Resource 430 Learning Resource 440 Delivery Models
Design Content Properties List 442 Actors and their
432 Learning Resource resources
Models 444 Tools and Telecom-
434 Media Elements munication
436 Source Doc. 446 Delivery Services
Phase 5: Validation 540 Test Planning 542 Revision Decision Log
Phase 6: Delivery Plan 610 Knowledge/Compe- 620 Actors and Group 630 Learning System/Re- 640 Maintenance/Quality
tency Management Management source Management Management

MISA proposes a a problem solving approach ed to perform them or to be produced by

in 6 phases. Each MISA phase is subdivided into learners and facilitators.
a number of steps where parts of a learning envi- • Phase 3: Designers construct a detailed
ronment or system are constructed. These phases learning design and specify the infrastruc-
are sequential, but spiral, with frequent returns to ture necessary. Visual learning scenarios
modify the result or previous tasks: are built for each learning unit defined in
phase 2, describing the learning and fa-
• Phase 1: Designers build a description of cilitating activities, the actors that perform
the training problem, its context and con- them and the resources needed or pro-
straints. The general goal that the solution duced by these actors. At the same time,
must fulfill and the main characteristics of a sub-model of the phase 2 knowledge
the target population are the most impor- model is associated with each learning unit
tant aspects to address at this point. thus defining “the learning unit content.”
• Phase 2: Designers define a preliminary According to the evolution of the design,
training solution, centered on a knowledge media and delivery principles are refined
model for the learning domain. Prerequisite to prepare the next phase.
and target competencies are associated • Phase 4: Centered on the learning resourc-
to the most important knowledge enti- es and delivery models and the properties
ties in the model. In this phase, designers of objects in these models several profes-
also build a first pedagogical visual model sionals may work on the initial design of
called “the learning event network” group- a learning environment (LE). Another im-
ing the main modules or learning units, portant concurrent task is the description
their sequencing and the resources need- of the properties of resources in learning
scenarios and the association of a sub-

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model of the knowledge model to provide The learning resource models are useful to
a specification of the “learning resource describe materials (or learning objects) to be
content.” adapted and produced, their media components,
• Phase 5: The project manager plans the source documents and presentation principles as
validation of the learning environment and well as other properties aimed at graphical design-
produces a list of possible revisions and ers and learning material producers.
decisions about how to improve the speci- Finally, delivery models are produced to show
fications created in the previous phases. how and where actors use or provide learning
• Phase 6: Designers and project manager materials and resources such as tools, communi-
prepare elements necessary to the delivery cation means, services and locations, used in the
of the learning environment. They produce learning environment. Each delivery model is a
a synthetic and global description of the multi-user workflow, where actors use or produce
learning environment for its maintenance resources, while assuming different roles. These
and quality management by various actors. processes address organizational issues, such as
group organization, staff assignments, technical
A Visual Modeling Approach help, resource delivery, and so on, which must
be prepared to ensure smooth deployment of a
In each of phases 2, 3, 4 and 6, MISA also proposes network-based or a distance learning environment.
the development of the learning environment along Each and every one of these models is built
four axes: knowledge and competency (content using the MOT+ knowledge representation tech-
model), instructional, resources and delivery. nique and tool (Paquette, 1999, 2002b). Graphical
The central product of each axis is one or more visual models are the basic DEs in each axis, the
visual models. backbone of the MISA method. Most of the other
The knowledge model centers on a graphical tasks, in MISA, describe properties of objects in
representation of the learning environment con- these models (e.g., competencies, learning units,
tent domain. In this model, the domain’s facts, resources, roles) as well as their relationships.
concepts, procedures and principles are displayed
and interrelated with precise links. Then, target
and prerequisite competencies are linked to MOT+: A GENERIC VISUAL
knowledge elements in the model, thus identify- LANGUAGE AND TOOL
ing prerequisites and learning objectives for the
pedagogical model. Subsequently, knowledge When designers start building a learning en-
units and competencies are also associated to vironment, two basic questions arise: “Which
learning units and to the resources present in the knowledge must be acquired, what are the target
learning units’ scenario models. competencies or educational objectives for that
The instructional model is essentially a visual knowledge?” and “How should the activities
network of learning events and units, to which and the resources be organized to best achieve
knowledge and target competencies are associated. knowledge and competency acquisition?” To
Each learning unit is also described by a visual help designers solve this type of questions, we
learning scenario specifying learning and support have developed a graphical knowledge modeling
activities linked to resources in the environment. method and tools, which help visualizing activity
Resources holding content (as opposed to tools sequences, actors and tools. In this section, we
and services) are associated with a subset in the present the MOT modeling language that serves
knowledge model. that purpose and the MOT+ visual modeling editor.

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The graphic or visual representation formalism In software engineering, many graphic repre-
that we present here (Paquette, 1996; Paquette, sentation formalisms have been or are used such
2002) has been tested for the past 10 years in a as entity-relationship models (Chen, 1976), con-
vast array of modeling applications and in many ceptual graphs (Sowa, 1964), the object modeling
various contexts. It is used by trainers for corpo- technique (OMT) (Rumbaugh, Blaha, Premerlani,
rate training, and designers or professors use it to Eddy, & Lorensen, 1991), KADS (Schreiber, Wiel-
prepare university courses or to propose modeling inga, & Breuker, 1993) or the unified modeling
exercises to their students. It has served to model language (UML) (Booch, Jacobson, & Rumbaugh,
processes for the implementation of a computer- 1999). These representation systems have been
supported high school, or to model instructional built for the analysis and architectural design of
methods or research projects processes. complex information systems. The most recent
ones require the use of up to eight different kinds
Basis for a Graphical Knowledge of model, which rapidly become hard to follow
Representation Language without considerable expertise.
Our initial goals were different. We needed a
It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand graphic representation system that was both simple
words. That is true of sketches, diagrams, and enough to be used by educational specialists, such
graphs used in various fields of knowledge. Con- as teachers, professors and tutors, who are not,
ceptual maps are widely used in education to rep- in general, computer scientists, still general and
resent and clarify complex relationships between powerful enough to represent the components and
concepts. Flowcharts are graphical representations their relationships of computer-based educational
of procedural knowledge or algorithms. Decision environments.
trees are another form of representation used in There is a consensus in educational science to
various fields, particularly in decision-making distinguish four basic types of knowledge entities
expert systems. (facts, concepts, procedure and principles), despite
All these representation methods are useful at some diversity in terminology and definitions.
an informal level, as thinking aids and tools for the See for example, the work of Merrill (1994),
communication of ideas, but they also have their Romiszowski (1981), Tennyson and Rash (1988),
limitations. One is the imprecise meaning of the and West, Farmer, and Wolf (1991). This categori-
links in a model. Another issue is the ambiguity zation is retained as the basis for the MOT graphic
around the type of entities or symbol system that representation language.
is used. Objects, actions on objects and state- All four types of knowledge are also consid-
ments of properties about them are all mixed-up, ered in the framework of schema theory. The
which make graph interpretation a fuzzy and risky concept of schema is the essential idea behind
business. Another difficulty is to combine more the shift from behaviourism to cognitivism, the
than one representation in the same model. For now dominant theory in psychology and other
example, concepts used in procedural flowcharts cognitive sciences, based on the pioneering ideas
as entry, intermediate or terminal objects could be of Inhelder and Piaget (1958) as well as Bruner
given a more precise meaning by developing them (1973). In the early seventies, Newell and Simon
in conceptual sub-models of the procedure. The (1972) developed, on the same basis, a rule-based
same is true of procedures present in conceptual representation of the human problem solving
models that could be developed as procedural procedural activity, while Minski (1975) defined
sub-models described by flowcharts, combined the concept of “frame” as the essential element to
or not with decision trees.

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understand perception, and also to reconcile the specialization (S) link from the later to the former
declarative and procedural views of knowledge. concept. Links between the “Triangle” concept and
Schemas play a central role in knowledge con- its sides or angles attributes is externalized using
struction and learning (Holoyak, 1991; Anderson a composition (C) link. The links from an input
et al., 1995). They defined perception as an active, concept to a procedure and from a procedure to
constructive and selective process. They support one of its products are both shown by an input/
memorization skills seen as processes to search, product (IP) link. The sequencing between ac-
retrieve or create appropriate schemas to store tions (procedures) and/or conditions (principles)
new knowledge. They describe understanding in a procedure is represented by a precedence (P)
as a comparison of existing schema with new link. Finally, the relation between a principle and
information. Globally, through all these processes, a concept that it constrains, or between a principle
learning is seen as a schema transformation en- and a procedure that it controls, are represented
acted by higher order processes, aiming at schema by a regulation link (R).
construction and reconstruction through interac- Using these links, the triangle concepts are
tion with the physical, personal or social world, arranged in the MOT model of Figure 1 where
instead of a simple transfer of information from relations between knowledge entities are transpar-
one individual to another. ent, mixing the types of entities and links.
The distinction between conceptual and proce- Concepts (or classes of objects), procedures
dural schema has been accepted for a long time in (or classes of actions) and principles (or classes
cognitive science. More recently, a third category of statements, properties or rules) are the primi-
called “conditional or strategic schema” has been tive objects of the MOT graphical language. The
proposed (Paris, Lipson, & Wixson, 1983). These type of the objects are represented by geometrical
schemas have a component that specifies the con- figures as shown on Figure 2, where each class
text and the conditions to trigger a set of actions or individual is represented by a name within
or procedures, or to assign values to the attributes the Figure.
of a concept. These categories map very well on These objects are different types of schema
the existing consensus in educational science. whose attributes are all explicitly externalized
and related to other schemas using six kinds of
The MOT Visual Modeling Language typed links constrained by the following grammar
rules:
We will now present briefly the syntax and se-
mantic of the MOT visual modeling language, 1. All abstract knowledge units (concepts,
based on the notion of schema. Here, we could procedures, principles) can be related by an
use graphs similar to UML object models to rep- instantiation I link to a set of facts represent-
resent the attributes that describe a schema with ing individuals called respectively examples,
different formats according to their type. In the traces and statements.
MOT graphic language (Paquette, 1996, Paquette, 2. All abstract knowledge units can be spe-
1999, Paquette, 2003), we have improved the cialized or generalized to other abstract
readability and the user-friendliness of graphs by knowledge using specialization S links.
externalizing the internal attributes of a schema 3. All abstract knowledge units can be de-
into other objects, with proper links to the original composed, using C links into other entities,
schema or object. For example, the link between generally of the same type.
the schemas “Triangle” and the “Rectangle Tri- 4. Procedures and principles can be sequenced
angle” is shown explicitly on Figure 1 using a together using P links.

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The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

Figure 1. A simple MOT model

Figure 2. Types of knowledge units in MOT

5. Concepts can be inputs to a procedure us- • Concepts can be object classes (countries,
ing an IP link to the procedure, or products clothes, vehicles, etc.), types of documents
of a procedure using an IP link from the (forms, booklets, images, etc.), tool catego-
procedure. ries: (text editors, televisions, etc.), groups
6. Principles can regulate, using R links, any
procedure to provide an “external” control
structure, to constrain a concept or a set of Figure 3. The MOT metamodel
concepts by a relation between them, or to
regulate a set of other principles, for example
to decide on conditions of their application.

Figure 3 summarizes these grammar rules of

the MOT graphic language in the form of an ab-
stracted graph where the entities represent types
of MOT objects.
There are various possible semantic interpre-
tations of these graphic symbols.

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 The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

of people (doctors, Europeans, etc.), or (advising on an investment), prescriptions

event classes (floods, conferences, etc.). (medicinal treatment, instructional design
• Procedures can be generic operations (add principles), etc.
numbers, assemble an engine, etc.), tasks
categories (complete a report, supervise a The MOT+ Graphic Editor
production, etc.), activities (take an exam,
teach a course, etc.), instructions (follow With this set of primitive graphic symbols, it has
a recipe, assemble a device, etc.) or sce- been possible to build graphic models, from simple
narios (of a film, of a meeting, of a learning to complex representations of structured knowl-
module). edge. For example, we can build representations
• Principles can state properties of objects equivalent to conceptual maps, flowcharts (itera-
(cars have four wheels), constraints on pro- tive procedures) and decision trees, and also other
cedures (the tasks must be completed with- types of models useful for educational modeling
in 20 days), cause/effect relationships (if it such as processes, methods and theories. All these
rains more than 25 days, the crop will be types of models have been used in a number of
in jeopardy), laws (any metal sufficiently projects since the first publication of the MOT
heated will stretch out), theories (the laws editor in 1998, and also in the last 5 years with its
of the market economy); rules of decision extension to MOT+. Figure 4 presents examples

Figure 4.

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of the main MISA visual models constructed with XML, HTML, Excel and other commonly used
the MOT editor. formats. In particular, the “export to XML” com-
Figure 4a presents an example of a knowledge mand provides the possibility for graphic models
model that describes part of the knowledge in the to be processed by software agents respecting for
domain of artificial intelligence (AI) for an intro- example the IMS LD or OWL schemas.
ductory Web-based course on that subject designed
with MISA. Here ovals represent AI processes,
rectangles represent AI concepts and hexagons REPRESENTING MULTI-
represent AI principles. ACTOR WORKFLOWS AND
Figure 4b presents a example of a Pedagogical LEARNING DESIGNS
model representing a learning scenario model for
one the course modules where learning activities In the two following sections, we address the
are represented as procedures (ovals) and learning issues of the standardization of visual modeling
resources as concept/object (rectangles). languages, to promote the reusability of educa-
Figure 4c presents an example of a Media tional models and the interoperability between
model representing the structure of a Web site for systems delivering learning environments. With
the course. Concepts represent Web pages or page the advent of an educational modeling standard
elements, ovals or circles represent hyperlinks, specification like IMS-LD, we decided to de-
as possible actions or procedures. Templates are velop a specialization of MOT+ to represent the
represented by principles. Facts represent concrete IMS-LD concepts. During the eduSource and
object such as page elements with their actual LORNET (www.lornnet.org) projects, we found
texts, pictures or other resources. that this specification was closely related to the
Figure 4d presents an example of a Delivery MISA pedagogical model including some aspects
model representing the course delivery process of the MISA delivery model. This R&D and the
where actors are represented as control principles, extension to a Web-based graphical editor are
acting on tasks represented as procedures, each presented in the following sections.
having input and output resources.
This first version of the MOT editor has been The MOT+LD Special
extended to the MOT+ editor, a mature editor with Visual Language
advanced graphic editing capabilities (fonts, color,
disposition on a page, etc.). Sub-models can be IMS-LD provides a representation of the com-
embedded at any depth and knowledge objects in ponents of a learning environment in a standard-
each one can be displayed in a multilayer mode. ized XML schema that can be executed by any
Models may be filtered in order to display only compliant e-Learning platform. IMS-LD does
some types of knowledge objects or links. Sub- not provide a visual language to build a learning
models from one model can be associated to objects environment specification. Initially, these had to
in another model called a co-domain, which is very be built using an XML editor or a form-based
useful for example to assign knowledge to activi- editor like RELOAD (2005). Also, IMS-LD is
ties in a pedagogical model. Graphic objects can not an instructional design method to build such
be associated to any type of document (using the representations. It needs to be accompanied by
OLE standard) such as a text document, slide pre- any instructional design method, and MISA is
sentation, Web page, spreadsheet or database file, more closely related than many other methods.
which can be displayed by clicking on the graphic Unfortunately, the MOT+ pedagogical models
symbol. MOT+ has extensive export facilities to built in MISA are not executable on a variety of

705
 The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

platforms because they are not standardized. In represented by different kinds of MOT concepts
fact, in the projects where we have used MISA, (rectangles). Standard MOT links are used between
the specification was translated by hand, into these objects. C (is composed of), P (precede),
the platform’s activity editor, with some loss of R (regulate or govern) and I/P (input / product)
information. links are sufficient to cover all the components
To address these problems, we first devel- of a standard IMS-LD level A learning design.
oped a graphic modeling editor for the IMS-LD The MOT+LD editor is presented with some
specification (level A) and made it available as a detail in (Paquette, Léonard, Lundgren-Cayrol,
specialized editor in the MOT+ software. Many Mihaila & Gareau, 2006). It enables a designer
examples of learning designs have been produced to build graphically a compliant IMS-LD model.
by different groups using this editor. They can be Afterwards, the graph is automatically validated
found at the IDLD portal (www.idld.org). Figure and exported as an instance of the IMS-LD XML
5 shows part of a unit of learning (UoL) on solar schema. This XML file can be read in form-based
astronomy presented recently at a workshop (Pa- IMS-LD editors such as RELOAD (2005), if level
quette & Léonard, 2006). B conditions and or level C notifications need to be
It shows an act and its activity structure con- specified. The XML can then be run by IMS-LD
taining various learning and support activities, all compliant players or platforms to deliver online
represented as MOT procedures (ovals). Method, learning sessions to their users.
plays, and acts are also represented as procedures Paquette and Marino (2005) briefly discuss the
in other parts of the model. Each procedure type strengths and weaknesses of the IMS-LD educa-
is indicated by a little label at the right lower tional modeling specification. One weakness is
corner of the ovals representing the procedures. the absence of knowledge representation, which
Similarly, roles are represented by different is central to learning and knowledge management
kinds of MOT principles (hexagons). Environ- that we seek to support by the TELOS3 system.
ments, learning objects, services and outcomes are We have proposed to improve that by the semantic

Figure 5. An example of a MOT+LD learning design

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The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

annotation of the activities, resources and roles orchestrate actors, activities and other resources,
included in a learning design. A semantic annota- a fundamental principle built in to the TELOS
tion is a mapping from a subject matter ontology system. A specialization of the scenario editor
to the learning design that associates knowledge is being defined to cover all three levels of the
elements to the components of the design. This IMS-LD specification.
aspect will be developed in the following sections. The scenario editor uses four kinds of MOT
objects with subtypes taken from the TELOS
Extending the MOT+LD Editor technical ontology (Magnan & Paquette, 2006).
These are shown on Figure 6. Concept symbols
Another aspect of IMS-LD we need to improve represent all kinds of resources: documents, tools,
is the control structure of the workflow that is semantic resources, environments, resource-ac-
actually covered by level B and C specifications, tors, resource-activities and datatypes. Procedure
where properties and conditions can be included in symbols represent function models composed of
the design to alter the flow of activities, notify an activities and commonly used operation templates.
actor or present a resource depending on previous Finally, principles are used both to represent differ-
actions or results stored in a user and group file ent types of actors (as control agents) and control
or model. This aspect may not be that important conditions. These two kinds of control entities
in open learning environments where a total or are represented here by different symbols. The
large degree of liberty is left to the learner and actor’s symbols are active agents representing
facilitators, but for a business workflow in an or- users, groups, roles or software agents that enact
ganization, or to aggregate software components the activities using and producing resources as
into larger resources, it is an important dimension. planned by the scenario model. Conditions are
To address that and provide a basis to build a control element inserted within the basic flow
function editor for the TELOS system, conceptual to decide on the following activities that can be
work on function maps has been defined as a activated.
central piece of the TELOS architecture (Rosca, In Figure 7, we see a combination of some of
2005; Paquette, Rosca, Mihaila, & Masmoudi, these symbols where a coordinator writes the plan
2006). Moreover, a comparative analysis has of a document in a first activity, after which the
been made between business workflows, IMS-LD Figure shows a general split condition. After that,
learning designs and function maps (Marino et al., these activities are executed in parallel, controlled
2006), leading to the identification of 21 control by the properties of the split condition object.
situations for workflows encountered in software Later on, the flow of activities merges through
engineering literature (Correal & Marino, 2006).
It was found that IMS-LD covers only some of Figure 6. Scenario editor symbols
these control situations, but probably the most
useful ones for pedagogical design.
Based on this work and the actual MOT+LD
editor, we are in the process of designing a new
visual editor. The scenario Editor aims both to
generalize IMS-LD and to capture the main aspects
of business workflows. The graphs produced by
this editor will be executable, providing interfaces
for concrete actors to enact the activities and use
the resources during delivery. It will also serve to

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 The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

Figure 7. A simple scenario model

the merge condition object the assemble activity will serve as data providers or be products of an
takes control. This activity will wait for some or activity (e.g. a new person of software agent added
all of the incoming flows to be activated before in a system). A similar distinction is made for
it is executed, again based on the properties of resource-activities that can be seen as resources
the merge condition object. to be transformed, for example by other activities
Figure 8 shows another kind of condition that creating or modifying their description.
alters the flow of execution. In activity-2, if the C links from MOT may also be used to show
time-event condition is met, the flow of control the composition of an entity into other entities.
will change. Depending on the type of the condi- A new unification, U link, is also necessary to
tion, the activity-4 will be shown or hidden. Activ- guide the execution engine, when components
ity-3 is still available. If activity-4 is shown and are aggregated and outputs from one need to be
completed, then activity-5 can be performed. connected with the inputs of another.
Properties of the event condition symbol will In TELOS, the scenario editor will enable
provide the details on the condition and action engineers to combine resources into larger aggre-
parts of the control principle to provide the execu- gates, technologist to built platform workflows for
tion engine with a clear formal definition of the designers of learning or knowledge management
processing to take place.
In the scenario editor, we see a combination of
a control flow and a data flow. The control flow Figure 8. Event-based control
is modeled using the MOT basic P and R links. P
links indicates the basic sequence or flow of activi-
ties. R linked conditions identify which activities
an event will trigger, thus altering the basic flow.
IP links from MOT serve to model the data
flow, either from resources to activities where
they are consulted, used or processed, or from
activities to the resources they help produce. This
is why we need to distinguish between actors as
active control entities and resource-actors that

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The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

environments, designers to build courses, work graphic representations. Knowledge in a subject

flows or learning /teaching scenarios. domain can be represented in many ways: tax-
onomies, thesauri, topic maps, conceptual graphs
and ontologies.
MOT+OWL: A STANDARDIZED We have selected to use OWL-DL ontologies
ONTOLOGY EDITOR (see W3C, 2004) for a number or reasons. It is
one of the three ontology Web languages that
In the first section we identified the pedagogical are part of the growing stack of World Wide
and the knowledge models as the most important Web consortium recommendations related to the
ones. We now proceed with a second standardiza- Semantic Web. Of these three languages, OWL-
tion task, that of the knowledge model. Any type DL has a wide expressivity and its foundation in
of knowledge representation, including text-based descriptive logic guarantees its computational
narratives or informal graphic models, can be completeness and decidability. Descriptive Logic
used to describe a domain of study. At the initial (Baader, Calvanese, Nardi, Patel-Schneider,
stage of design, the informal nature of an ontology 2003), is an important knowledge representation
representation is useful. The user’s mind must be formalism unifying and giving a logical basis to
free to choose any representation that seems best the well known traditions of frame-based systems,
suited for the educational project to be considered. semantic networks, object-oriented representa-
Still, this very freedom does not facilitate the tions, semantic data models, and formal speci-
software processing of the representation. fication systems. It thus provides an interesting
Semi-formal modeling languages like MOT framework to represent knowledge for which a
go part of the way to address this. Unlike infor- growing number of processing agents are built
mal graphs built with any graphic editor, such as throughout the world.
PowerPoint, the MOT graphic syntax is structured OWL-DL provides a precise XML schema
and has a general unambiguous semantic. Using but no graphic representation per se. Some on-
the MOT editor, models can be exported in many tology editors like PROTÉGÉ (2006), provide
formats, including a native XML schema. Using some graphical views of the ontology, but the
this schema, software agents can perform differ- construction of an ontology is essentially form-
ent kinds of processing. Still, some ambiguity based. Our goal was to provide a complete formal
remains. In instructional engineering applications, graphic representation of the OWL-DL that could
we had to constrain the MOT graphic language combine the virtues of interactive construction
even more to enable the delivery of learning with the computational capabilities of a formal
scenarios in a digitized platform like Explor@-2 graphic representation.
(Paquette, 2001). Even then, part of the transfer
of the design to the delivery platform had to be The MOT+OWL Visual Language
done manually, to prevent enforcing unnatural
graphic representations on the designers. In the context of the MOT representation system,
ontologies, in particular OWL-DL constructs, cor-
The Ontology Web Language respond to a category of models called theories.
Ontologies can thus theoretically be modeled
To deliver computer-based learning environments, graphically using the MOT syntax. While doing
after a phase where informal graphic design has this, we found out that while the MOT primitive
cleared up ideas, we need to move from informal objects and links were sufficient to represent
or semi-formal graphs to formal computable ontologies expressed in OWL-DL, the graphs

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 The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

Figure 9. OWL-DL equivalents

would become cumbersome unless new symbols portant for our purpose because learning environ-
were added. We have thus specialized the MOT ments are built around multi-actor processes.
language and graphic editor by adding sub-types Figure 11 presents a MOT+OWL visual graph
for concepts, principles and facts and by adding that translates the conceptual structure of a learn-
new links. ing design presented in the IMS-LD information
Figure 9 gives a few examples of the model (2003). In the Figure, “C” properties (green
MOT+OWL graphic elements with their interpre- hexagons) are an abbreviation for “is-composed-
tation in descriptive logic and their correspondence of” which has the same meaning as the C link in
to standard OWL-DL XML schema fragments. standard MOT models, or the aggregation link
See Paquette and Rogozan (2006) for a complete in UML models.
description of the MOT+OWL graphic language. This example illustrates the fact that func-
Three types of MOT entities are sufficient to tional relations between components of multi-
represent OWL-DL models. Concepts represent actor processes such as a learning design can be
classes, principles represent properties and facts represented by ontologies. Such ontologies have
represent individuals. On these graphic entities, been used to test, for example, the conformance
icons are added corresponding to axioms or prin- of particular learning designs to the IMS-LD XML
ciples stating a property of the class. We also schema (Amorim, Lama, & Sanchez, 2006), and
added some new special links to express things to execute them in the context of an ontology-
like equivalent “equi” or disjoint “disj” classes driven system.
stating properties of two classes or two properties.
In the standard MOT syntax, these icons or Associating Knowledge and
special links would be expressed by principles Competencies to Learning Designs
with “R” links to classes or properties. For ex-
ample, in the second and the two last examples of We have pointed out earlier the importance of
Figure 9, the following standard graphs (Figure associating knowledge and competencies to
10) are equivalent, with the same precise OWL- the components of a learning design. This is a
DL interpretation as XML schema components. key element of the MISA method. Actually, in
These would of course make the graphs more IMS-LD, the only way to describe the knowl-
difficult to read. edge needed to achieve the activities or that is
Using a limited set of graphic symbols, we present in the resources is to assign optional
can formally describe any semi-formal MOT educational objectives and prerequisites, to
model that is amenable to a representation in the unit of learning as a whole and/or to all or
descriptive logic. This is obviously the case for some of the learning activities. These can not
most conceptual models, laws and theory models. be added to express the level of competency for
However, this is less evident in the case of pro- a support activity carried out by a teacher or
cedural models, sometimes called task ontologies. tutor. Objectives and prerequisites correspond
Procedural and process/methods models are im- to entry and target competencies as used in the

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The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

Figure 10. MOT standard equivalents

MISA method. They are essentially unstructured

Figure 11. A simple task ontology for multi-actor
pieces of text composed according to the IMS
scenarios4
RDCEO specification (IMS 2002).
Unstructured texts are difficult to compare.
Consistency checking between different levels
of the LD structure cannot be supported compu-
tationally. Even at the same level of a learning
design, for example within an act, no relations
exist between the content of learning activities
and of the input or outcome resources, and from
these to the actors’ competencies. In fact, in
IMS-LD the knowledge represented in learning
resources is not described at all, and the actor’s
knowledge and competencies are only indirectly
defined by their participation in learning units or
activities, if, and only if, educational objectives
have been associated to the activities.

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 The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

What we need first is a qualitative structural ontology associated to activity 2.1A would logi-
representation of knowledge and competencies cally correspond to the union of the sub-models
associated to activities, resources and roles. of all input resources to the activity.
This can be done using domain ontologies. As a Finally, the Figure shows that most of the
first step, the MOT+ editor allows to show side ontology model should be the subject of the dis-
by side a learning design, using the MOT+LD cussion, since there is another team, team B that
editor, and a domain knowledge ontology using has more information to bring to the discussion
the MOT+OWL editor. An example is shown in using also information from input resources and
Figure 4. The left hand window is the learning in a team B chat. The larger sub-model is thus
design presented earlier in Figure 5. The right associated to the 2.0 activity structure.
hand window presents part of domain ontology This example shows how semantic annotation
of the solar system (that was built before Pluto can help guide the construction of learning designs
was declared a quasi-planet). and to evaluate their coherence. By associating
A semantic annotation is simply a mapping the right amount of knowledge to the different
from the domain ontology to the learning design resources and activities, a designer can build a
that associates knowledge elements (classes, coherent design that will trigger collaboration
properties and individuals of the ontology) to between learners, or help a trainer decide on its
components of the learning design. intervention, or guide the actions of an intelligent
In Figure 12, we see that data on the orbital tutoring system, and, in general support the evolu-
period of planets in the solar system has been as- tion of the learners’ competencies.
sociated to a learning object in the design, which is
a PowerPoint presenting this data to team A. This Desirable Properties in a Visual
resource is an input to learning activity 2.1.A, but Educational Modeling Language
it is not the only input to this activity. There is also
another resource (clues A) that gives additional This chapter concludes with a discussion of the
information to team A, plus the chat between team most important features and characteristics of a
members that will bring other more information to visual educational modeling language, which we
each participant. As a result, the sub-model of the think are the most useful and beneficial to the user.

Figure 12. An example of ontology annotation of a learning design

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The MOT+Visual Language for Knowledge-Based Instructional Design

Visual Generality

The benefits of graphical cognitive modeling Generality means that the representation language
have been eloquently summarized by Ausubel should have the capacity to represent, with a rela-
(1968), Dansereau (1978), Novak (1993) and tively small number of object and link categories,
Jonassen, Beissner and Yacci (1993). Graphs all knowledge in very different subject domains,
illustrate relationships among components of at various levels of granularity and precision. It
complex phenomena. They uncover the com- should enable, to represent simple models such as
plexity of actors’ interactions and make the a multiplication table, up to complex models such
most important parts stand out. They facilitate as multi-actor workflows, rule-based knowledge
the communication about the reality studied. systems, methods and theories. It should also
They favor the global comprehension of the embed equivalent representations to commonly
phenomena under study. They help grasp the used graphs such as conceptual maps, semantic
structure of related ideas by minimizing the use networks, flowcharts, decision trees or cause/
of ambiguous natural language texts. As an ex- effect diagrams.
ample, entity-relation graphs reduce ambiguity
compared to a natural language description, but Formalizable
some remain on the interpretation of the terms
written on the links or on the nodes. Ambiguity The graphic language should be upward compat-
can be reduced further by the use of standardized ible from informal graphs, up to semi-formal and
typed objects and typed links. totally unambiguous formal models. At the infor-
mal level, an integrated representation framework
User-Friendliness facilitates the organization of thought and com-
munication between humans about the knowledge
Not all graphic modeling languages are user- which is exchanged, all along the evolution of the
friendly. A good counter-example is UML. The graphic representation model. Here the process
large number of models and symbols require is more important than the result. On the other
considerable expertise and a steep learning time end, the graphic language makes it possible to
for the interpretation and for the construction of use more constrained elements to produce totally
models. Furthermore, each type of model captures unambiguous descriptions that can be exported
a different viewpoint of the information and it to a set of symbols, such as an XML file, to be
is impossible to mix them in the same graph to processed by computer agents. Here the model is
provide a global view of a subject domain. The more important than the process.
representational system must be easy to use
without technical or scientific mastery after a Declarative
short period of initiation. Dansereau and Holley
(1982), have studied experimentally the use of Graphic language can be procedural or declara-
different sets of graphic symbols by learners. tive. Procedural graphic languages have been
Their results show that typed links are preferred built in the past; essentially extending flowcharts
by the majority of learners, as long as there are to promote graphical programming that would
not two few nor two many links and they express produce code directly. Our proposal is to use, as
sufficiently different meanings. much as possible, a declarative graphic language,
for a number of reasons. Firstly, it is easier for
a person to declare the components of his/her

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knowledge than to describe the way it should be representation is complete (all conclusions are
processed. In expert systems for example, the ex- guaranteed to be computable) and decidable (all
ecutive instructions are not wired-in the program, computations will finish in finite time). These
but externalized and made visible in a knowledge considerations have motivated the construction
base on which a general inference engine proceeds. of the MOT+OWL graphic language that is
Secondly, the same model can be used for many equivalent to the OWL-DL XML schema based
different applications, not necessarily the one on descriptive logic.
for which the processing has been planned in a
procedural program. This is done by querying the
model using an inference engine, in a Prolog-like CONCLUSION
manner. Thirdly, the processing knowledge itself
can be given declaratively, so that higher order This chapter has presented a 10-year effort to
meta-knowledge, also can be singled-out. This provide an educational visual language for ap-
idea is similar to structural analysis as proposed plications that can span form informal support
by Scandura (1973) and it is exactly the way we to idea generation, up to structured semi-formal
should see the relation between generic skills and graphs based on typed objects and links, and finally
domain knowledge in a competency, as meta- to graphic design on the formal conceptual and
knowledge given declaratively, applied to domain specification levels (MOT+LD, MOT+OWL).
knowledge, for example, rules for diagnosing In Botturi et al. (2006), the reader can find
a component-based system applied to different a classification of other visual languages, some
models describing a car, a software or a learning of them being presented in other chapters of this
environment. handbook. According to this classification, MOT+
has the same properties as those of UML. It quali-
Standardized fies as a visual, layered, formal, conceptual and
specification elaboration language, with multiple
Standardization is an important property to sup- perspectives.
port knowledge communication and use between This corresponds to our initial goal of building
persons or software agents. At the informal level, a virtual language that is both user-friendly for
each model constructed by a person must be in- designers (compared to UML) and still general
terpretable by another person. At the formal level, and powerful enough to enable the design of the
the communication capabilities extend to software main components of a learning system, according
agents. The move towards graphic versions of to standard specifications. With the development
standards like IMS-LD for learning designs and of the new scenario editor based on MOT+ con-
OWL for ontologies adds wider communication cepts, we can now go a step further and provide a
capabilities between researchers and educators visual scenario programming language that can be
while at the same time adding formal non-am- executed by an ontology-based engine to deliver
biguous interpretation for machine processing. usable learning environments to its users.

Computability
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le langage graphique MOT+OWL et le langage des Science Publishers.
prédicats du premier ordre. TELOS documenta-
Schreiber, G., Wielinga, B., & Breuker, J. (1993).
tion. Montreal, Québec: LICEF Research Center.
KADS—A principled approach to knowledge-
Paquette, G., & Rosca, I. (2004). An ontology- based system development. San Diego, USA:
based referencing of actors, operations and Academic Press.
resources in elearning systems. SW-EL/2004
Sowa, J. F. (1984). Conceptual structures, informa-
Workshop. The Netherlands: Eindhoven.
tion processing in mind and machine. Addison-
Paquette, G., Rosca, I., Mihaila, S., & Masmoudi, Wesley Publishing Co.
A. (2007). TELOS, a service-oriented framework
Tennyson, R., & Rasch, M. (1988). Linking cogni-
to support learning and knowledge management.
tive learning theory to instructional prescriptions.
In S. Pierre (Ed).E-Learning networked environ-
Instructional Science, 17, 369–385. doi:10.1007/
ments and architectures: A knowledge processing
BF00056222
perspective. Springer-Verlag
West, C. K., Farmer, J. A., & Wolff, P. M. (1991).
Paquette G., Marino, O., De la Teja, I., Lundgren-
Instructional design: Implications from cognitive
Cayrol, K., Léonard, M., & Contamines (2005).
science. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Implementation and deployment of the IMS
learning design specification. Canadian Journal
of Learning Technologies (CJLT), 31(2). Retrieved
from http://www.cjlt.ca/ ENDNOTES
Paris, S., Lipson, M. Y., & Wixson, K. K. 1
MISA:Méthode d’ingénierie des systèmes
(1983). Becoming a strategic reader. Contem- d’apprentissage is a French acronym mean-
porary Educational Psychology, 8, 293–311. ing, “method for instructional systems
doi:10.1016/0361-476X(83)90018-8 engineering”
PROTÉGÉ. (2006). Protégé Homepage. Retrieved
2
ADISA:Atelier distribué d’ingénierie des
July 24, 2006 from http://protege.stanford.edu/ systèmes d’apprentissage is a French acro-
nym meaning “distributed workbench for
RELOAD. (2005).RELOAD homepage editor learning systems engineering”
and player. Retrieved July 24, 2006, from http:// 3
TELOS: (TEleLearning Operating System)
www.reload.ac.uk/ is a new system built within the LORNET
Romiszowski, A. J. (1981). Designing instruc- project (www.lornet.org) to enable engineer
tional systems. New York: Kogan Page. and technologists to assemble eLearning
and knowledge management platforms and
Rosca, I. (2005). TELOS conceptual architecture. environments.
(LORNET Technical Report: 0.5.).Canada: LICEF 4
On Figure 11, principles with 1 express
Research Centre, Télé-université. OWL cardinality axioms here meaning “at
Rumbaugh, J., Blaha, M., Premerlani, W., Eddy, least one”.
F., & Lorensen, W. (1991). Object-oriented model-
ling and design. USA: Prentice Hall.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Visual Languages for Instructional Design: Theories and Practices, edited
by Luca Botturi and Todd Stubbs, pp. 132-153, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.13
poEML:
A Separation of Concerns Proposal
to Instructional Design

Manuel Caeiro-Rodríguez
University of Vigo, Spain

ABSTRACT separation of concerns allows us to approach the

modeling of educational units in an incremental
This chapter introduces a new visual educational way, offering advantages in expressiveness, for-
modeling language (EML) based on a separation- mality, adaptability and flexibility.
of-concerns approach, poEML: perspective-ori-
ented EML. EMLs were proposed to support the
modeling of educational units. These languages INTRODUCTION
are related to ID, as they are intended to repre-
sent models of educational units. This chapter As a design discipline, ID is devoted to produce
introduces the poEML separation of concerns effective educational units (e.g., a lesson, a course,
and its graphic constructs. The main idea un- a practice, a workshop). Botturi, Derntl, Boot and
derlying poEML is to break down the modeling Figl (2006) show how modeling languages can
of educational units into separate parts that can contribute to ID by supporting the creation of visual
be specified independently. poEML is mainly models that facilitate the design, communication
focused on supporting the computational execu- and execution of educational units. Specifically,
tion of educational unit models. In addition, the some VIDLs are focused on supporting the creation
of computational models of educational units that
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch313 can be executed by customized LMSs. This is the

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
poEML

main goal of the ID language described in this predefined plan. Usually, educational plans
chapter, while other goals are secondary (e.g., have to choose between several alternative
to facilitate the design and the communication). paths, or they have to be changed to solve
The achievement of a VIDL that allows us unexpected situations. Therefore, a VIDL
to create computational models of educational should allow us to create adaptable and
units is a complex endeavor. These are some of flexible models of educational units.
the problems involved:
The proposed VIDL tries to solve these
• Expressiveness: One main problem is problems by following a separation-of-concerns
how the VIDL will support the creation of approach. Separation of concerns is an impor-
models representing the broad variety of tant principle in other design domains (e.g.,
static and behavioral issues involved in ed- architecture and software design). For example,
ucational units. Depending on the learning in architecture, building models or plans are di-
goals, pedagogical approach (e.g., behav- vided into several parts. These include plans of
iorism, constructivism, social-collabora- the structure of the building, the layouts of floors,
tive) or learning context (e.g., face-to-face, electrical installation, and plumbing installation.
blended, Web-based), teaching and train- This separation of concerns facilitates the design
ing requires different resources and proce- task, as the designer’s attention can be focused
dures. Here are some examples: in a tradi- on one concern at a time. Similarly, the model-
tional face-to-face course a teacher gives ing of educational units can be approached from
lectures and proposes tasks to learners; in a a separation-of-concerns approach as well. For
Web-based course a learner accesses a Web example: the activity structure of educational
site to get documents and to perform tests; units can be considered as one concern, and the
in a tennis lesson a player repeats the same order in which activities have to be performed
movements several times under the super- as another. The proposed VIDL, developed with
vision of an instructor; in a primary school, this separation-of-concerns principle, is called
children play games to learn numbers and poEML: perspective-oriented educational model-
letters. There is a large variety of elements, ing language.
resources, procedures, and behaviors pres- The remainder of the chapter is organized as
ent in educational units and a VIDL should follows. The following section introduces the
allow us to express them in models. context of this proposal and its classification.
• Formality: Formality is necessary to sup- The next section describes the main ideas of the
port the computational execution of the language, together with the proposed separation
models in customized LMSs. To be exe- of concerns. Then, the fourth section includes
cuted, models need to include an appropri- the description of the poEML elements and their
ate level of detail, and need to be arranged graphical representations. This section only con-
in accordance with clear and unambiguous tains poEML elements that are most relevant to
constructs. Therefore, the intended VIDL an ID point of view. Next the JPoEML graphical
should allow us to create models with pre- editor is introduced. In the sixth section, a simple
cision and consistency. course is modeled with poEML as a case study.
• Adaptability and flexibility: Another The chapter ends with some conclusions.
problem for VIDLs is that educational
models are not fixed. Educational units
rarely work perfectly in accordance with a

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BACKGROUND Classification

The EML Context This section introduces poEML in accordance with

the classification framework proposed in Botturi,
poEML is introduced here as a VIDL, but it was Derntl, Boot and Figl (2006) for ID languages.
developed as an EML: educational modeling poEML features and classification is presented
language (Koper, 2001). EMLs have been pro- in Table 1.
posed as modeling languages which “describe
the content and process within a ‘unit-of-learning’
from a pedagogical perspective in order to sup- THE SEPARATION OF CONCERNS
port reuse and interoperability” (Rawlings et al.,
2002). Several languages have been proposed as Separation-of-concerns is a long-standing idea
EMLs trying to satisfy this definition. IMS-LD that simply means that a large problem is easier
(instructional management systems—learning to manage if it can be broken down into parts. It
design) (Koper et al., 2003; Koper & Tattersall, is an important design approach in other areas,
2005), issued by the IMS Global Consortium1, such as software design, where it is used to fa-
is the principal attempt and the current de-facto cilitate the understanding, design and manage-
EML standard. Since its publication, IMS-LD has ment of complex systems. Accordingly with the
become an important e-learning standard, and has separation-of-concerns approach, programs are
promoted the development of active research and broken down into distinct parts that overlap in
practitioner communities (see Chapter XV in this functionality as little as possible (Kazman, 2001).
handbook). In any case, IMS-LD does not pro- aspect-oriented programming (AOP) has further
vide appropriate solutions to solve the problems developed the separation-of-concerns approach to
identified in the introduction of this chapter (also propose the concept of crosscutting concerns as
described in Chapters XIII and XIV in this hand- concerns that cut across other concerns (Kiczales
book). poEML is an attempt to develop a solution et al., 1997).
to some of these deficiencies.

Table 1. poEML features and classification

Classification of features of poEML

Stratification Layered, poEML offers different representations to describe entities of different types, namely: roles, activities,
learning materials, etc.
Formalization Formal, poEML defines a closed set of concepts and rules for composition of concepts.
Elaboration poEML is mainly an implementation language as it is able to provide a high level of detail of elements and strategies
involved in educational units.
Perspective Multiple, as it provides different views on the same entities. For example, it provides structural, order and temporal
diagrams related to different static and behavioral issues about the parts of educational units.
Notation system poEML has both a textual (XML) and a graphical notation.
Classification of application
Communication poEML is reflective and communicative. It is reflective as it is intended to support structuring and conceiving solu-
tions. It is communicative as the graphical representations can be used to share and interchange design solutions.
Creativity poEML is both generative and finalist. It is generative in the sense that it can be used to create and refine design
solutions. It is finalist as its purpose is to formalize the design models that can be processed by computational systems.

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poEML

poEML follows the separation-of-concerns 1987). Considering that any educational unit can
approach to support the modeling of educational be conceived as a set of hierarchical aggregated
units. Similarly to AOP, poEML identifies two activities, the expanded mediation model provided
kinds of concerns to break down educational by this theory provides an interesting framework
unit models, namely: perspectives and aspects. to identify perspectives (see Figure 2). The core
These two kinds of concerns can be represented of this model is that any activity involves a sub-
in orthogonal axes (see Figure 1). On the one ject playing a role acting on an object to achieve
hand, the horizontal axis separates the elements a certain goal. This connection is influenced by
involved in educational units in different perspec- the environment and the community where the
tives. Static and behavioral elements are both taken activity is performed. In other words, the activity
into account in the perspectives. For example: the depends on the environment and the community.
environments are considered in one perspective The environment contains the tools and resources
and the order between activities in another. On that can be used by the subject to act on the object.
the other hand, the vertical axis separates models The community puts the emphasis in the social
in accordance with different levels of control or context where the subject operates, involving the
aspects. Each aspect involves a certain level of influence of two new issues: rules and division of
control that can be used to determine changes in labor. The rules component highlights the fact that
the structure or behavior of the elements in the within a community, subjects are bound to rules
perspectives. The basic level of control is deter- and regulations that affect the way they interact
mined, which does not allow any change in an in the activity, including also the interaction with
educational unit model to be specified. the environment and its elements. The division of
labor refers to the breaking down of the goal into
Perspectives sub-goals and the distribution of responsibilities
among the available subjects. As a result new
The activity theory is a meta-theory about activi- subsidiary activities (sub-activities) are produced.
ties and their constituent components (Engeström, The expanded mediation model has guided the
identification of 13 perspectives:
Figure 1. Separation of concerns in poEML
through Perspectives and Aspects • Structural: The structural perspective is
about the arrangement of the elements in-
volved in educational units. The proposed
structure is based on the activity concept.
Educational units are conceived as a set
of hierarchical activities grouping all the
other elements: functional goals, actors,
environments, sub-activities, and specifi-
cations. This structural perspective enables
these elements to be grouped in an activ-
ity hierarchical structure. Each of the el-
ements is further described in one of the
following perspectives:
• Functional: This perspective is about the
functional goals that have to be attained in
an educational unit. Functional goals in-

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Figure 2. Proposed perspectives in accordance with the activity theory expanded mediation model

cluded in an activity specify the work that cluded in each activity. The behavioral is-
has to be performed by participants on it. sues involve the participants flow, namely,
For example, a functional goal can be “to how the participants performing a certain
produce a basic transistor circuit” or “to role in an activity have to be assigned to
evaluate the learners.” These functional another role in a sub-activity.
goals are different from learning goals • Environments: An environment is a place
that refer to a desired knowledge, skill, where the activity of an educational unit is
or capability. This perspective involves performed. An environment is also made
the description of static and behavioral is- up of artifacts and tools that can be used
sues of functional goals. The static issues by participants. For example, a lab envi-
involve features and elements included in ronment is made up of several simulators
functional goals (e.g., input and output pa- as well as documentation about the simu-
rameters). The behavioral issues involve lators operation. This perspective involves
relationships among functional goals (e.g., the static description of the environments
dependency and completion relationships). and the relationships among environments.
They can be used to create functional flows It does not consider any behavior issues.
in educational units, indicating how goals • Data: This perspective is about the data
included in an activity are related with elements used in educational units. These
goals included in its sub-activities. data elements are included in the other
• Participants: This perspective is about elements: input and output parameters in
the participants involved in the educa- functional goals; properties in roles; and
tional unit. Participants in the models are artifacts in environments. This perspective
not specific persons. Instead, the desired involves the description of static and be-
participants are represented by roles. This havior issues of data elements. The static
perspective involves the description of the issues are about the features of data ele-
static and behavioral issues of participants. ments (e.g., type) and their structure. The
The static issues involve the description behavior issues are about the transfer of
of the roles and the structure of groups in-

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data between data elements, namely, the permission while learners are assigned
data flow. “novice.”
• Tools: The tool concept is used to repre- • Awareness: Awareness refers to the pro-
sent the applications and services that can cessing of runtime information (events)
be used in an educational unit (e.g., simu- and the notification of relevant situa-
lators, editors, communication, and collab- tions. For example, in many educational
oration services). To facilitate the reuse of units it is very important that teachers be
the educational unit models, tools are not aware of learners’ actions. Nevertheless,
fixed during design, but are described in as important as this is, it is not to overload
an abstract way. During the run-time, tools the teacher with excessive information.
provided by different vendors that satisfy Therefore, awareness involves giving the
such description can be used (this differen- right participant the appropriate informa-
tiation is similar to the distinction between tion and avoiding information overload.
roles and participants). To accomplish this, awareness should be
• Organizations: This refers to the organi- focused, customized, and temporally con-
zational structure required to carry out an strained (Baker et al., 2002).
educational unit. This information may be • Interaction: This perspective is about the
used to constrain the behavior of other per- performance of automatic operations in
spectives. For example, the assignment of tools. Many of the controls required to sup-
a teacher to an evaluation activity may de- port collaboration among a group of partic-
pend on his position in the organizational ipants involve the invocation of operations
structure. in collaborative tools at certain time points
• Order: This perspective is about the se- or as a result of events. This perspective
quence in which activities have to be per- involves the mechanisms required to sup-
formed. It indicates whether activities have port the invocation of operations.
to be performed in sequence or in parallel • Causal: This causal perspective involves
to set synchronization points among sev- the use of competencies (Cooper & Ostyn,
eral activities performed in parallel, etc. In 2002), metadata (Duval, 2002), learning
other domains this order perspective is also objectives, and pre-requisites to inform
known as control flow. participants about why they should per-
• Temporal: Temporal constraints can be form an educational unit.
used to indicate when an activity must or
can be initiated and when it must be fin- This chapter is mainly focused on the ID fea-
ished. An example of temporal constraints tures of this proposal. Some of the perspectives
would be to indicate that a lab practice specifically exist to support collaboration in edu-
must be initiated by 14:00 and that it has to cational practices (e.g., authorization, awareness
be finished in 2 hours. and interaction). As such, these perspectives may
• Authorization: Authorization involves not be very important from an ID point of view
participants’ rights to access the environ- and will not be discussed further in this chapter.
ments’ elements, mainly access to the
artifacts’ and tools’ functionalities. For Aspects
example, a simulator may provide two dif-
ferent permissions: “expert” and “novice.” In addition to the breaking down of static and
Teachers may be assigned the “expert” behavioral issues in perspectives, the vertical axis

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 poEML

distinguishes among different levels of control. an ID point of view. poEML is arranged in several
They are introduced in order to support differ- packages reflecting the separation-of-concerns
ent kinds of control in educational unit models, explained in the previous section. The modeling
from determined to decision-based. The aspects of each perspective and aspect is supported with
proposed in poEML are: the elements of a specific package. Therefore, the
structural, functional, participants, environment,
• Determined: This is the basic aspect. In data, order, and temporal packages are described.
accordance with this aspect, the structure For each package, a UML diagram showing its
and behavior of an educational unit is fixed elements and relations is included. (See Chapter
in the model. During the run-time the edu- IX of this handbook for a good UML primer.) In
cational unit is always carried out in the addition, the graphical representation of such ele-
same way. A “determined” aspect does not ments and relations is also presented. First, we will
introduce any element. explain some general issues about the language.
• Data-based or conditioned: This involves
the use of conditions on data elements to General Issues
control changes in the structure or behav-
ior of educational unit elements. For exam- This section describes some general issues about
ple, the functional goals of a course may the poEML elements and their features.
need to change from optional to mandatory
depending on a data element of the learner Common Features
profile.
• Event-based: Event-based aspects involve All poEML elements have two common properties:
the use of events to control changes in the a name and a description. The name is used as an
behavior of educational units. Events are identifier and a reference. The description is used
used to signal situations that appear unex- to inform designers during design-time as well as
pectedly during the execution. For exam- participants during run-time about the purpose of
ple, a lab activity has to be finished when the element. For example, for a functional goal:
a certain event is produced in a simulator.
• Decision-based: This involves the use • The Name identifies the functional goal in
of human decisions to control changes in the educational unit model: “To design a
the structure and behavior of educational microprocessor.”
units. Often, changes are not dependent • A Textual Description informs partici-
on data or events, but on the judgment of pants about its purpose: “Design a mi-
responsible persons (one or several). For croprocessor of eight bits that enables the
example, a teacher may decide the goals performance…”
that should be optional or mandatory. This
aspect is used to explicitly describe the hu- Abstract Elements
man decisions that have to be taken during
run-time. poEML includes several abstract elements. One
of the most important is the Choice Point that
POEML belongs to the Aspect package. This element is
an abstraction of a Condition, Event, or Decision.
This section introduces the poEML elements and Conceptually it represents a point where a choice
graphical notations which are most relevant from has to be performed during run-time. Obviously,

724
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this choice can be established using any of the activity-centered approach is followed, but instead
elements considered in these aspects. of “activity,” the term Educational Scenario (ES)
is used. From a conceptual point of view, an ES
Graphical Conventions represents a complete piece of instruction with a
specific educational purpose. It can be used to rep-
poEML elements are represented using different resent educational unit models at different levels
geometric figures. In addition, it includes several of aggregation, from simple lessons to complete
kinds of relations (association, aggregation, spe- curricula. From a practical point of view, any
cialization and dependence) that are represented educational unit model involves a hierarchical
using arrows. These arrows are depicted in ac- structure of aggregated ESs. In other words, an
cordance with UML conventions (see Chapter educational unit is represented by an ES (named
IX in this handbook). As there are many different as root-ES) that is composed by other ESs (named
kinds of dependencies, dependency arrows are as sub-ESs or children ESs). These sub-ESs can
annotated with a label that indicates the type of also be made up of other ESs.
dependency. In addition, each ES involves a closed system
of elements. The elements included in one ES can
Run-time Instances operate with elements included in the same ES,
exclusively. The interactions with elements in
poEML enables to specify the number of run-time other ESs have to be explicitly specified at certain
instances that need to be created out of the elements perspectives as functional flows, participant flows,
defined. This feature is required in order to sup- data flows, and control flows.
port the computational execution of educational
unit models. For example, usually Goals have Elements Involved
to be accomplished only once, but certain Goals
have to be executed several times (e.g., “a teacher Figure 3 illustrates the ES and its constituent
has to assess an examination as many times as elements. It represents an ES element involving
individual learners have performed the exam”). an aggregated structure relating the elements
In this situation, the functional goal is specified considered in the 13 perspectives: (i) its own
once, but it has to be performed repeatedly for break down in sub-ESs; (ii) a Goal (or set of
each individual. poEML allows us indicate the Goals) that need to be satisfied; (iii) a participant
number of run-time instances by the specification or set of participants (specified as Roles) that will
of a number. This number can be set during design- work towards the goals achievement; (iv) one
time or determined during run-time in accordance or several Environments where participants will
with the value of a Choice Point. In addition, it work, composed by (v) Data Elements and (vi)
is also possible that the number of instances take Tools that represent applications and services; and
the value zero. In this case the element will not optionally (vii) a particular Organizational Struc-
exist during the run-time. This feature enables the ture that situates participants in an organization
adaptation and modification of models. scheme; (viii) Order Specifications to indicate the
order in which the sub-ESs are intended to be per-
The Structural Package formed; (ix) Temporal Specifications to indicate
or constrain the moment at which each sub-ES
The structural package is used to arrange and has to be initiated and finished; (x) Authorization
organize all the elements involved in educational Specifications giving permissions to participants
unit models. To support such an arrangement, an for the use of resources; (xi) Awareness Specifica-

725
 poEML

tions indicating how events should be processed Graphical Representation

and notification submitted to participants; (xii)
Interaction Specifications with constructs that The elements of this package can be graphically
permit the performance of automatic operations; represented as a set of hierarchical aggregated
and, (xiii) several Records containing descriptions elements. At this time this representation is a
of competencies, learning objectives and pre- hierarchical tree (see Figure 4). The root and the
requisites. Each one of these elements is modeled branches of the tree are ESs. The leaves of the
in a different package. tree are the other poEML elements that are rep-
In addition to its constituent elements, an ES resented by appropriate symbols. The root ES is
can involve the specification of multiple in- represented with an icon different from the icon
stances. Sometimes during execution several used for the other ESs to show that it is the root
instances of the same ES must be created. For ES that represents the educational unit.
example, an ES involving a pair of learners per-
forming a lab practice has to be created for as The Functional Package
many pairs of learners there are in the class, be-
cause the same lab practice has to be performed The Functional package involves the modeling
by each pair. of Goals (functional goals). Every ES needs to
include a Goal or set of Goals indicating what
to do. It involves the modeling of the static and
behavioral issues of functional goals.

Figure 3. Main elements and relationships involved in the Educational Scenario element

726
poEML

Figure 4. Graphical representation of the elements

The next items describe the elements of this
of the Structural package
package:

• Input Parameters and Output Parameters

indicating the data elements that have to
be provided to perform the Goal, and the
data elements that must be produced as a
result of the performance of the goal, re-
spectively. For example: “Specifications of
the problem,” “The qualification obtained
in an evaluation.” These parameters are
characterized in accordance with the Data
Element of the Data package (see Figure
5).
• Input Constraints and Output Constraints.
The Input Constraints enable control of
Elements Involved when a functional goal can be attempted.
For example: “The software tool that sup-
Figure 5 represents in an UML diagram the ele- ports the design of microprocessors must
ments and relationships of this package. be available,” “The learner assigned to the
corresponding ES has obtained a qualifica-
tion greater than five in a previous ques-

Figure 5. Main elements and relationships of the Goals package

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 poEML

tionnaire.” Meanwhile, Output Constraints ◦◦ Aggregation Relationships are used

enable control of when a goal has been sat- to indicate that a Goal (G1) can be
isfied. For example: “The document con- decomposed into several sub-Goals
taining the microprocessor design has been (G1, G2, … GN). To satisfy G1 it is
delivered.” These constraints are specified necessary to satisfy the N sub-Goals.
using a Choice Point of the aspect package This allows complex goals to be bro-
or they can reference to other functional ken down into more simple ones. For
goals. example, a practice has as a goal “to
• The Mandatory or Optional character of develop a software application.” This
a Goal. Many times, educational units in- goal is broken down into the follow-
clude certain parts that are not required. ing sub-goals: “perform the analy-
They are included as a complement to sis”; “design a solution”; “program
satisfy learners’ curiosity or to get a bet- the design”; and “perform tests.”
ter understanding. poEML recognizes this ◦◦ Specialization Relationships are used
possibility and distinguishes between man- to indicate that a Goal (G1) is de-
datory and optional goals. This aspect can tailed by several sub-goals (G2, G3,
be fixed during design-time or determined … GN). To satisfy G1, some number
during run-time using a Choice Point of of the N specialized sub-goals must
the aspect package. be satisfied. This allows different
• The Instances that have to be created of paths to achieve the same purpose.
a Goal. In poEML, a Goal has to be per- For example, the goal “examine the
formed as many times as instances are cre- learners” has the following possible
ated from it. This construct permits us to specializations: “make a written ex-
indicate how many times a Goal has to be amination;” “make an oral examina-
performed. The number of Instances of a tion;” “make a portfolio examina-
Goal can be fixed to a value during design- tion;” etc.
time, be determined during run-time, or
constrained in accordance with a Choice Graphical Representation
Point.
• The Accesses indication allows us to speci- Figure 6 shows the graphical representation of
fy how many times a Goal can be accessed the elements of this package. Please note the fol-
for performance. Some times Goals cannot lowing issues:
be satisfied by an unlimited number of at-
tempts, but have limits. For example: “A • Goals are represented with different colors
student airplane pilot has to learn to take depending on whether they are mandatory,
off and land in less than a certain number optional or hidden. They include the name
of attempts.” Similarly to the Instances of the ES and the name of the Goal.
indication, this value can be fixed during- • The Aggregation and Specialization rela-
design, determined during run-time or tionships connect Goals with other Goals.
constrained. • The Mandatory or Optional (MO), Input
• Relationships between Goals. Finally, po- (I) and Output (O) dependencies connect
EML allows two different kinds of rela- Goals with Choice Points.
tionships to be indicated:

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Figure 6. Graphical representation of the elements of the Goals package

• The Number of Instances (NI) and Number cordingly to a participant flow specification. This
of Accesses (NA) connect Goals with Data kind of specification facilitates the reuse of ESs.
Elements.
Elements Involved
Dependencies with the Structural
Figure 7 represents in a UML diagram the main
Perspective elements and relationships of this package.
The next items describe the main elements of
The Goals specification has strong implications this package include the following:
for the execution of the educational unit models.
The structural package permits us to compose • Properties involving Data Elements about
the structure of the educational unit through the the Role. The value of the Properties dur-
aggregation of ESs. Meanwhile, the Goals pack- ing the execution will correspond with the
age let us indicate what has to be done in the particular participant assigned to the Role.
educational unit. This enables the design of “goal Some examples of properties associated
maps” where different paths through the structural with a Role: personal data as name, sur-
model can be conceived. name, address; previous knowledge, etc.
• Role Aggregations enabling the specifica-
The Participants Package tion of Composed Roles made up by other
Roles (sub-Roles). This feature allows the
The Participants package involves the modeling modeling of groups. For example a project
of Roles. Every ES may include a Role or set of group is made up by the following roles:
Roles representing the expected participants. one leader, three developers, one tester and
Notice that each ES has to define its own one supervisor.
Roles. They can be the same or different from • The Instances that have to be created of
the Roles in its Parent ES. During the execution, each Role. During the execution each in-
participants will be transferred from the Roles stance of a Role has to be performed by a
in the Parent ES to the Roles in the Sub-ESs ac- different participant. In this way it is pos-

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Figure 7. Main elements and relationships of the Participants package

sible to indicate that a certain ES requires ◦◦ Role Flow elements. These are sim-
the participation of several persons in the ple arrows connecting Roles and Role
same Role. For example: “A discussion ES Connectors.
needs to involve five learners.”
• The participant flow recognizes that par- Graphical Representation
ticipants can change their Role between
activities during the run-time. For exam- Figure 8 shows the graphical representation of
ple: “A participant performs as learner in the elements of this package. Note the following
a theoretical ES and as project leader in a issues:
practical ES.” The participant flow can be
modeled using two elements: Figure 8. Graphical representation of the elements
◦◦ Role Connectors. These are operators of the Participants package
that indicate how participants will
be processed. Four types of connec-
tors are supported: (i) selection con-
nectors that permit us to take several
participants from a larger set; (ii)
election connectors that let us to take
exactly one participant from a larger
set; (iii) relation connectors that en-
able to constraint possible elections;
and (iv) assignment type connectors
distinguish between forced assign-
ment and voluntary assignment.

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Figure 9. Main elements and relationships of the

• Three different kinds of Roles icons are
Environments package
provided: Learner, Staff and Group. They
include the name of the ES where they are
included and the name of the Role.
• The Aggregation association is used to
model Groups.
• The Parameter (P) and Number of
Instances (NI) dependencies are used to
connect Roles with Data Elements.
• Each kind of Role Connector is represent-
ed with a different icon.
• The Role Flow dependency is used to con-
nect Roles with Role Connectors.

The Environments Package

The Environments package involves the model-

ing of Environments. Every ES may include an made up by other Environments (sub-En-
Environment or set of Environments containing vironments). For example: “A laboratory
the resources that can be used. Environments room is made up by a working environ-
contain Tools and Artifacts specified with Data ment and a test environment.”
Elements. Two different kinds of Environments • The Class element is used to support the
are considered: virtual and physical. classification of the resources included in
the Environments of an ES. Many times,
Elements Involved the resources of an environment need to
be classified. For example: “Resources for
Figure 9 represents in a UML diagram the ele- expert learners and resources for novice
ments of this package. learners.” They are used in the specifica-
The next items describe the elements of this tion of the awareness, authorization, and
package: interaction perspectives.
• Finally, poEML considers that
• Artifacts contained in the Environment. Environments will be characterized in an
These Artifacts are characterized us- abstract way during design-time. Then,
ing Data Elements. Some examples: “A during run-time, a concrete environment
document explaining a concept,” “A vari- containing the specified Artifacts and Tools
able indicating the grade obtained in a will be provided. This is similar to the dis-
questionnaire.” tinction between Roles and participants.
• Tools contained in the Environment. These Nevertheless, it is possible to specify the
Tools are characterized in accordance with use of a concrete Environment. To do so, a
the Tool element of the Tools perspective. Reference indication has to be specified to
Some examples: “A simulator,” “A text- establish the concrete environment. In ad-
editor,” “A chat service.” dition, this Reference can also be used to
• Environment Aggregations enabling the indicate that an Environment in an ES has
specification of Composed Environments

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to be the same that other Environment in Elements Involved

other ES.
poEML proposes the elements depicted in Figure
Graphical Representation 11 to support the representation of data needs in
educational unit models:
Figure 10 shows the graphical representation of
the elements of this package. Please note the fol- • The Data Element is the main component.
lowing issues: For each Data Element, the following
properties can be specified: name, descrip-
• Special icons are used to represent tion, type, and default value.
Physical, Virtual, and Class elements. • The External File element allows one to
They include the name of the ES where specify data elements contained in a file
they are included and the name of the external to the educational unit model.
element. This element can be used to transfer infor-
• A Contains (C) dependency is used to indi- mation to or from the external context.
cate which Artifacts and Tools are included • The Data Flow element enables the indi-
in each Environment. cation of how data values flow between
• A Belongs (B) dependency is used to relate Data Elements, External Files, and Data
resources with Classes. Connectors.
• A Reference (R) dependency is used to in- • The Data Connector involves several al-
dicate the reference from an Environment ternatives to transfer values between data
to other Environment. elements. Three different connectors are
available:
The Data Package ◦◦ The Reference connector shows that
a Data Element has the same value as
The Data package supports the modeling of Data other one
Elements and the transfer of data values between ◦◦ The Copy connector shows that a
Data Elements. Data Elements may be included Data Element takes the value of oth-
in Goals, Roles and Environments to feature er Data Element. The Copy can be
parameters, properties and artifacts respectively. synchronous (if it is produced when
the sink Data Element is created) or

Figure 10. Graphical representation of the elements of the Environments package

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Figure 11. Main elements and relationships of the Data package

asynchronous (if it is produced when The Order Package

a Choice Point is satisfied).
◦◦ The Transformation involves the per- The Order package allows us to indicate the order
formance of operations using the data in which the sub-ESs of an ES will be performed.
contained in Data Elements. Some It is not possible to establish order specifications
operation types are: Boolean (e.g., among sub-ESs that belong to different parent ESs.
AND, OR), mathematical (e.g., +, -, This constraint is introduced to help facilitate the
*), string processing (e.g., sub-string, reusability of ESs.
delete).
Elements Involved
Graphical Representation
The indication of the Order among sub-ESs is
Figure 12 shows the graphical representation maintained in Order Specifications. For an ES,
of the basic elements in the Data package. The several Order Specifications can be included in
different Data types have particular graphical the same model. During the execution one or
representations. zero in the Order Specifications may be activated
in accordance with a Choice Point. Each Order
Specification is composed by the elements de-
picted in Figure 13:
Figure 12. Graphical representation for the ele-
ments of the Data package • The Order Flow element enables the speci-
fication of links between ESs and Order
Connectors.
• The Order Connector element is used to
indicate different order operations. The
provided connectors are:
◦◦ Sequence: The Sequence specifica-
tion describes a point where an ES

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Figure 13. Main elements and relationships of the Order package

can be initiated when the previous ES synchronization specification is used.

has finished. To initiate the next ES, all parallel
◦◦ Unordered Sequence: The ESs must finish. Using an association
Unordered Sequence specification with a Choice Point it is possible to
describes a situation where several indicate that the synchronization has
ESs can be initiated in sequence, but to be produced in a Deferred way,
with no predefined order in which namely, when a condition, decision
they must be performed. The order is or event is satisfied.
decided during the execution.
◦◦ Parallel Split: Parallel split specifies Graphical Representation
a point where several ESs can be initi-
ated and performed in parallel. Figure 14 shows the graphic representation of
◦◦ Loop: Loop specifies a point where a the elements of this package. Note the following
return to an already finished or com- issues:
pleted ES may be required.
◦◦ Merge: Merge specifies a point • Two special figures are used to indicate the
where several ESs that were being start and the finish of the order execution.
performed in parallel converge. Each • Each Order Connector is represented by
time one of the ESs finishes, a new a different figure in accordance with its
instance of the next ES is created and behavior.
initiated. • The Order Flow arrow is used to connect
◦◦ Synchronization: To specify a point ESs with Order Connectors. Each ES and
where several ESs that were being Order Connector has exactly one input
performed in parallel converge, the Order Flow and one output Order Flow.

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Figure 14. Graphical representation of the ele-

Elements Involved
ments of the Process package
Temporal indications and constraints are specified
in Temporal Specifications. For an ES, several
Temporal Specifications can be included in the
same model. During the execution one or none
of the Temporal Specifications may be activated
in accordance with a Choice Point.
Each Temporal Specification is composed by
elements depicted in Figure 15:

• The Temporal Flow element enables the

specification of links between ESs and
Temporal Connectors.
The Temporal Package • The Temporal Connector element is used
to indicate different temporal relations. It
The Temporal package allows one to indicate and can be associated with a Choice Point or
constrain the time at which an ES can/has to be a Data Element. If it is associated with a
initiated or finished. Data Element, that element represents an
During run-time, Temporal Specifications and absolute time (e.g., February 14th, 2007). In
Order Specifications may produce conflicting the other case, when a Temporal Connector
situations. For example: “Both the lab practice is associated with a Choice Point it acts as
and the exam have to be performed in sequence. a temporal reference (i.e., the time at which
The exam has to be started at 16:00.” To know an event is produced). In this case an Offset
what to do in these cases Temporal Specifications can be included to indicate a delay to the
are assigned as a priority factor.

Figure 15. Main elements and relationships of the Temporal package

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 poEML

Figure 16. Graphical representation of the ele-

relative time. These issues affect the four
ments of the Temporal package
Temporal Connectors:
◦◦ Equality: To specify that action A has
to be performed just when another ac-
tion B is produced. For example: “The
exam has to be initiated just when the
lab practice has been finished,” “The
course starts on September 19th.”
◦◦ Hard-Before: To specify that action
A has to be performed before another
action B is produced. If action B is • An Offset (O) dependency is provided
produced and A has not yet been pro- to link Temporal Connectors to Data
duced then action A is forced to be Elements to indicate an offset on the tem-
performed. For example: “The lab poral specification.
practice has to be finished hard-be-
fore the test activity is finished.” THE JPOEML EDITOR
◦◦ Soft-Before: To specify than action
A can be performed before another JPoEML is an authoring tool that enables the
action B is produced. If action B is design of educational unit models in accordance
produced and A has not been pro- with the poEML structure and organization (see
duced yet then action A cannot be Figure 17). It is available at http://www.poeml.
performed. For example: “An option- com. This application permits us to approach the
al activity can be initiated soft-before design of educational units by focusing on each
the examination has been initiated.” perspective and on each aspect each time. In this
◦◦ After: To specify that an action A can way, it is an appropriate tool to test the ID capa-
be performed after action B is pro- bilities of the language.
duced. For example: “The video ses- The JPoEML graphical interface is separated
sion can be initiated after the debate in two main areas:
has been initiated.”

Graphical Representation Figure 17. JPoEML editor graphical interface

with an OrderSpecification in edition
Figure 16 shows the graphic representation of the
elements of this package. The dependencies are
used in the following ways:

• The Temporal Flow connects an ES

Temporal Input or Temporal Output with a
Temporal Connector.
• A Reference (R) dependency is provided to
link Temporal Connectors to Choice Points
or Data Elements indicating relative or ab-
solute temporal references, respectively.

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poEML

• The right side of the screen includes two The Goals Model
panels to provide permanent information
about model elements. It is composed of The Goals perspective is an appropriate starting
two panels: point to initiate the design. The idea is to specify
◦◦ The top panel is used to represent the goals that indicate what participants have
the structure of the educational unit to do. The Goals specification may be done in-
model. It shows the hierarchical tree crementally, first indicating the main Goals and
structure of ESs and contained ele- then refining these Goals into more detail by
ments. This panel provides a perma- specifying aggregated goals, specialized goals
nent and global view of the educa- and other features.
tional unit model. Figure 18 depicts the graphical representation
◦◦ The bottom panel is an area where of the case study functional goals’ model. This
the properties (e.g., name, descrip- representation is incomplete as some goals may
tion, type) of the active element are be further subdivided, and additional elements at
displayed. Depending on the active each goal may be included. The “root” Goal is
element (e.g., ES, Goal, Role) differ- “Perform the Course.” It breaks down into two
ent data fields are provided. sub-Goals: “Perform the Theory” and “Perform
• The central portion of the screen is the the Practice.” The first one includes an Output
more important part of the JPoEML edi- Parameter (a Composed Data Element) and the
tor. It permits the graphical representation second one includes an Input Parameter and
of each perspective and aspect. At a given an Output Parameter. These goals are further
moment only one perspective or aspect can divided. Some of the sub-Goals are depicted in a
be represented. Perspectives and aspects light brown color indicating that they are optional.
are indicated at tabs in the bottom side and The “Perform the Examination” sub-Goal of the
left side of this panel respectively. In addi- theory has two specializations: “Perform an Oral
tion, a contextual panel with tools for each Exam” and “Perform a Written Exam.” During
perspective and aspect is available on the execution, only one is required.
left side.
The Structural Model

AN EXAMPLE The Structural perspective may also be used to

initiate the design of educational unit models. In
This section describes an example of an educa- this case, it has been performed after the Goals
tional unit model. Another example can be found were available. This is how the previous Goals
in chapter XVI of this handbook. This educational are assigned to the ESs.
unit is made up by a theoretical part and a practical Figure 19 shows the example structure. The
part with separated examinations. course breaks down into four main ESs: two for
poEML enables the incremental design of the theoretical and practical parts and two for the
educational units. The following sections show the examinations. In addition, these main ESs also
models for the functional, structural, participants, break down into other sub-ESs. At this design
environments and order perspectives. stage these ESs only include the Goals. Roles, En-
vironments and the rest of elements will be added
to each ES in accordance with the perspectives.

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 poEML

Figure 18. Graphical representation of the simulation course Goals perspective

The Participants Model The diagram also includes Role Connectors

and Role Flows to indicate how participants are
Figure 20 shows the Participants model. The transferred from Role to Role. These connectors
course Roles are represented in the top of the are of type Election and Relation. The Election
figure: a Learner and a Teacher. The Learner has
two associations of type Number Instances with
Condition Elements. They are included to indicate Figure 19. Graphical representation of the simula-
the minimum and maximum number of learners tion course Structural perspective
that may be involved. Similarly, the Teacher has
an association of type Number Instances connected
with an Integer Data Element, fixing the number
required teachers (in this example two).
The Roles of other ESs also have associations
of type Number Instances. Notice that the theo-
retical ES only includes a Learner Role with one
instance. Obviously, all the learners have to per-
form the theoretical part of the course. To do it,
the theoretical ES is assigned a number of in-
stances equal to the eventual number of learners.
In this way, each learner will work in a particular
instance of the theoretical ES. The same is applied
to the practical part ES, where two Roles are in-
volved: a Pair of two Learners and a Teacher.
Notice that the Pair has an association Number
Instances with an Integer Data Element. In the
Condition-based aspect this element takes the
value number of learners divided by 2 plus 1. This
is the number of Pairs that have to be created.

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Figure 20. Graphical representation of the simulation course Participants perspective

uses a “FIFO” (First-In-First-Out) algorithm es- retical exam ES includes two environments: a
tablishing that learners are assigned in the order Physical Environment named as “Aula Magna,”
they are enrolled in the course. The Selection that is fixed using Reference association with
involves a “Difference” mode, establishing that Data URI Element to a particular room; and a
the teacher assigned to the Theoretical Exam has Virtual Environment named as “Assessment”
to be different from the teacher assigned to the that contains a Data Composed Element. This
Practical Part. last environment is also used in the practice
examination ES. To do it, a Virtual Environment
The Environments Model is specified in such ES and connected using a
Reference to the previous one.
For this example, the instruction has been
considered as a blended course where the theo- The Order Model
retical part examination has to be performed
face-to-face and the other parts are performed Figure 22 shows an Order Specification for the
on the Web. Figure 21 shows the Environments ESs under the “root” ES. It involves three types
for the main example ESs. In the “root” ES two of Order Connectors: Sequence, Parallel Split
Environments are specified: the “Course Env.” and Synchronization. In accordance with this
contains a file with general information about specification the course is initiated with the
the course and the “Teacher Environments” theoretical part ES. When it is complete, it is pos-
provides information for teachers. This envi- sible to initiate the practical part and to perform
ronment should be visible and accessible for the theoretical exam. When the practical part is
teachers (this can be specified with the elements finished it is possible to perform the practical
of the Authorization package). The rest of the examination. The course ends when all the ESs
ESs includes particular environments containing are completed.
different artifacts and tools. Notice that the theo-

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Figure 21. Graphical representation of the simulation course Environments perspective

Figure 22. Graphical representation of the simula- Following a separation-of-concerns approach

tion course Order perspective poEML breaks down the modeling of educational
units into a set of separated parts that can be
specified step-by-step. In this way, the expres-
siveness of the language is enhanced as it is
possible to notate more issues and behaviors of
educational units at each part. The formality of
the solution is also enhanced, to make it easier
to support the computational processing of the
models by considering each part independently.
In addition, models are adaptable, to make it pos-
CONCLUSION sible to include several alternatives and consider
their activation during run-time using Choice
This chapter introduces poEML focusing on its Points; and flexible, so that the modeling of a
ID capabilities. poEML has been proposed to perspective/aspect can be changed affecting other
contribute to the modeling of educational units in perspectives in a controlled way. Based on these
the context of EMLs. This language is oriented assumptions,poEML and its graphical notation
towards several goals: expressive power, for- may be a valuable tool for ID.
mality, flexibility and adaptability. The eventual
achievement of all these goals is not an easy task.
It is likely that a large improvement process in- ACKNOWLEDGMENT
volving several steps will be required to improve
the poEML language. Currently, it is not clear in I want to thank “Consellería de Innovación e
which direction and which steps should be taken to Industria” for its support to this work under grant
improve EML and poEML is an attempt to explore “E-BICS: E-learning—Bases de Integración e
a particular direction: separation-of-concerns. Coordinación sobre eStándares” (PGIDIT06PX-
IB322270PR).

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Maeda, C., Lopes, J.-M., & Irwing, J. (1997).
Baker, D., Georgakopoulos, D., Schuster, H., & Aspect-Oriented Programming. Proceedings of
Cichoki, A. (2002). Awareness provisioning in the European Conference on Object-Oriented
collaboration management. International Journal Programming, 1241, 220–242.
of Cooperative Information Systems, 11(1&2),
145–173. doi:10.1142/S0218843002000522 Koper, R. (2001). Modeling units of study from
a pedagogical perspective—The pedagogical
Botturi, L. (2005). Visual languages for instruc- metamodel behind EML. Open University of The
tional design: An evaluation of the perception of Netherlands.
E2ML. Journal of Interactive Learning Research,
16(4), 329–351. Koper, R., Olivier, B., & Anderson, T. (2003). IMS
Learning design information model. IMS Global
Botturi, L., Derntl, M., Boot, E., & Figl, K. (2006). Learning Consortium, Inc.
A classification framework for educational model-
ing languages in instructional design. Proceedings Koper, R., & Tattersall, C. (Eds.). (2005). Learning
of IEEE ICALT2006, Kerkrade, The Netherlands. design. A handbook on modelling and delivering
networked education and training. Springer Berlin
Cooper, A., & Ostyn, C. (Eds.). (2002). IMS re- Heidelberg.
usable definition of competency or educational
objective—information model. IMS Global Con- Rawlings, A., Van Rosmalen, P., & Koper, R.
sortium. Retrieved March 27, 2007, from http:// Rodriguez-Artacho, M., & Lefrere, P. (2002).
www.imsglobal.org/competencies Survey of educational modelling languages
(EMLs). CEN/ISSS/WS/LT. Endnote 1 The IMS
Duval, E. (Ed.). (2002). Learning object metadata Global Learning Consortium is a main e-learning
standard. IEEE Learning Technology Standards standardization body involving main vendors of
Committee. e-learning products, universities and educational
Engeström, Y. (1987). Learning by expanding: An institutions to promote the development and adop-
activity-theoretical approach to developmental tion of e-learning standards. Web site at http://
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Kazman, R. (2001). Software Architecture. Hand-

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This work was previously published in Handbook of Visual Languages for Instructional Design: Theories and Practices, edited
by Luca Botturi and Todd Stubbs, pp. 183-207, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.14
SEAMAN:
A Visual Language-Based Tool
for E-Learning Processes

Gennaro Costagliola
University of Salerno, Italy

Filomena Ferrucci
University of Salerno, Italy

Giuseppe Polese
University of Salerno, Italy

Giuseppe Scanniello
University of Basilicata, Italy

ABSTRACT tool is also able to automatically generate the

courses starting from the supplied specification.
One of the crucial activities in the development Moreover, such a tool should also provide sup-
of e-learning courses concerns the design phase. port for reuse. To fulfil these requirements, in this
In this phase, instructional designers define the chapter we present a tool based on a suite of visual
e-learning processes by specifying the activities languages, which has been specifically conceived
students should carry out (knowledge objects, to support instructional designers in the defini-
assessment, practice, etc.) and their temporal se- tion and creation of learning processes. The use
quence. This phase is usually performed using an of visual languages is motivated by the success
iterative process, with step-by-step refinements. they have achieved in other contexts (e.g., soft-
Thus, it can greatly benefit of the availability of ware engineering) for the construction of suitable
tools that assist instruction designers to carry models that allows to focus only on the features
out their work. In particular, a rapid prototyping of interest and to provide more effective descrip-
approach could be effectively supported if the tions and reasoning. The proposed suite of visual
languages includes the learning activity diagram,
which extends UML activity diagrams to make
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch314

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
SEAMAN

them suitable for modelling e-learning processes, exploiting ideas and benefits of component-based
the Self-Consistent Learning Object language approaches for implementing and delivering
used to define knowledge contents, and the Test learning environments. In particular, the idea is
Maker Language for specifying assessment and to compose an e-learning process reusing learning
self-assessment tests. The visual languages have components or activities, at different granularity
been then implemented in SEAMAN (System levels (Rosenberg, 2001).
for E-Learning Activity MANagement), a sys- In this chapter we describe a visual language-
tem prototype conceived to support instructional based approach aimed at supporting the definition
designers in the design, the generation, and the of e-learning processes assembling predefined
deployment of e-learning processes. didactic contents. The learning contents can be
broken down and structured into a hierarchy from
smaller, lower order blocks of material to higher,
INTRODUCTION more complicated levels of learning. In particular,
we have identified three different granularity levels
E-learning or electronic learning is a general referring to the size of knowledge contents. The
term used to refer to computer-enhanced learn- use and assembling of these knowledge com-
ing. The most notable advantages of e-learning ponents provides the instruction designer with
are flexibility, convenience, and the ability to a modular paradigm to create distance courses,
work at your own pace. In particular, groups of which resembles software development processes
students participate and complete coursework based on visual languages (Ferrucci et al., 2002;
enjoying e-learning activities in accordance with OMG Group, 1993). Hence, it has been defined a
their daily commitments, thus making e-learning hierarchy of three visual languages to be employed
a viable alternative for learners with disabilities during the different phases of the distance courses
or those that have other commitments such as design process. Based on these languages we have
family or work. constructed the System for E-Learning Activity
One of the crucial activities in the development MANagement (SEAMAN) to provide automated
of e-learning courses concerns the design phase. design support. The system and the underlying
In this phase, instructional designers define the approach are particularly suitable for learning
e-learning processes by specifying the activities methodologies centred on didactic materials and
students should carry out (knowledge objects, assessment rules.
assessment, practice, etc.) and their temporal se- The first visual language we propose extends
quence. The e-learning evolution proposes a good the activity diagrams of UML (unified model-
number of approaches and tools aimed at assisting ling language) (OMG Group, 1993) to enable
instructional designers during the analysis, design, the specification of didactic contents, assessment
and delivery of instruction (Bruce & Sleeman, activities, and their relationships. For that reason
2000; Campbell & Mahling, 1999; Designer’s such diagrams are named learning activity dia-
Edge, 2003; Goodyear, 1997; Schar & Kriger, grams (LAD). They provide an explicit way to
2000; Vrasidas, 2002). Many instruction design represent complex relationships between struc-
approaches proposed in the literature are based tural and behavioural e-learning activities. Any
on traditional pedagogical learning approaches, or activity specified in a LAD sentence can be further
on the object-oriented paradigm. Indeed, existing refined by reusing previously defined e-learning
models of instruction design have been influenced activities or using a visual sentence belonging to
by linear or object-oriented software development either the self-consistent learning object (SCLO)
processes. Nowadays, the new trend consists of language or the test maker language (TML). SCLO

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is a special case of state transition diagrams, and effectiveness of product.” Thus, tools supporting
enables the instruction designer to define learn- instruction design during all the phases of the
ing content objects. Instead, TML extends state learning process definition are desirable. Good-
diagrams to enable the design of assessment and year views the instruction design as falling within
self-assessment tests. It lets us describe tests that four main approaches (Goodyear, 1997). These
adapt themselves to student’s answers. It is worth approaches allow the instruction designer to gener-
noting that tests play an important role in our ap- ate e-learning activities from given specifications
proach, allowing us to define learning processes by means of tools supporting the design of course
adapting themselves to student performance. structure, the selection of presentation templates,
The chapter is organized as follows. The next the reuse of design elements, and the coordina-
section provides an overview of related work. Then tion of activities accomplished by a design team.
the proposed visual languages are presented. The Moreover, Goodyear also proposes an approach
description of the SEAMAN system architecture, for analyzing and designing distance courses that
its facilities, and a sample application follows. is divided into neat parts (Goodyear, 1999). The
Finally, a discussion on the achieved results and first part of Goodyear’s approach resembles the
future work concludes the chapter. work of other people (outside education) who are
interested in the design of technology support-
ing the work of information systems designers,
RELATED WORK requirements engineers, human factors specialists,
and so on. The second part is instead focused on the
Many activities regarding the e-learning process design of good learning tasks exploiting traditional
development are today accomplished by soft- analysis and design processes. Often, these tools
ware tools that support instructional designers in are not able to compensate the lack of expertise
their job (Bruce & Sleeman, 2000; Campbell & of instruction designers. Jones et al. (2003) have
Mahling, 1999; Designer’s Edge, 2003; Good- presented an information systems design theory
year, 1997; Vrasidas, 2002). In particular, the for the design of information systems to be used
e-learning evolution proposes a good number of in Web-based education. Vrasidas (2002) presents
tools assisting instructional designers during the and discusses a system to develop hypermedia
analysis, design, implementation, and delivery of approaches as part of courses and learning envi-
instruction via the Web (Bruce & Sleeman, 2000). ronments delivered on the World Wide Web. It
If, on one side, an automated support should be details the structuring of information, branching
provided by authoring tools (Campbell & Mah- and interactivity, user interface, and navigation
ling, 1998; Chang et al., 1996; Kasowitz, 1997; through Web-based distance courses.
Thomson & Cooke, 2000), on the other side these Opposed to these approaches, which are based
tools should implement suitable e-learning process on traditional models of instruction design, there
design methodologies (Douglas, 2001; Goodyear, are approaches and tools relying on object-oriented
1997; Muraida & Spector, 1997; Vrasidas, 2002). models. Douglas (2001) proposes an instruction
Muraida and Spector (1997), and Kasowitz design methodology based on the object-oriented
(1997) review much of the work done in automated paradigm. Designer’s Edge (2003) provides an-
instruction design support tools. In particular, other interesting approach and tool for instruction
Muraida and Spector (1997) assert that there is design based on the object-oriented paradigm.
“a lack of instructional designer expertise, pres- Differently from the approaches we discussed
sure for increased productivity of designers, and above, AIMS (2004) Project describes a theoretical
the need to standardize products and ensure the framework in which the knowledge domain edit-

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ing and the course editing are distinguished. First course activities and associated roles are identified
the instructional designer constructs the domain and modelled using FlowMake. Personalization
model in terms of concepts and links. Finally, he/ of the learning processes according to learners’
she defines the course structure starting from that diversities is not provided. Differently, Carchiolo
description. Similarly, Thomson and Cooke (2000) et al. (2002) present a prototype of a Web-based
propose the APHID method to support designers e-learning environment through which students
during the course creation by using instructional can follow dynamically adapted learning process.
patterns. They also provide patterns describing In particular, the environment provides students
teaching strategies known to be successful in with all formative paths moving from an initial to
particular situation. These patterns are used to a desired knowledge, and where paths are adapted
design hypermedia applications. according to the student needs and capabilities, and
New trends seek means to exploit ideas and dynamically modified according to the learners’
benefits of component-based approaches for and teachers’ feedbacks.
implementing and delivering learning environ-
ments. In particular, the idea is to reuse learning
components, at different granularity levels. At the VISUAL LANGUAGES
topmost level there are existing self-consistent
learning contents that may be composed of learning Visual and diagrammatic representations play a
objects, which in turn may be composed of raw central role in several application domains, since
contents (Rosenberg, 2001). It is worth noting that they provide important tools for describing and
the self-consistent learning materials can be seen reasoning. As visual languages have been applied
as a framework in which instruction designers in- to new application domains, such as spatial data-
sert learning contents and raw contents specifying bases, education, software engineering, and so on,
their interrelations and dependencies. Therefore, many different types of visual notations have been
it could be interesting to reuse a self-contained devised. In particular, in the software engineering
learning content and possibly also the associated domain they are widely employed for supporting
learning objects. the phases of the development process, such as
Lin et al. (2002) suggest the use of workflow requirements specification, analysis, and design.
technology to define and manage the coordina- The numerous analogies between the software
tion of e-learning activities. In particular, the development and the instruction design processes
authors introduce an e-learning environment, suggested us to exploit visual languages to support
called Flex-eL, which has been built upon work- several tasks of the instruction design process.
flow technology. The workflow functionality of Thus, the three visual languages we propose extend
Flex-eL manages the coordination of learning or resemble languages that have been successfully
and assessment activities of the course process and largely used in the software engineering field
between students and teaching staff. In particular, to design software systems.
this environment provides a unique environment The main language is the learning activity
for teachers to design and develop process-centric diagrams (LAD), which extends UML activity
courses and to monitor student progress. A process- diagrams with means to model the workflows
modelling tool called FlowMake is also proposed of learning processes (OMG Group, 1993).
in order to define e-learning processes. A process LAD can be used to model e-learning activities
model is defined as workflow graph containing composed of distance modules, assessment, and
tasks and workflow modelling structures. Tasks self-assessment tests. States in LAD are activities,
are associated with roles and applications. The and most of the transitions are implicitly triggered

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 SEAMAN

upon the completion of the actions associated completed, we associate different coloured coins
to the e-learning activities. The second visual to content objects execution. The synchronization
language we have defined is used to refine the symbol (Figure 1D) is a thick horizontal bar, and
learning content objects, whereas the third one is used to coordinate content objects. The actions
is employed to design the assessment and self- underlying content objects may be concurrently
assessment tests. These visual languages have executed more than once. The number of concur-
been introduced to refine the basic objects used rent invocations is determined at runtime by a
within learning activity diagrams. They are named concurrency expression. The synchronization bar
self-consistent learning content objects (SCLO) provides a simple way to express concepts like
and test maker language (TML). We describe them waiting for concurrent content objects to finish
in the following subsections. before proceeding forward along the learning
process (join), and the starting of several content
Learning Activity Diagrams objects in parallel (fork). It is worth noting that
by removing the synchronization bar elements
The purpose of the LAD language is to model from the LAD language we derive a special case
workflows associated to distance educational of flow diagram, but with a considerably reduced
processes. As consequence, it allows instruc- language power. In fact, we cannot describe activi-
tion designers to describe educational materials, ties without dependences; hence all the activities
dependences, and assessment rules. Material have to be consumed in a sequential fashion. In
dependences allow the author to vary the degree the definition of processes focused on flows, and
of control over the order in which the students driven by internal processing, like for example
must explore the materials spread in SCLO ob- industrial, didactic and software processes, this
jects. Moreover, using the results of assessment type of behaviour is vital.
or self-assessment tests, the flow of the learning Let us now introduce two symbols describing
process is adapted to the learner performance. For assessment and self-assessment activities. The
example, before taking up a course the instruction assessment test symbol (Figure 1F) is used to
designer can define a student test whose result represent an activity aiming to evaluate the
may be used for assessing the knowledge, and
to properly adapt the student learning process.
Figure 1. LAD icons: A) SCLO object; B) refined
The visual language symbols are shown in
self-consistent learning content object; C) transi-
Figure 1. The first symbol (Figure 1A) represents
tion element; D) synchronization bar element; E)
a SCLO object, or content object for short. The
self-assessment element; F) assessment element;
name of the object can be placed in the symbol.
G) merge element; H) start and stop marker
This symbol represents a state of a learning process
that is left when the associated learning object is
completely executed. Every learning object can in
turn be separately analysed and refined by using
another visual language (Figure 1B). When this
happens the icon shows a nested structure. The
arrow (Figure 1C) represents the transition symbol,
and it can contain a label. When the transition is
not labelled, the only result of interest is content
object completion. In those cases where it is im-
portant to know which content object has been

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SEAMAN

learner knowledge. The self-assessment activity of Material_4. Finally, Material_3 is presented

(Figure 1E) is meant to be accomplished by the to the learner with advanced knowledge. After
student to assess his/her knowledge. As a conse- that, there are two parallel e-learning activities,
quence, we differentiated the notations for these which do not depend on the student knowledge.
two symbols. Both symbols are used to represent Following Material_7 there is an assessment test,
decisions. As an alternative to guards on separate so if one student has a learning deficiency in that
transitions leaving the same state, the aim of these self-consistent e-learning activity then he/she must
objects is also to synchronize the incoming ac- revise it and repeat the associated test. This means
tivities. These have one or more incoming arrows, that the self-assessment element needs memory
and one or more outgoing arrows. The guard to remember the test result.
conditions are used to indicate different possible
transitions that depend on test results. A decision Self-Consistent Learning Object
may be shown by labelling multiple output tran- Language
sitions of an action with different guard conditions.
These guard conditions may depend on self- The SCLO language is a kind of state transition
consistent learning content objects that the instruc- language. Before defining it, we have investigated
tor has to assess. several languages used in multimedia software
We have used a merge symbol (Figure 1G) to engineering (MSE). However, most of MSE
merge back decision branches. A merge has two languages have turned out to be complicated,
or more incoming arrows and one outgoing ar- requiring high expertise to be used. However,
row. As opposed to the synchronization bar, the our aim was to formalize a visual language to be
incoming transitions are not synchronized. easily used by the target user within the visual
Content experts, instruction designers, in- environment implementing it. Thus, we have first
struction technologists, media developers, and
evaluation specialists are all professional figures
that could be involved in the distance learning Figure 2. A LAD sentence
development process. For this reason, learning
objects may be organized into swim lanes; the
lanes can be used to organize learning objects
with respect to these professional figures.
The last two symbols (Figure 1H) are the start
and the stop markers. They are used to indicate
the initial and final states of a diagram.
Figure 2 shows an example of LAD visual sen-
tence, which represents a set of e-learning activities
that have been structured into 4 swimlanes based
on the learner knowledge. The student knowledge
is assessed using the first test, so if the student
has a score less than 60% then his/her knowledge
is considered elementary. Thus, the learner has
to study in depth the content presented in Mate-
rial_1, and Material2 before going on. Vice versa,
when the test result is between 60% and 80% the
contents presented to the learner will be those

747
 SEAMAN

defined a graph language to describe multimedia Figure 4 shows a visual sentence example of the
contents of learning processes. SCLO visual language.
Four icons have been used to define this lan-
guage. These are the multimedia node, multimedia Test Maker Language
link, start and stop marker node. Multimedia nodes
(Figure 3A) represent the educational content that Student assessment and self-assessment is a criti-
will be presented to the student. Typically they cal task in the knowledge process (Cynthia et al.,
are composed by one or more multimedia raw 2000; Safoutin et al., 2000). The literature proposes
contents. Thus, this node can be an atomic ele- a wide range of authoring tools to construct tests.
ment or it may be composed aggregating atomic Often, these tools do not have an associated visual
multimedia contents. The atomic content elements environment to describe the test structure and its
can be single Web page or simple multimedia contents. In this chapter we introduce the test
objects, for example, short movies, songs, jokes, maker language (TML), a visual language support-
images, simulations, and so on. The multimedia ing teachers during the design and implementation
object can have one or more incoming arrows, and of tests. The language provides means to describe
one or more outgoing arrows (Figure 3B). Two tests that adapt their contents to student answers.
multimedia nodes can be joined through a multi- TML has five different symbols and three link
media link. This represents the fact that students types. The symbols are: question, aggregation
can browse multimedia contents by crossing links symbol, multimedia object, and start and stop
connecting objects. The last two symbols are the markers. The three link types define transitions
start and the stop markers (Figure 3C and 3D). between language symbols. Each of them has a
These are used to indicate the initial and final state. different colour.
The system prototype we present in the chapter The instructor can use the question symbol to
implements this visual environment by presenting represent one question and its associated answers,
a predefined page layout to the lecturer that he/she or he/she may refine it by using symbol annota-
can use for managing knowledge content objects.

Figure 3. The visual language elements: A) multimedia node or knowledge fragment; B) multimedia
link; C) start marker node; D) stop marker node

Figure 4. A visual sentence representing a learning content object

748
SEAMAN

tions. Annotation is performed by using visual designers can share and reuse content objects at
sentences from the same language. different granularity levels.
Question symbols (Figure 5A) are grouped with To better understand the functionality of SEA-
respect to knowledge contents and swim lanes. MAN, let us consider the use case diagram in Fig-
These are also used to give an execution order ure 7 showing the relationships among use cases,
to regrouped answers associated to knowledge instruction designer, and the framework used to
contents; the swim lanes order is from left to right. deliver learning processes. In particular, two actors
Links are used to model answers to questions. were identified, namely the instructional designer
Thus, when a language sentence has an any link and the e-learning framework. The former actor
(Figure 5D) it means that the following question can define the learning process flow of e-learning
does not depend on the answer. Conversely, the courses, the knowledge content objects, and the
false and true links (Figure 5E and 5F) modify tests using SEAMAN tool. Once the definition of
the student test structure. The last symbol (Figure learning process flow and its e-learning activities
5C) is recommended to motivate answers. is completed, the course can be generated. The
An example of visual sentence from the TML generation process releases instruction contents to
is depicted in Figure 6. It is worth noting that be deployed via Web, and will be available using
swimlane tags can be used to declare the score that an e-learning framework, as for example E-World
the learner must achieve in order to pass the tests. (Casella et al., 2007).
Figure 8 shows the layered architecture of
SEAMAN. It includes three visual editors, one
SYSTEM PROTOTYPE for each presented visual language, an application
logic layer, corresponding to the generation engine
In this section we present SEAMAN (system for e- module, and a repository. The LAD editor allows
learning activity management), a prototype based the instructional designer to describe and model
on the described visual language hierarchy. SEA-
MAN assists instructors during the specification
and implementation of e-learning processes and Figure 6. A visual sentence representing a student
their associated e-learning activities, supporting assessment process
the delivery of instruction via the Web. The system
integrates modules for several authoring activities,
such as knowledge contents, assessment, and self-
assessment tests. The system can be configured
as a centralized application so that the instruction

Figure 5. TML elements: A) question node; B)

start and stop marker C) multimedia symbol; 
D-
E-F) joint lines

749
 SEAMAN

Figure 7. A SEAMAN use case diagram

the learning process flow based on knowledge package have been implemented, while the
content objects, assessment, and self-assessment classes in the graphic symbol package are aimed
tests, and their dependences. The knowledge at visualizing the language objects in SEAMAN
contents and the tests are defined by using the visual environments. In particular, this package
SCLO editor, and the TML editor, respectively. contains the interface that all the visual objects
The generation engine module generates learning have to implement since they can be managed by
processes, knowledge contents, and the tests using SEAMAN visual environments. The classes
the predefined generation rules stored within the implementing the proposed visual objects are in
repository of the system prototype. Furthermore, this package too. The input and output of the
the generation engine module produces a zip file visual sentences are managed by the classes of
that contains didactic resources and configuration input & output package. Finally, the property
files. The didactic resources are composed of package is used to manage the users’ preferences,
HTML files and SVG (scalable vector graphics, and the multilingual menu of SEAMAN.
2007) files, which are described by metadata files. The class diagram in Figure 10 shows the
Some configuration files to allow the e-learning relations between the classes implementing the
framework to manage the learning process are three visual editors and the generation engine.
also produced. The generated e-learning course
and its activities are stored in the repository to
enable the instructional designer to eventually Figure 8. The SEAMAN architecture
successively deploy them in an e-learning frame-
work, for example, E-World (Casella et al., 2007).
The SEAMAN tool is further described by the
UML package diagram of Figure 9 and the UML
class diagrams of Figure 10. In particular, Figure
9 shows the semantic dependencies among the
packages: graphical user interface (GUI), graph-
ic panel, graphic symbols, input & output, and
properties. The GUI package is aimed at manag-
ing the graphical components, allowing the inter-
action between SEAMAN tool and the instruc-
tional designer. To insert and delete objects in the
visual programming environments implemented
in SEAMAN the classes in the graphic panel

750
SEAMAN

Figure 9. SEAMAN package diagram

such as usability, colours, and graphical layout
become crucial for student welfare and e-learning
course success. For this reason we defined sev-
eral predefined graphical layouts that instruction
designer chooses for the Web pages implement-
ing the e-learning activities of a given process.
Moreover, the prototype allows us to define new
layouts or to customize existing ones.
The e-learning activities generated by the
prototype are iteratively navigable through a Web
browser. Although the e-learning activities gener-
ated using the proposed approach are HTML pages,
we need sophisticated technologies that only some
browsers support. Thus, SEAMAN works for
This class diagram highlights the extensibility recent versions of Netscape and Internet Explorer.
and the flexibility of the proposed system proto- Although the language aims to support the de-
type. It is worth noting that extensions or custom- sign and development of learning processes, it has
izations of the proposed visual language hierarchy also turned out to be a powerful tool for presenting
can be implemented by developers in SEAMAN e-learning activities, and for monitoring student
with little effort. In such a way new types of e- progress. Thus, an animation of diagrams allows
learning activities can also be introduced to students to monitor their progresses. Moreover,
complete the formative offer. thanks to SVG storage format of LAD visual
As output of SEAMAN is an e-learning en- sentences, the student learning process can be
vironment that is delivered on the Web, features

Figure 10. SEAMAN high level class diagram overview

751
 SEAMAN

visualized by using a Web browser with a suitable 3. Use the TML environment to define assess-
plug-in. The animation is executed only when the ment and self-assessment tests in the LAD
activities of a given distance course are deployed sentence.
in an e-learning platform, implementing the
learning traceability through a special conceived Figure 11 depicts the visual sentence describ-
software component, such as the SCORM Run ing the learning process of the PLT course within
Time Environment (ADL, 2003). Moreover, SEA- the SEAMAN visual environment. On the other
MAN generates a server module interacting with hand, Figure 12 highlights how the same sentence
the LMS. The server module is integrated in the is presented to the student by using a Web browser
platform when the course is delivered. Colour- with SVG plug-in. The sentence does not provide
ing the activities green when the student finishes traceability animation because no e-learning ac-
them, we provide a high level representation of tivity has been completed. The two figures show
the learning traceability. that the course is divided in two parts. The former
deepens topics about compilers preliminary no-
tions, and basic tools for developing them (such
A SAMPLE APPLICATION as Lex and Yacc). The second part is conceived
for designing and implementing compilers. In
Several lecturers at University of Salerno have particular, the main characteristics of the JAVA,
used SEAMAN to create e-learning courses. In C#, and C++ compilers are shown. There are no
particular, in this section we show its use for the dependencies among these topics, so their content
design of the Programming Language Technolo- can be also completed simultaneously.
gies course (PLT for short), belonging to the bach- Starting from the objectives and the topics of
elor’s degree in computer science at University the course the lecturer has introduced three tests,
of Salerno. The aim of the PLT lecturer was to
design the e-learning process to provide students
with knowledge and expertise in the design and Figure 11. LAD sentence describing PLT learning
implementation of compilers. After attending process in SEAMAN
the course generated starting from the defined
e-learning process, the student should be able
to design and implement a language compiler.
In particular, as a course project the student is
required to implement a subset of functionality
of the Java language compiler back-end.
The main steps to create a course with SEA-
MAN are:

1. Use the LAD environment to define the

course structure in terms of contents and
tests;
2. Use the SCLO environment to insert content
for each SCLO object mentioned in the LAD
sentence;

752
SEAMAN

Figure 12. LAD sentence describing PLT learning

compiler of the Java language are evaluated by
process displayed using Internet Explorer
using the second self-assessment test depicted in
Figures 11 and 12. The visual sentence describing
this test is shown in Figure 13. In this picture we
can also see an example of question with the as-
sociated answers. Finally, the lecturer has created
a test for assessing the learners’ knowledge on
the whole course contents.
The visual sentence in Figure 14 shows the
definition of the learning content object “Compil-
ers/Interpreters” depicted in Figures 11 and 12.
The main fragment describes the compilation and
interpretation processes, whereas subsequent
fragments show the detailed activities.

CONCLUSION

Academic and commercial e-learning authoring

tools (Apple et al., 2002; Campbell & Mahling,
two of which are self-assessment and one is as- 1998; Douglas, 2001; Goodyear, 1997; Muraida
sessment. The first self-assessment test, depicted & Spector, 1997) use the basic concepts of the
in Figures 11 and 12, regards LEX and YACC multimedia software engineering (MSE) (Christ-
tools. Since these tools are considered vital for offersen & Christoffersen, 1995). This is a new
the realization of the final course project, the frontier for both software engineering (SE) and
lecturer has introduced a test and a feedback on visual languages (VL) (Bell & Jackson, 1992;
them. Instead, the runtime environment and the Campbell & Mahling, 1998). As it has happened

Figure 13. TML sentence describing the test on the runtime environment and compiler

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 SEAMAN

Figure 14. A visual sentence representing the Compiler/Interpreter learning content object

for these fields, also the e-learning field can benefit completed the design of their course with SEA-
from the use of visual languages to simplify the MAN they were asked to fill in a questionnaire
work of an instruction designer. To this sake, in to provide feedbacks on system usability issues.
this chapter we have presented three visual lan- In particular, other than the course name and the
guages for defining several stages of the e-learning lecturer familiarity with diagrammatic languages,
course design process. The languages have been the form contained the following three categories
implemented within SEAMAN, a prototype that of questions: intuitiveness of language symbols
has been conceived to allow instruction design- and visual sentences, training and usage times,
ers to generate friendly learning environments and comprehensive tool evaluation with respect
and enhance their welfare. Experimental results to well-known authoring tools.
have shown that the use of visual languages can In general, we noted that familiarity with
encourage the design of distance courses, as op- diagrammatic notations seems to facilitate tool
posed to what happened before with tools using usage. We also observed that non-computer
more rudimental interaction paradigms. science professors had more difficulties on the
We also carried out a usability study of SEMAN LAD language than on the other two visual
using five lecturers at University of Salerno as languages. Probably, this was mainly due to the
subjects. The subjects used the SEAMAN system fact that although workflows should be familiar
to produce a complete electronic version of their in business and many other disciplines, mapping
course. In particular, they have redesigned the the concept of activity synchronization on real-
following five courses from bachelors’ degrees re- world problems is not immediate. Moreover, the
lated to computer science: Programming Language discrete mathematics professor also had some
Technologies, Databases, Discrete Mathematics, difficulties on the definition of assessment and
Fundamental of Physics, and Business Administra- self-assessment tests with the TML language.
tion. All the lecturers underwent an introductory More specifically, she found some problems in
course of six hours on the SEAMAN system and its understanding the meaning of the true, false,
visual notations. After that they were asked to use and any joint links, and how they affect the test
the system on their course, having the possibility behaviour at run-time. In conclusion, the SCLO
to invoke individual tutor support. Once they had language was the easier to understand and use,

754
SEAMAN

whereas the LAD required some effort for people AIMS. Adaptive Information System for Manage-
non-familiar with activity diagram notations. The ment of Learning Content. (2004). Retrieved from
hierarchical visual language organization appeared http://wwwis.win.tue.nl:8080/AIMS
to be grasped quite intuitively by all of the lectur-
Apple, D. K., Nygren, K. P., Williams, M. W.,
ers. Regarding the time necessary to enter a visual
& Litynski, D. M. (2002). Distinguishing and
sentence in SEAMAN this mostly reflected the
elevating levels of learning in engineering and
familiarity with the given notation, although most
technology instruction. In Proceedings of 32nd
of the lecturers took reasonable times. Finally,
ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference,
looking at the feedbacks of questions in the third
(pp. 6-9). Boston.
group, it seemed that the use of visual languages
in SEAMAN makes e-learning process creation Bell, M. A., & Jackson, D. (1992). Visual author
somewhat easier as opposed to traditional author- languages for computer-aided learning. In Pro-
ing tools, and that all of the lecturers involved in ceedings of IEEE Workshop on Visual Languages,
this experiment expressed the possibly of using (pp. 258-260). Seattle, WA, USA.
the SEAMAN prototype in the future.
Bruce, L. R., & Sleeman, P. J. (2000). Instructional
Future work will be devoted to extend the
design: A primer. Greenwich, CT: Information
visual languages proposed in this chapter. This
Age Publishing.
has a two-fold goal. On one hand, we aim to in-
troduce less technical and more metaphor oriented Campbell, J. D., & Mahling, D. E. (1998). A visual
visual languages to provide further abstraction in language system for developing and presenting
the e-learning design process, and consequently Internet-based education. In Proceedings of IEEE
increase system usage among non-technical Symposium on Visual Languages, (pp. 66-67).
teachers. On the other hand, we aim to extend our Nova Scotia, Canada.
visual languages in order to enable the modelling
Carchiolo, V., Longheu, A., & Malgeri, M. (2002).
of additional aspects of the e-learning process.
Adaptive formative paths in a Web-based learn-
Special interest deserves the specification and
ing environment. Educational Technology &
the realization of collaborative activities, in order
Society, 5(4). From http://ifets.ieee.org/periodical/
to encourage cooperative and problem-based
vol_4_2002/carchiolo.html
learning (Laister & Koubek, 2001). In this way
groups of students can work together to solve Casella, G., Costagliola, G., Ferrucci, F., Polese,
problems, while keeping their diversities. As a G., & Scanniello, G. (2007). A SCORM thin cli-
result, the learning environments will encourage ent architecture for e-learning systems based on
individual accountability, prompt feedback, and Web services. International Journal of Distance
high self-expectations. Education Technologies, 5(1), 13–30.
Chang, C. K., Chen, G. D., Liu, B. J., & Ou, K.
L. (1996). A language for developing collabora-
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pp 147-164, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.15
coUML:
A Visual Language for Modeling
Cooperative Environments

Michael Derntl
University of Vienna, Austria

Renate Motschnig-Pitrik
University of Vienna, Austria

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

In this chapter we present coUML, a visual mod- This chapter presents the coUML approach to
eling language for cooperative environments. modeling of cooperative learning designs and
As modern instructional environments have a environments. coUML stands for “cooperative
highly cooperative nature, coUML is proposed as UML.” Its notation is based on UML, and it ex-
a powerful and effective language for modeling tends UML with a modeling profile specifically
instructional designs in such environments. Be- designed to enable the modeling of complex,
ing based on UML, it was conceived and refined cooperative learning environments. While coUML
through application and experience over multiple clearly focuses on process modeling in coopera-
years, primarily in a cooperative blended learning tive environments, it also allows modeling and
environment. We present relevant requirements integrating relevant structural information such
and applications that contributed to the develop- as goals, documents, and involved roles.
ment of coUML, as well as a detailed specification While the name “coUML” was coined during
of model elements, characteristics and features the preparation of this chapter, initial ideas and
that describe its current state. uses of the coUML language date back to 2002,
when we were starting an initiative to discover and
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch315

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
coUML

document the e-learning practices at our depart- that were already in use at our department. As
ment. During this project the coUML modeling no visual modeling language was particularly
approach proved to be a valuable aid in creating suited for such a task, we started to employ the
visual models of our teaching and learning activi- following simple procedure: First, we write down
ties for documentation, communication, research, a verbal description of a course and its activities,
and dissemination purposes. The complete and including an outline of relevant teaching and
user-friendly specification of coUML in this learning goals, and the primary teaching approach
chapter along with illustrations and examples, employed (e.g., project-based learning). The
is provided to make this approach available to second step is to visualize the course scenario
interested readers and practitioners. as one or more threads of activities according to
The chapter is structured as follows: In the the course description. Initially, we used simple
next section we provide some background in- symbols for drawing activities and arrows as con-
formation on the roots and requirements of the nectors between activities. Gradually the notation
coUML approach. In the third section a detailed system evolved from requirements drawn from
specification of the coUML language is provided, practice and experience, and was finally based
illustrated with examples. In the fourth section we on a more formal, standardized notation system.
present three application scenarios of coUML. Additionally it was apparent that the current wave
This is followed by a discussion on the coUML of Web-based tools and enhancements not only
features and the presentation of a survey on visual penetrated educational environments, but any
instructional design modeling languages among environment where people cooperate to achieve
blended learning experts. In the final section we personal and organizational goals, e.g., in projects
present a conclusion and an outlook on further or communities. Therefore we present coUML as
coUML-related activities. a language that is rooted in, yet not constrained
to educational environments.

THE COUML APPROACH Requirements and Need

Background It was clear that a course was, conceptually, not

just a sequential thread of activities; we would
The coUML approach emerged from practice (cf. need additional control-flow structures such as
Derntl & Motschnig-Pitrik, 2005). About 4 years decisions, concurrent flows, and composite ac-
ago, we were searching for a way to capture our tivities. We were also interested in a number of
teaching and learning designs. Our primary ap- additional, instructionally relevant information
proach to designing the instructional processes to be included in the visual models of teaching
for our courses was based on the principles of and learning activities, which are outlined in the
blended learning (Garrison & Kanuka, 2004). As following list of requirements:
a traditional university we build on face-to-face
meetings in the courses, and we have gradually R1: Support for logical/temporal arrangement
started introducing online and distant means of of activities, as well as decisions and concurrent
collaboration, evaluation, and delivery into our activities.
teaching and learning activities. The goal then
was to build a comprehensive library of blended R2: It should be possible to model activities at
course designs or patterns including verbal de- different levels of detail, which requires a means
scriptions and semi-formal models of scenarios of refining composite activities. This should allow

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multiple views on complex activities and help to COUML LANGUAGE SPECIFICATION

keep the models clear and understandable, even
though this introduces layers of abstraction which In this section, the coUML language and its usage
might be difficult to grasp for many people. is specified in detail. First, we outline and describe
modeling artifacts created with coUML, and then,
R3: It should be possible to attach roles to ac- building on basic UML prerequisites, we define
tivities, for example that online chat support for the model types and elements used by coUML.
urgent questions is provided by a student tutor
and consumed by course participants. coUML Modeling Artifacts

R4: Most learning activities “consume” and/or Using coUML to model a course design produces
“produce” documents (Web sites, reports, slides, a number of artifacts, i.e., models and additional
evaluations, data, etc.); modeling and visualizing information. These are separated into primary,
that information would help in document manage- secondary, and auxiliary artifacts, as described
ment efforts mostly on the side of the instructors below. The procedures taken and the modeling
and administrators. “toolkit” to understand and create these artifacts
are described in detail in subsequent sections.
R5: It should be possible to model the learning
goals planned for a course, in order to show which Primary Artifacts
activities in the learning process are “responsible”
for supporting and achieving certain goals. Course activity model (CAM): The primary
modeling artifact of coUML is the course activity
R6: As we are interested primarily in modeling model (CAM). It comprises a number of activity
blended learning course designs, we need to tag diagrams showing the course’s activities from
activities as proceeding in a present (i.e., face-to- any desired viewpoint. The CAM aims to provide
face), Web-based, or blended mode. The rationale expressive diagrams showing the chronological
behind this distinction is explained later in the order as well as the intent of activities (usually
language specification. both teaching and learning activities) of the course.
coUML allows modeling the CAM diagrams at
different, arbitrary levels of detail, which might
Language Choice be helpful with complex course designs.
The CAM is the core of the coUML course
An existing modeling language that immediately model—it can be used to model complete and
supported all our requirements was not readily planned course designs, but it can as well be
available. While there were a number of languages used to model specific course phases during the
available which would support the basic control course design stage. As such, it can be used as
flow requirements (R1 and R2), only UML pro- a communication and documentation medium
vided additional built-in support for R3 and R4. among course designers; by instructors as a handy
Additionally, UML offers extension mechanisms guide to the conduct of the course; and also by
to define custom model elements, e.g., based on the researchers as a conceptual model of the course,
modes of presence defined in R6, or learning goals e.g., for evaluation or analysis purposes.
according to R5; for this purpose it was necessary Course structure model (CSM): Particularly
to define a UML extension for modeling blended for modeling complex course designs, another
activities, as specified in the following section. primary artifact is needed, which is the course

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structure model (CSM). The CSM is created and created, coUML enables modeling of all relevant
maintained concurrently with the CAM, as it shows documents. These models can be used to structure
structurally which activity diagrams are used in the and describe the documents and to connect roles
CAM to provide a comprehensive course model. with documents, showing the document providers
Readers might notice that the CSM—as a and consumers.
complement to the CAM—is not necessarily a
mandatory artifact of a coUML course model, as Auxiliary Artifacts
CAM diagrams are still valid without the CSM.
However, the CSM acts as an overview or entry Course package model (CPM). The CPM is
point to the CAM, and is therefore also considered intended to provide condensed information re-
a primary artifact, especially from the reader’s or garding the course, so to say its “fact sheet.” It
viewer’s points of view. includes a tabular overview of relevant course
parameters, and a model comprising a view of
Secondary Artifacts all model packages used for modeling the course.
This can be used as an “entry point” to the detail
The secondary coUML artifacts as listed below models provided for the course, i.e., roles, docu-
are used to complement the primary artifacts. ments, goals, CAM, and CSM. It is recommended
These complements can optionally be created to create the CPM, as it supports easier usage of
to provide additional, more detailed information and navigation in the course models. However,
regarding the following: the fact sheet and model overview are auxiliary
Roles: Activities in the CAM are performed by and thus optional artifacts.
persons taking over specific roles in the course.
Typical roles would be instructor, student, or tutor. coUML Modeling Procedures
The role model displays the roles involved, and
optionally how they are related with each other. The coUML modeling procedure to be employed
Additional textual information regarding the roles heavily depends on the planned intent of the mod-
can be provided in structured form as well. els and on the concrete ID process for a course,
Goals: From an instructional point of view, particularly on the current course design status
course activities are designed to achieve specific and the desired level of modeling detail. coUML
learning goals. coUML offers the option of creat- offers a number of features and artifacts for which
ing goal models, which explicitly depict learning there may be no use in certain stages of the course
goals and, if desired, their relationships with each design process. For instance, for some courses
other. This allows systematically breaking down there might be no explicit information available
overall course goals into more tangible, readily or needed regarding documents. coUML is flex-
achievable learning goals; these in turn can be ible enough to separate concerns and allow for
attached to activities in the CAM to show which detached as well as integrated modeling of such
activities are intended to support or achieve a goal. course design artifacts.
Documents: Instructors typically provide There is no particular default procedure for
documents and resources as input to learning and creating a comprehensive coUML model of a
teaching activities, and during these activities ad- course. In the following, we discuss two common
ditional documents and resources might be created usage examples and respective procedures.
or contributed by course participants. To account Modeling a completed course design: The
for this fact, and to provide an overview of which most straightforward use of coUML is for com-
documents and resources are to be provided and pleted course designs. For example, these models

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could be used as a “contract” between course a given design task it might even be sufficient to
administration and instructors; or as a structured experiment with the CAM only.
course documentation by instructors and instruc- As an example of the design-in-progress case,
tional designers. In such cases, there exists a verbal we want to show how coUML could support the
or textual description, or at least a consensus, on ADDIE process model. ADDIE defines a simple
the design of a course. It could as well happen that and frequently used ID process comprising the
the course to be modeled was finished already. phases: analyis—design—development—imple-
Hence, all available coUML modeling features mentation—evaluation. The following list shows
can be exploited in a chronological procedure, how coUML could be used as a “generative” tool
which could look like the following: for supporting the five phases of the ADDIE model:

1. Create the CAM as the primary artifact. 1. Analysis: In this phase, an initial “map” of
2. Create role-, goal-, and document models the course is created by addressing issues
according to available information. Leave such as characteristics of the learners (e.g.,
out or complement missing information. their previous knowledge), desired learn-
3. If desired, refine or complement the CAM ing outcomes, delivery options and tools
to include the secondary artifacts defined in available, suitable pedagogies and strate-
step 2. gies, and course objectives (e.g., curricular
4. Create a CSM for the final CAM. requirements). With coUML, the analysis
5. Create the CPM by identifying relevant results can be written down in the fact sheet
course parameters and providing an over- provided by the CPM. Initial sketches of
view model. involved roles, learning goals, and course/
activity structure in the CSM and CAM can
Modeling design-in-progress: coUML can be created as well.
also be used as a tool during the course design 2. Design: During the design stage the course
stage, e.g., as a more formal communication and learning objectives are elaborated in
“language” among instructional designers, or as detail, the course structure and activities are
a personal aid for instructors during course plan- designed in detail, relevant course material
ning and design. In such cases, the steps outlined is collected and structured, instructional
in the above procedure can typically not be taken strategies are developed, and the evaluation/
in strict chronological order, as working on a later assessment strategy is specified. coUML
step may require the refinement of artifacts created can help in this phase with the learning goal
during an earlier step. Also, optimal and complete models for course and learning objectives,
information is usually only available for complete the document model for specifying and
(finished) course designs. If coUML is used dur- structuring course content, and the CSM
ing the course design process the procedure taken and CAM for modeling course structure and
could look like the following: modeling roles, activities. Integrating coUML secondary
then CAM, CSM, documents, goals, revision artifacts (goals, documents, roles) into the
of the CAM and CSM, and finally creating the CAM may further facilitate course design.
CPM. As we see, there is no use for a standard 3. Development: For the development of the
procedure in the design-in-progress case, even course content and support systems the
though the primary artifacts such as the CAM and coUML models created in the previous model
CSM would likely be the first to be created. For represent a comprehensive documentation
of the design; they can be used as a “con-

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tract” among developers and instructional “class diagrams”). These two model types and
designers. their respective elements provide the basic syntax
4. Implementation: In this phase, a training and semantics of all coUML models. Therefore
and delivery plan is developed. The coUML the following sub-sections briefly introduce these
models, in particular the CAM and also the model types and their uses for creating coUML
document model, show the crucial points in modeling artifacts. Understanding these basic
the instruction to be considered for training UML model types is required for understanding
and preparing instructors and students, as coUML modeling artifacts, which are specified in
well as for provision of required tools and detail in the coUML specification section below.
learning material. All readers who are already familiar with or
5. Evaluation: coUML models can be used as interested in UML please note that we do not define
visual documentation of the whole ADDIE a full, formally correct UML extension profile in
process and thus inform formative evalu- this chapter. This would require including lots of
ation procedures. Summative evaluation technical background on and references to UML
procedures can, for example, be supported meta-model and semantics, which would contra-
by the CAM and learning goal models (e.g., dict the intended practical nature of this chapter.
for matching actual learning outcomes with Therefore all relevant coUML model elements and
learning goals). extensions are introduced and described first and
only when needed, that is at the point where the
UML Prerequisites respective coUML model types and elements are
explained. Also, UML elements and features not
Before approaching the specification of coUML needed by coUML are ignored in the following
model types and elements, we first introduce the introduction.
relevant model types and elements of UML, upon
which all coUML modeling artifacts are based. Static Structure Diagrams
UML is a conceptual modeling language that
was primarily conceived for modeling static and A static structure diagram, commonly referred to
dynamic aspects of software systems. It was as “class diagram,” is a model type used to build
standardized by the Object Management Group the static structure of a system’s analysis or design
(OMG; http://www.omg.org) in 1997 and its cur- model by primarily modeling classes and their
rent version is 2.0. In the past decade it has been relationships (Eriksson & Penker, 1998). A class
established as the “lingua franca” in computer is a structural element that represents a concept of
science. It does not explicitly rely on any particu- the application area as it models a set of objects
lar software design process, nor is it restricted to with shared properties and behavior. For instance,
modeling computer systems and software systems. all students share some common properties like
It also offers extension mechanisms that allow postal address, date of birth, attended courses, etc.,
modelers to define their own model types and as well as some common behavior like moving to a
modeling elements, both formally and visually. new address, attending courses, taking exams, and
Hence, UML allows modeling static and dynamic so on. The class representing these properties and
aspects of any system or concept. the behavior of persons would be “Student”. Each
UML in its current specification offers about student would be an instance of this class, with
a dozen different model types, of which we only concrete values for each property. In UML a class
need two, namely activity diagrams and static is visually represented by a solid-outline rectangle
structure diagrams (commonly referred to as carrying the name of the class (see Figure 1).

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Figure 1. Class “Student”

tuting each instance of the aggregate class,
either as a range or as a fixed number. So
Figure 3 models that a course consists of
five course units.
• Generalization: A generalization relation-
ship connects a more specific concept with
a more general concept. Thereby, the more
Classes, or the concepts that they represent, specific concept “inherits” all features of
may maintain relationships with other classes. the more general concept and may add new
The most important relationships, which are also features. Generalizations are used to (hier-
relevant for coUML, are: archically) refine concepts. For example, a
student is a person and an instructor is a
• Association: Describes a shared relation- person as well, because both have a date of
ship among instances of classes connected birth, address, etc., but both may also have
through the association. Visually, an as- special properties which are not common
sociation is drawn as a solid-line path be- to all persons. Visually, a generalization is
tween two classes. For example, students drawn as a solid line with a hollow triangle
can be related to courses they attend; this at one end pointing to the more general
would require an association relationship concept (see Figure 4). The generalization
between classes “Student” and “Course” arrow can be verbalized as an “is a” rela-
(see Figure 2). tionship; Figure 4 therefore states that an
“instructor is a person” and that a “student
is a person.”
• Aggregation: An aggregation is a special • Dependency: A dependency constitutes a
kind of association representing a part- “weak” association among classes that is
whole relationship. Thereby, one partici- usually not structurally relevant to any of
pating class acts as the aggregate and the the participating classes. For example, a
other class represents the parts. For exam- dependency might show that a tutor sup-
ple, when each course consists of multiple ports the instructor during a course, which
course units, class “Course” would be the is structurally irrelevant, but still valuable
aggregate and class “Course unit” would information. Visually, this is depicted by
represent the parts of the aggregate. a dashed arrow between involved classes
Visually, an aggregation is drawn like an (see Figure 5).
association adding a hollow diamond at the
end of the aggregate class (see Figure 3). Finally, it is possible to group related model
On the other end of the aggregation (i.e., at elements together in packages. Thereby, a pack-
the class representing the parts) the mod- age symbol is drawn around the respective
eler may note the number of parts consti- model elements belonging to the package. Visu-
ally, a package is drawn as a rectangle with a tab
on top of its top-left corner carrying the name of
Figure 2. Association relationship
the package (see Figure 6).

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Figure 3. Aggregation relationship

among activities. After an activity is completed,
the outgoing transition moves the current process
state to the activity at which the transition is di-
rected. This is to say that activity diagrams arrange
activities performed in a process in chronological
order. Visually, an activity is drawn as a rectangle
Figure 4. Generalization relationship with round edges, and a transition is drawn as an
arrow (see Figure 7).
There is a special kind of activity which can
be used in much the same way as a normal activ-
ity; yet it acts as a placeholder for a number of
more specific activities. This is called a “subactiv-
ity”.Subactivities are used to decompose complex
activity diagrams into different layers, each with
different levels of detail. For example, the subac-
tivity “enroll in a course” would link to a more
detailed diagram showing the concrete activities
Figure 5. Dependency relationship performed by students enrolling in a course, which
could be “enter student registration number” fol-
lowed by “select course” and finished by “confirm
enrollment.” Visually, subactivities carry a small
icon connecting two circles in the lower right
corner (see the example in Figure 8).
Figure 6. Package

Figure 7. Activities and transitions

Activity Diagrams

Activity diagrams are used to model the behavior

of a system, demonstrating how the objects mod-
eled in the structural model interact dynamically.
Mapping this general definition to ID modeling, Figure 8. Subactivity linking to a set of activities
the target “system” would be the course or instruc-
tion to be modeled. In coUML, activity diagrams
are used for modeling the course activity model
(CAM).
Put simply, activity diagrams mainly consist
of activities, i.e., states in the process where some
action is performed, and directed transitions

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There might be points in a process, where the of the activity diagram, and an end node is drawn
next step has to be chosen among a number of as a hollow circle comprising a smaller, filled
alternative steps. Activity diagrams account for circle inside (see Figure 11).
such cases by offering decision nodes that can
have multiple outgoing transitions, of which Extending UML Elements
exactly one transition will become active depend-
ing on conditions defined by the modeler. There- Each existing model element in UML can be
fore, decision nodes split up the flow of an activ- stereotyped to represent a more specific concept.
ity diagram into multiple alternative flows. For The stereotype is named after the specific concept
example, “write project report” is succeeded by to be introduced. Such new modeling elements
a decision offering as alternatives “revise project can be introduced and readily used without much
report” and “present project report” as next steps effort. Visually, the modeler can define his/her
(see Figure 9). The decision would depend on the own graphical representation of the new model
quality of the project report. Good reports are element, or he/se can just attach the stereotype
approved for presentation, while bad reports need name as text within matched guillemets (« ») to
to be rewritten first. Visually, decision nodes are the element. This extension mechanism is power-
drawn as hollow diamonds. Often, alternative ful and highly relevant to our purpose, as coUML
flows offered through decisions need to be joined derives all special elements from built-in UML
back together at a certain (later) point in the dia- elements by adding stereotypes, such as «goal»
gram. This is done by drawing another decision
node at that point, this time acting as a join node
with multiple incoming transitions. In Figure 9, Figure 9. Decision among alternative activities
the decision symbol is used both as a decision
and a join node at the same time.
Additionally, there might be phases in a process,
where various activities need to be done concur-
rently. For example, students would “work on
projects,” and concurrently “use the online discus-
sion forum.” In activity diagrams this is possible
by splitting up a transition into multiple concur-
rent (or synchronized) transitions through a Figure 10. Synchronization of concurrent activities
synchronization bar. Visually this is drawn as a
thick, solid horizontal line. The end of concurrent
activities is indicated through another synchroni-
zation bar, which continues the process only when
all its incoming transitions are active. This means
that all concurrent activities have to be com-
pleted before the process can continue (see Figure
10).
Finally, each activity diagram has exactly one Figure 11. Start node (left) and end node (right)
start node, which may carry outgoing transitions
only, and at least one end node, which may have
ingoing transitions only. Visually, a start node is
drawn as a filled circle carrying the title or name

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to classes in the goal model, or «web-based» Note that in this section we only model those
to activities in the Course Activity Model. For aspects of the WE course required for the in-
examples of using stereotypes see the following troduction of the coUML language elements. A
coUML specification section. more complete case study on modeling a whole
course using coUML is provided in Chapter XVI
Specification of coUML Model of this handbook.
Types and Elements
Course Package Model (CPM)
The following sub-sections specify the model
types and elements used for creating the coUML Semantics
course design artifacts as described earlier. All The CPM shows which primary and secondary
modeling artifacts are specified using a template coUML modeling artifacts are provided for a
consisting of five sections: semantics, syntax, specific course design. As such, the CPM acts
example, modeling procedure, and textual infor- both as an overview and entry point to all coUML
mation. Regarding examples we try to illustrate artifacts provided for a course design.
the specified models and elements by using a
(simplified) course on Web engineering. Syntax
The CPM is modeled as a class diagram with
The Web Engineering Course one super-ordinate package carrying the course
title. This package includes other packages, each
The Web engineering course (hereafter simply representing (a group of) a primary or secondary
“WE course”) is an undergraduate course in coUML artifact. No relationships are used in the
computer science. It consists of seven consecutive CPM.
course blocks including project-based learning in
teams and face-to-face lectures. The lectures are Example
held by an instructor who also coaches the team The WE course is modeled using coUML including
projects (where he/she is assisted by a tutor). All examples of the CAM, the CSM, and the second-
documents for projects and lectures are managed ary artifacts. The CAM and CSM are contained in
on a Web-based learning platform. dedicated packages, and each secondary artifact
The seven blocks are organized as follows: (i.e., roles, goals, and documents) is also contained
After an introductory block, five blocks are dedi- in a dedicated package. The CPM for this course
cated to advancing knowledge and experience in would look like Figure 12.
Web engineering through applying techniques
and theories presented in the lectures on team Modeling Procedure
projects. This includes Web technology basics, It is easier to model the CPM when all artifacts are
requirements engineering, conceptual modeling, already known and available. However, the CPM
Web data management, and Web programming. may also represent the planned or in-progress state
The arrangement of these topics allows for com- of artifacts. In this case, the CPM would have to
pleting the projects in an incremental develop- be updated if any artifact is added, removed, or
ment process. The final course block concludes renamed.
the course with a grading procedure and a course
quality assessment. Textual Information
More details on the course are introduced as The CPM is complemented by the course’s “fact
required for the specification of new elements. sheet” including relevant course parameters. This

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Figure 12. CPM for the Web engineering (WE) course

can be used as a quick overview of course facts by Table 1 shows a brief fact sheet of the WE
course designers, teaching staff, and even students. course.
The fact sheet is presented as a table comprising
two columns: parameter and description. The head Models for Roles
row of the table shows the course name, and all
subsequent rows include relevant parameters in Semantics
the left column and their respective values in the The model for roles is intended to depict roles
right column. We propose the following set of involved in a course. As a secondary artifact,
parameters, which may be reduced or extended the role model is created only if deemed to be
according to specific needs: of significant use to the design team. There are
considerable benefits of modeling roles: First, each
• Summary: A short summary of the course role must carry a clear and unique name, which
content and intent. facilitates communication and understanding.
• Structure: A description of the structural Second, they can be used as additional informa-
organization of the course, e.g., division tion in the document model and the CAM. In the
into multiple blocks with dedicated topics, document model, roles are represented as providers
or weekly lectures, etc. and consumers of documents, while in the CAM
• Mode of presence: Indicates whether the the roles are used to show areas of responsibility
primary mode of presence in the course is in the course phases and activities. On the other
face-to-face, online, or blended. hand, if roles are used in the document model or
• Online support: Lists available online the CAM, the model of the role must be provided
tools and resources, such as course Web to maintain the internal consistency of the models.
sites, learning management systems, etc. In either case, modeling roles requires additional
• Participants: How many and who are the effort and also adds to the complexity of the overall
participants? coUML model.
• Teaching staff: Teaching staff involved in
the course, such as instructor, supervisor, Syntax
tutor, external guest, etc. Roles are modeled in class diagrams. Technically,
• Instructional strategy: Description of a role is represented by a class with stereotype
main instructional strategy employed in «role». We define our own custom visual repre-
the course, such as project-based learning, sentation for this, which is a stick-figure with the
case-based lab practice, etc. role name written below it (see Figure 13; UML
• coUML models: A list of coUML models experts may note that we reuse the built-in UML
or artifacts provided for the course design.

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Table 1. Fact sheet of the WE course

“Web Engineering”
Summary Integrated lecture and lab course in computer science, held in a blended mode. Relevant Web engineering
theory and techniques are presented by the instructor and applied hands-on by the students their team projects.
Structure The course comprises seven consecutive blocks; each block is conducted in a blended mode integrating face-
to-face and online activities.
Presence mode Blended face-to-face and online
Online support A Web-based learning platform is available; any required tools for projects are available in the laboratory.
Participants Twenty undergraduate computer science students with basic knowledge in computers, Internet technologies,
and computer programming
Teaching staff One instructor, one tutor
Instructional strategy Lectures and project-based learning using a blended learning approach. Projects and subject matter are elabo-
rated in a stepwise, incremental fashion (synchronized with theory input during the lectures).
coUML models CPM, CSM, CAM, roles, learning goals, documents

Figure 13. The “Instructor” role

each specialized role. For example, there
might be activities in a course where both
instructor and student roles actively par-
ticipate; these two roles could then be gen-
eralized through a “participant” role (see
Figure 15). Consequently, if the participant
role is partaking in any course activity in
the CAM we implicitly know that both in-
structor and student roles can be involved.
• Dependency: A dependency relationship
between two roles indicates that one role
actor symbol). Packages may be used to group supports the other role in course activities.
related roles together. For instance, the tutor role typically sup-
The following relationships are possible be- ports the instructor role, which is modeled
tween roles: as a dependency carrying the stereotype
«support» (see Figure 16). While coUML
• Aggregation: Means that each instance of only specifies the «support» stereotype, the
the aggregate role consists of a number of modeler may introduce additional stereo-
instances of the other role. A typical ex- types as needed. Modeling dependencies
ample would be the “team” role that ag- among roles is optional; usage of this fea-
gregates the “student” role in the sense that ture might increase the informational con-
each student team consists of a number of tent of the role model, but it also tends to
students (see Figure 14 showing that each overload the model.
team comprises four students).
• Generalization: This means that a more Optionally, roles and role hierarchies can be
general role is refined by more specific divided into multiple packages in one or more
roles. The more general role provides class diagrams. For example in a more complex
structural and/or behavioral elements for role hierarchy it might be useful to separate teach-

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Figure 14. Role aggregation

ing roles from learner roles. The decision on this
is left to the modeler (see the remarks for “mod-
eling procedure” below).

Example
In the WE course, active roles include the in-
structor, the tutor, and students. Additionally,
we identify the “team” role: In the first session,
students are organized into teams of four to work
on their web engineering projects for the rest of
Figure 15. Role generalization the course. Therefore, the team role is modeled
as an aggregation of the student role. At the stu-
dent role end of the aggregation, the number “4”
indicates that each team consists of four students.
Activities performed by the team role for one of
the WE course blocks can be seen in the CAM
example (see Figure 42).

Modeling Procedure
Identifying the roles for a course is straightfor-
ward. Most courses involve at least the instruc-
tor, student, and tutor roles. It might be easier to
identify roles after the first attempts to model the
CAM diagrams, as it makes little sense to con-
ceptually define a role which does not partake in
Figure 16. “Support dependency” between two any course activity. Also, with most or all course
roles activities available, identification of participating
roles is easier.
As coUML makes no assumptions on role
granularity, it would also be possible to refine the
role hierarchy into greater detail according to the
activities in which they partake. For example the
student role could be split up into more specific
roles that students take on in different activities.
Consider the peer evaluation of student projects:
the “student” role could be divided into a “project-
Figure 17. Role model of the WE course contributor” role and a “peer-reviewer” role. The
final decision on the granularity of the role model
is left to the modeler, however with the advice that
fewer roles are clearly easier to handle.

Textual Information
The role model is complemented by a tabular
description of the roles. The two columns of the

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Figure 18. Learning goal “Understand basic Web

table expose the role name and a short description
technology” having ID “7”
for each role. For example the role description for
the tutor in the WE course would be, “Supports
the students and the instructor during various
activities, e.g., facilitating/helping project teams,
collecting documents from students, maintaining
the online content, seeing through online activ-
ity, etc.”

Goal Model
Note that some existing goal modeling ap-
Semantics proaches use the UML use-case symbol for mod-
The goal model can optionally be used to explic- eling goals, while others use stereotyped class
itly model and describe learning goals as well as symbols. For coUML we preferred to use the
their relationships with each other. Like the role latter option as we consider goals as being struc-
model, the goal model is considered as a second- tural elements; use cases on the other hand are
ary modeling artifact that can be omitted if not behavioral elements typically used to represent
needed. However, this model is useful as a tool to interactions (or events) preformed by users and
explicitly name and relate goals with each other. the system to achieve some goal. With coUML
The modeler is free in setting the focus for the the achievement of goals can be modeled in the
goal model, which means that coUML does not CAM.
suggest any underlying taxonomy (e.g., Bloom’s Goals are modeled in packages and it is also
taxonomy of learning goals—cf. Bloom, 1956), possible to group related goals together. This is
nor any other assumptions about the learning goals. achieved by placing the respective goals inside a
Nevertheless, coUML allows assigning priorities grouping box, which is drawn as a rectangle with an
to learning goals. attached name for the goal group (see Figure 19).
If the modeler decides to create this model, It is possible to assign priorities to goals, if
the learning goals can subsequently be used as desired. There are several options of doing so: we
additional content in the CAM, where activities could attach a text note to the goal that defines
can be connected to learning goals. This is useful its priority (e.g., “Priority 1”); we could group
for showing which activities support or achieve together learning goals belonging to the same
which learning goals. priority by using a grouping element like the one
in Figure 19; or we could create a diagram con-
Syntax sisting of vertical layers, where each layer repre-
Goals are modeled in class diagrams. Each goal is sents one priority level. The choice is left to the
drawn as a class with stereotype «goal» above the modeler.
learning goal name. Additionally a goal identifier The following relationships are possible be-
(ID) can be placed in the top-left corner of the tween goals:
class symbol, allowing referring to a goal by its
ID (can be a number, an acronym, etc.), which is • Aggregation: Means that the aggregate
typically shorter than its name. To avoid introduc- goal is decomposed into a number of
ing yet another icon, we reuse the already known smaller, typically more concrete goals.
class symbol and restrain from defining our own Thereby, the aggregate goal is considered
icon for goals (see Figure 18).

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Figure 19. Grouping of cognitive learning goals in the WE course

as achieved after all its sub-goals have been timation of the real relationship among
achieved. Figure 20 shows an example of two goals, so multiple interpretations
goal aggregation in the context of the WE are possible.
course. Goal 1 can be achieved by achiev- • Generalization: This means that a goal is
ing all of its sub-goals 2, 3, and 6. refined by more specific goals. This is an
• Dependency: A dependency relationship advanced feature which can lead to more
between two goals indicates that one goal confusion than to better understanding
plays a role in achieving or supporting the among novices. However, generalizing
other goal. Dependencies may be stereo- goals is also a powerful concept, as the
typed to express the particular type of de- general goal can be used to provide shared
pendency between two goals. The follow- properties for multiple sub-goals: If, for
ing two stereotypes are defined by coUML example in a course on writing research
(note that this list can be extended accord- papers, learning goal A (“Writing research
ing to the modeler’s needs): papers”) is a generalization of learning
1. «require», meaning that a goal requires goals B (“Writing case-study papers”) and
another goal to be achieved first. For C (“Writing empirical papers”), then each
example to achieve the learning goal relationship that A maintains with other
“Implement an application concept in learning goals (e.g., with learning goal D
teamwork” in the WE course requires – “Structuring of research papers”) is in-
the goal “Understand Web script pro- herited by both B and C. So if A requires D
gramming” to be achieved first, as one to be achieved, then B and C require D as
cannot reasonably implement a Web well (see Figure 23).
application without being familiar with
Web programming (see Figure 21).
2. «support», meaning that working
towards a goal supports the achieve-
ment of another goal. This could be Figure 20. Goal aggregation
interpreted as a weak, inverse form
of «require». We could modify the
example above to state that Web script
programming supports implementation
of application concepts, which could
also be argued in certain cases (see
Figure 22). We see that the choice of
dependency relies on the modeler’s es-

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Figure 21. “Require dependency” between two Figure 24. Learning goal model for the WE course
learning goals

Figure 22. “Support dependency” among two

learning goals

Modeling Procedure
If learning goals are available in structured text
form, they can be modeled by identifying relevant
Figure 23. Generalization of goals learning goals, assigning a short name and an op-
tional ID, and finally – if considered useful—by
modeling relationships among goals.
There might be no explicit textual description
available for many courses, especially in early
design stages. In such cases it would be reason-
able to think about and specify learning goals
textually and proceed with modeling. If it is not
intended to explicitly write down learning goals,
it is valid to omit the goal model altogether, or to
Like the role model, the goal model can be try to extract the goals from the course activities
divided into multiple packages in one or more or other available course information.
class diagrams.
Textual Information
Example The goal model can be complemented by a tabular
Figure 24 shows the goal model for the learn- description of the goals. The two columns of the
ing goals of the WE course. Consider a list of table expose the ID or the name of the goal and a
learning goals specified textually by the instruc- more detailed description, respectively. See the
tor: To create our goal model, we provide a case study in Chapter XVI for an example.
short name and attach a numerical ID for each
relevant. Additionally we include the informa- Document Model
tion that goal 1 is an aggregation of goals 2, 3,
and 6, and that goals 4 and 5 are generalized Semantics
by goal 3. While these relationships might not The document model shows a structured overview
explicitly be stated in the textual description of all documents that are created, provided, and/
of the learning goals, the modeler should try or used in a course. Moreover, it is possible to
to identify the most appropriate representation show for each document: who are the providers
for goal relationships. and who are the consumers. This is achieved by

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connecting roles from the role model to documents course, after all sub-documents have been
in the document model. written.
The obvious benefit of creating this modeling • Dependency: A dependency relation-
artifact is that it is easy to identify, for example, ship between two documents indicates
which documents have to be created prior to the that one document plays a role in the pro-
course, which documents have to be provided vision or usage of the other document.
by teaching staff throughout the course, which Dependencies among documents may be
documents are produced by students, or which stereotyped to convey the particular type
resources are generally available. Creating a of dependency. Only one stereotype is
document model can provide substantial support suggested by coUML (note that the mod-
in the tedious, yet indispensable task of document eler may introduce additional stereotypes
management in a course. as needed): «require», meaning that a
As we will show in the specification of the document requires another document to
CAM, modeling a document model subsequently be available before it can be provided or
allows connecting documents with activities in used. A typical example would be written
the CAM, to show which documents are input to feedback: One can only provide feedback
and output from activities. on a project report when the project report
is already available (see Figure 28).
Syntax
The document model is provided in class diagrams. It is possible to use a dependency to connect
Each document is drawn as a class with stereotype a role defined in the role model with a document
«document» above the document name. No special and vice versa. This would indicate the “document
visual icon is defined for documents. Similar to flow” among roles. Note that this is modeled
the goal model, a document ID can be placed in without assigning a stereotype to the dependency.
the top-left corner of the class symbol, allowing
referral to a document by its ID (see Figure 25).
Documents are modeled in packages and it is Figure 25. A case study document on requirements
possible to group related documents together, for engineering carrying ID “RE 2”
example document resources for student projects.
This is achieved by placing the respective docu-
ments inside a grouping box (see Figure 26) in
the same way as in the goal model.
The following relationships are possible be-
tween documents:
Figure 26. Grouping of project resources
• Aggregation: Means that the aggregate
document consists of a number of sub-
documents. Figure 27 shows an example
of document aggregation in the context the
WE projects. The final project report con-
sists of the sub-documents: project assign-
ment, project plan, and project results. The
project report is created at the end of the

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Figure 27. Document aggregation

except the requirements specifications which
are created by the project teams and submitted
to the instructor.

Modeling Procedure
Documents can be identified by studying the
textual course description and particularly by
analyzing course activities with respect to their
Figure 28. “Require dependency” between two
input and output documents. Therefore it might
documents
be advisable to defer the creation of the document
model until after the CAM is modeled. In this case
the document model would have to be refined
each time the CAM changes its use of documents.

Figure 29. “Document flow” unidirectional de-

Depending on the direction of the dependency,
pendencies among roles and documents
the following intents are served:

1. A unidirectional dependency pointing from a

role to a document means that the document
is provided or created by a person embody-
ing that role (see Figure 29).
2. A unidirectional dependency pointing from
Figure 30. A bidirectional dependency between
a document to a role means that the role
the instructor role and a document
uses this document for some purpose. So,
persons embodying that role are addressees
or consumers of the document (see Figure
29).
3. A bidirectional dependency between a docu-
ment and a role means that the role acts as
both provider and consumer of the document
Figure 31. Document model for the third WE
(see Figure 30). This constitutes an integra-
course block on requirements engineering
tion of the two unidirectional cases above.

Like the role model and the goal model, the

document model can be divided into multiple
packages in one or more class diagrams.

Example
A part of the document model of the WE course is
given in Figure 31. It shows which documents are
used and created in the third course block (“Block
3: Requirements engineering”): It is apparent that
the instructor provides most of the documents,

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Textual Information detail and from a certain point of view. The level
A tabular overview of documents is provided as of detail and the point of view are determined by
a complement to the document model. Thereby the modeler according to the course activities to
each document can be specified in great detail be modeled. The following elements are used to
according to specific needs. coUML suggests model basic activity diagrams:
at least providing information on the following
properties for each document: ID, name, type (e.g., • Start Node: Each activity diagram must
paper, report, Web site, animation, spreadsheet, have exactly one start node, which acts as
etc.), description (more detailed information on the entry point to the “execution” of the
the content or use of the document), provider diagram. It carries the name of the cur-
(who is responsible for providing/creating the rent diagram, which is usually the course
document?), and deadline (a point of time in the name (if the activity diagram represents
course where the document must be available). the whole course—see Figure 32) or the
See the case study in Chapter XVI for an example name of a particular phase or activity in
of a document table. Additional parameters could the course (if the activity diagram mod-
include: public (is a document available to other els only one part of the course). The latter
roles?), location, online availability, size, already case may be complemented by placing the
available, and so forth. course name in smaller letters above the
name of the current activity diagram (see
Course Activity Model (CAM) Figure 33).

Semantics
The CAM is the primary artifact of a coUML • End Node: Each activity diagram contains
course model. It is used to model the teaching at least one end node, which represents the
and learning process of a course or instruction. end of execution of the current activity dia-
The CAM may provide any number of activity gram. This means that each final activity of
diagrams showing the course activities from any an activity diagram must be connected to
point of view, in any desired level of detail. Its an end node via a transition.
enormous flexibility makes the CAM a very pow-
erful and versatile resource for course analysis,
design, and documentation. Moreover, the modeler
Figure 32. Start node of the WE course activity
may reuse secondary artifacts defined in other
diagram
models and link them to activities in the CAM,
e.g., to show which documents of the document
model are needed for which activities.
The most basic use of the CAM is for model-
ing the arrangement of course activities from an
organizational point of view, i.e., aligning activities Figure 33. Start node of the activity diagram for
performed by multiple roles in activity diagrams. block 3 of the WE course

Syntax
The CAM comprises a number of activity dia-
grams. Each activity diagram depicts a phase of
a course, or the whole course at a certain level of

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• Activity: An activity symbol in an activity 1. «web-based»: This stereotype means that

diagram represents a state of the execution the activity is primarily performed online,
of the diagram where a specific activity is using the Web. It is visualized by filling the
performed by some role involved in the activity with light-blue color and by placing
course. For example, at one point of the the letter “W” (standing for “web-based”)
course the students have to read a docu- surrounded by a circle in the activity’s right-
ment containing information on the task hand corner. Figure 35 shows an example
of creating the requirements specification of the Web-based activity, where require-
for their projects. This activity could be ments specifications for the team projects
modeled as “Read requirements specifica- are submitted online via the Web.
tion guidelines” (see Figure 34). The name 2. «present»: This stereotype means that the
chosen for the activity should be meaning- activity is primarily performed in face-to-
ful to potential viewers, while keeping in face or present mode. It is visualized by
mind that the name should not be too long. filling the activity with light-green color and
by placing the letter “P” (standing for “pres-
An activity symbol may also be used to rep- ent”) surrounded by a circle in the activity’s
resent more than one concrete course activity, right-hand corner. Figure 36 shows an ex-
which is possible when modeling a diagram at a ample of a face-to-face lecture activity on
lower level of detail. Note that, unlike in many requirements engineering.
other educational modeling languages, in coUML 3. «blended»: This stereotype means that the
the size of an activity symbol is not related to its activity is performed in a mixed, blended
estimated or planned execution time. The symbol mode using the Web and face-to-face meet-
should just be drawn large enough to accommodate ings. This stereotype is visualized by filling
its name. Also, an activity diagram is usually the activity with light-red color and by plac-
easier to read when all its activities have about ing the letter “B” (standing for “blended”)
the same size. surrounded by a circle in the activity’s right-
The modeler may explicitly denote the mode hand corner. Figure 37 shows an example
of presence in which the activity is performed, of an activity modeling the blended elabora-
which is either Web-based, face-to-face (pres- tion of project reports.
ent), or blended. This is particularly useful in
blended learning environments. With coUML it
can be achieved by assigning a mode-of-presence Figure 35. Web-based activity
stereotype to the activity. The following three
stereotypes are defined:

Figure 34. A course activity

Figure 36. Presence activity

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Note that for blended activities the level of For example, if we want to refine the blended
detail used in the diagram plays a significant role: activity in Figure 37 with a sub-diagram showing
At the highest level of detail, blended activities can the concrete activities performed in elaborating
not be modeled, as each single activity will proceed project reports, the resulting subactivity and its
either Web-based or present. At lower levels of sub-diagram would look like those in Figure 38.
detail, an activity may represent more than one
single activity, where presence and face-to-face • Transition: As already defined, a transi-
modes can be mixed. This would make the activity tion is a directed connection (drawn as a
a blended activity like the one in Figure 37. Project solid-line arrow) between two nodes in an
reports are elaborated in personal meetings and activity diagram. It can be used to connect
via the Web by exchanging electronic documents, activities, subactivities, decisions, concur-
e-mails, etc., making it a truly blended activity rencies, and start- and end nodes. A transi-
with a low level of modeling detail. tion maintains the “control flow” in an ac-
tivity diagram; it becomes active when its
• Subactivity: A subactivity is a special kind source node has completed its actions, and
of activity, which links to another activity it immediately passes control on to its tar-
diagram. This means that the subactivity get node. This allows temporal and logical
represents a number of course activities, arrangement of activities and other nodes.
which are modeled in more detail in a sub- For example, the activity diagram on the
diagram. Logically, subactivities are only right-hand side of Figure 38 starts with the
needed when modeling at a relatively low activity “Write project draft.” After this ac-
level of detail. The sub-diagram to which tivity is completed, the transition becomes
the subactivity points, is consequently active and moves the state of execution to
modeled at a higher level of detail. This its target activity, which is “Project meet-
means that subactivities are a powerful ing.” After this, the “Finalize project re-
tool to model course activities at different port” activity becomes active. The last
levels of detail, while providing links be- transition is directed at the end node.
tween these levels. This supports both the
modelers and the viewers, because for ex-
ample overloaded diagrams can be avoided
Figure 38. Subactivity (on left side) and its sub-
this way.
diagram (on right side) showing the elaboration
of project reports
Note that for easier recognition the start node
of the sub-diagram should carry the name of its
parent subactivity. Also note that the modeler can
assign a mode of presence to each subactivity in
the same way as it is done for normal activities.

Figure 37. Blended activity

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Through transitions the three activities are end. At the start a single transition is split
arranged in chronological order. up into multiple concurrent transitions
• Decision: A decision node (drawn as a hol- with a synchronization bar symbol (thick,
low diamond) denotes a point in a course solid line), and at the end these multiple
where the flow of activities is split up into concurrent transitions are rejoined again
multiple alternative flows. Exactly one of with the same symbol. During execution of
these alternative flows becomes active. the activity diagram, at the end of a concur-
To help decide which of the alternative rency the flow can continue only after all
“routes” to take, each outgoing transi- incoming concurrent flows are finished.
tion of a decision node carries a so-called Consider Figure 40 for example. After the
guard condition. If the guard condition of “Pick up project assignment” activity is
a transition is satisfied, that transition will completed, the two activities “Elaborate
become active. A flow split up by deci- project reports” and “Keep online project
sions can be rejoined later in the diagram diary” take place concurrently with each
by another node which is then called a other. The end of the concurrency can be
join node that is visually identical to the seen as a synchronization point: If both
decision node. Consider Figure 39 for ex- concurrent activities are completed, the
ample: The instructor lets students choose process can continue with “Submit project
whether they want the next course unit on report.”
data modeling to be delivered as a lecture
by the instructor, or as self-study via the
Web. Depending on the preference of stu- • Temporal constraints: It might be neces-
dents, two alternative activities need to be sary or useful to explicitly model time slots
modeled, i.e., a face-to-face lecture and an or constraints such as deadlines for activi-
online self-study. The following join node ties. The modeler is relatively free in the
reconnects the split flow of activities. way of adding this information. However,
the following is propsed for coUML:
Points in time are visualized in activity dia-
• Concurrency: A concurrency is used to grams by drawing a dotted line with a
model separate activity flows which pro- deadline or other date near the activities to
ceed concurrently with each other. which the deadline is relevant. This feature
Concurrencies have a dedicated start and is used in Figure 42; for example, we can

Figure 39. Decision and join nodes Figure 40. Concurrent (synchronized) activities

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see that the submission of requirements ments in the swimlanes of the role or activ-
specifications by the project teams has to ity that produces the document.
be completed until Sunday in the third • Goals: (Learning) goals can be connected
week. to activities through dependency relation-
ships. In the CAM, learning goals are mod-
Activity diagrams can optionally be extended eled as objects, just like documents. The
with elements from secondary artifacts: name of the object must match the name
and/or ID of the goal in the goal model. To
• Roles: There is a feature for activity dia- explicitly show the specific type of goal
grams that allows modeling which role is dependency, the following stereotypes are
the primary actor in an activity. An area, suggested:
in which a particular role acts as the pri- ◦◦ «achieve»: States that the activity
mary actor in activities, is surrounded by achieves a goal.
a so-called “swimlane,” which carries the ◦◦ «support»: States that the activity
name of the respective role name. For ex- supports the achievement of a goal.
ample, in Figure 42 there are swimlanes This can be considered as a weak
for three roles: instructor, teams, and stu- form of the «achieve» dependency.
dents. Therefore we know that the first ac- See for example Figure 41, where
tivity after the start node (i.e., “Download the “Do requirements analysis and
resources on requirements engineering”) specification” activity supports the
is performed by students. In cases where achievement of the “Conducting a
an activity is performed by multiple roles, requirements analysis” learning goal.
the activity can be resized to span or touch
multiple swimlanes.
• Documents: coUML allows modeling the Interpreting Activity Diagrams
“document flow” in an activity diagram. When viewing and trying to interpret an activity
To achieve this, simple transitions can be diagram, the best approach for novices is to “walk
replaced by dashed arrows and an object through” the diagram by placing an imaginary
symbol, which is a rectangle carrying the execution token at the start node of the diagram.
document name as defined in the docu- Then, you continue to follow the outgoing transi-
ment model (if the object represents mul- tion of the current node, by moving the imaginary
tiple documents a symbol with two stacked token along the transition arrow to the next node:
objects is used). The document flow fea-
ture is especially useful when a document 1. If you reach an activity you are at a point of
is direct output of one activity and subse- the course where an activity is performed by
quently direct input to the next activity. For some role, which can be identified by the
example, in Figure 42, the “Requirements containing swimlane of that activity. The
specifications” documents are output of
the “Submit requirements specifications”
Figure 41. “Support dependency” between an
activity and input to the following “Read
activity and a learning goal
specifications” activity performed by the
instructor. If swimlanes are used for roles,
it is a service to viewers to model docu-

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coUML

Figure 42. CAM diagram of “Block 3” of the WE course

token remains stationary at this activity until transition carrying the answer or value that
the activity is completed. is true/correct for the current token. If you
2. If you reach a subactivity, you follow the reach a decision node with only one outgo-
(imaginary) link to the activity diagram to ing transition, which represents a join for
which the current subactivity points. The the most recent decision, you just continue
execution token is transferred to the start to pass the token along the single outgoing
node of this sub-diagram. After execution of transition.
the sub-diagram is finished (i.e., the token 4. If you reach the start of a concurrency, you
reaches an end node), you return the token will also see multiple outgoing transitions.
to the originating subactivity and follow its Contrary to decisions, each one of the outgo-
outgoing transition. ing transitions will become active after the
3. If you reach a decision, you will notice synchronization bar. This can be achieved by
the multiple outgoing transitions leaving splitting the execution token up into a number
the decision node. It is important that the of concurrent execution tokens matching
execution token can only proceed along the number of outgoing transitions. Now
exactly one of the outgoing transitions. To place one of the tokens on each transition
help decide which outgoing transition to fol- and concurrently proceed with each token.
low, the decision may carry a question to be This concurrent flow of activities is ended
answered or a condition to be satisfied. Each by another synchronization bar, which can be
of the transitions then carries one answer or recognized by its multiple incoming transi-
one possible condition value. You follow the tions and only one single outgoing transition.

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 coUML

At this point, you wait until each part token the CAM is achieved. If the modeler decides to
of the previously split-up execution token add more information, additional elements from
arrives at the synchronization bar. After the secondary artifacts can be included. Typically,
last token has arrived you rejoin the tokens roles (swimlanes) are introduced first, followed
and continue with one single token along the by the document flow with activities, and finally,
path of the synchronization bar’s outgoing if desired, learning goals. Also during modeling,
transition. it might be useful to create alternative diagrams
5. If the current transition you follow represents for the same course activities, representing a dif-
a document flow (i.e., a dashed arrow) you ferent point of view, a different level of detail, or
pass the token along the document flow, just to experiment with activity arrangement or
move it past the document node (at this available secondary artifacts.
point you know that the current document A concrete, effective procedure for a particular
was produced by the previous activity), modeling/design team and task is best discovered
and finally on to the following activity or and optimized during modeling practice.
activities.
6. If the current activity node carries an outgo- Textual Information
ing dependency to a learning activity, you A table should be provided for each activity
know that this activity supports or achieves diagram to describe each activity in more detail.
the respective learning goal. For the ex- Two columns (name of activity and description)
ecution token, these dependencies can be should be sufficient, but additional information
ignored, i.e., they just provide additional can be provided like scheduled start and end time
information to the viewer. of activities, role responsibility, tool support, etc.

Example Course Structure Model (CSM)

Figure 42 shows the activity diagram of the CAM
for block 3 of the WE course. Three roles are Semantics
involved (the instructor, the project teams, and The CSM provides an overview of all activity
the students) in this blended course block. The diagrams modeled in the CAM. As such it acts
temporal constraints also show important points in as a visual aid for users and modelers of a course.
time during the two weeks covered by the diagram. Viewers can use it as a guide to “browsing” the
CAM.
Modeling Procedure
Initial attempts at the CAM can be made while Syntax
ignoring secondary artifacts like documents or The CSM consists of one or more class diagrams
learning goals. As an initial step, relevant activities comprising a class symbol for each activity dia-
should be modeled at a low level of detail. Each gram in the CAM. The class symbol carries the
low-detail activity can subsequently be refined name of the respective diagram. There is only one
in sub-diagrams to achieve a higher level of de- specified relationship between diagrams, which is
tail. During modeling it might become apparent drawn as a dependency, meaning that the source
that a diagram becomes too complex or bloated, diagram links to the target diagram through a sub-
which might require rearrangement or refinement activity. Packages can be used to group diagrams
of activities. This process can be iterated until a together. See the following example.
satisfying and consistent degree of elaboration of

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coUML

Example COUML APPLICATIONS

Figure 43 shows the CSM for the WE course. The
main activity diagram (indicated with light-gray This section briefly presents three applications
fill) would be the “Web Engineering” diagram. for the coUML approach: first, in its original ap-
The CSM shows that this diagram links to seven plication area for instructional designs. Second,
sub-diagrams detailing each of the seven blocks we expose the coUML language as a means of
of this course. modeling generic blended learning processes,
also referred to as “blended learning patterns,” to
Modeling Procedure enable the reuse of blended learning design experi-
The creation of the CSM follows a straightforward ence. And finally, we present a more technology-
procedure. Start with the main activity diagram oriented application for modeling and using the
representing the whole course, and draw the learner context in a course.
symbol in the CSM with light-gray fill or pattern.
For each subactivity in this diagram, draw a dia- Instructional Design
gram symbol in the CSM and connect the main
diagram symbol to it via a dependency. This step Supporting the instructional design process is
is repeated for the whole “tree” of sub-diagrams, perhaps the most relevant use of coUML. As it
sub-sub-diagrams, and so on. allows integrated and incremental modeling of
If there are alternative models for certain course structural and dynamic aspects of an educational
activities or phases, another CSM package can be environment, it can be used in different stages of
created with links to these diagrams. instructional design, and even when the design
process is already completed. A comprehensive
Textual Information example for applying coUML in this respect is
The CSM can optionally be complemented with provided as a case study on a course on “Introduc-
a tabular overview giving a textual description tion to Instructional Design” in Chapter XVI of this
for each diagram. handbook. Please refer to the textual case-study
description and the respective coUML models
Figure 43. Course structure model (CSM) for the provided in that chapter.
WE course
Pattern Modeling

The primary objective of the pattern approach (Al-

exander et al., 1977) is to capture generic scenarios
in a way that makes them amenable to reuse. With
coUML this can be achieved by providing models
of useful and effective courses and scenarios with
a higher level of abstraction. The resulting pattern
of a scenario can be used as a template or model
for instantiating or deriving concrete scenarios
in different, but similar contexts. To support this,
each pattern is provided with detailed descriptions
of intent, motivation, coUML scenario model,
parameters, and application examples (Derntl,

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 coUML

2005). Consider for instance the Web-based “Di- can subsequently be attached to activities modeled
ary” pattern described and modeled in Figure 44 in the CAM. This extension was used to model
(note that the pattern description in the figure is a laboratory course that employed wireless de-
not given in full detail). The scenario is modeled vices in an RFID-tagged laboratory environment
at a high level of abstraction, featuring only the (RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification;
most essential steps in using Web-based diaries it allows attaching tags to objects which can be
in educational environments. Consequently, the wirelessly scanned by RFID-enabled computers
scenario can be applied by adapting it to specific such as laptops or PDA’s). Based on the context-
needs, requirements, and available technology- enhanced CAM models a software system was
and Web support. developed that was, for instance, able to display
available books and papers on the current course
Context-Aware Scenario Modeling topic if the student entered the laboratory library.
This way it was possible to automatically consider
In a recent project (Derntl & Hummel, 2005) and update each learner’s context (e.g., location,
coUML was extended by introducing learner learning progress, learning resources, available
context information as an additional secondary devices, etc.) during a learning activity.
modeling artifact. Thereby a learner context
model was developed to allow modeling of the
learner’s personal context (e.g., name, expertise, DISCUSSION
etc.), physical context (e.g., location), digital
context, and other more technology- and device- Language Features
related context structures. The learner’s context
coUML is basically an extension of UML. We
consider this as an advantage as UML’s seman-
Figure 44. Excerpt of the Web-based “Diary”
tics are formally specified and well documented.
pattern
Meanwhile UML has a tradition of being used in
several fields such as Web design, business pro-
cesses and workflows, organizational modeling,
context modeling, and many more. For example,
there are many commercial and open-source
UML modeling toolkits available which could
be used for modeling basic coUML diagrams.
Additionally, transformation procedures for
UML-based modeling (e.g., to XML) are already
well-researched and tested, and can be applied to
coUML models without “reinventing the wheel.”
The language-related features of coUML can
be characterized as follows: coUML is pedagogi-
cally neutral; there are no modeling elements, re-
strictions, terms or assumptions included which
would restrict the user in modeling any particular
scenario. It is designed to be simple to learn and
use, even for non technically-oriented people.

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This has turned out to be a tough goal to achieve, • Specification of the interdependence be-
as many people are reluctant to use UML, which tween process and content flow. This al-
generally seems to be considered as a tool for lows for the subsequent derivation of
pure computer science use. Despite its (debat- learning activity models and for example
able) notational simplicity, coUML can be used the integration of e-content modules.
for modeling processes at almost any degree of • Specification, identification, and explicit
complexity and detail; it includes all necessary integration of various means of quality as-
control-flow structures, and the composite subac- surance activities into learning scenarios to
tivities allow structural aggregation and hierarchi- improve learning processes.
cal composition of cooperative scenarios through • Specification of different roles as well as
links between activity diagrams. Finally, it can be modes of presence and interaction involved
used for creating new learning designs, analyzing in cooperative environments. While this is
and redesigning existing learning designs, and as a central feature of coUML, we add that
a visual toolkit to documenting learning designs. the language is not restricted to modeling
Another aspect, which is presented as an appli- of cooperative activities. In fact, it could
cation is its use as a modeling tool for blended as well be used to model non-cooperative
learning patterns. learning environments.
coUML’s features particularly related to its
artifacts (i.e., models) are: Language Classification

• Visual presentation of didactical knowl- Using the visual instructional design language
edge, in particular of learning strategies (VIDL) classification scheme introduced by
such as problem-based learning, inductive Botturi, Derntl, Boot and Figl (2006), coUML’s
derivation of knowledge, deductive learn- feature and application classification is presented
ing, knowledge creation, etc. in Table 2.
• Specification of goals, social settings, and
roles of learning activities. Expert Survey on Modeling Support
• Presentation of learning processes at vari-
ous levels of detail and arbitrary switch- In order to find out whether there is a broader
ing between levels, if that leads to better need among researchers and practitioners for
understanding. visual modeling support in designing blended
• Knowledge communication between edu- course environments, we conducted a survey
cational scientists and between educators during a business meeting of the “Forum New
as well as communication between educa- Media Austria” in November 2005, which was
tional scientists and learning-technology attended by e-learning experts (both research-
developers. ers and practitioners) from diverse fields such
• Supporting the specification of functional as psychology, pedagogy, mathematics, educa-
requirements on a supporting learning tional technology, or computer science. During
platform. a workshop on blended-learning modeling, we
• Explicitly captured didactic elements such distributed a questionnaire among the participants
as course phases, threads, and activities (N = 27) aiming to survey general perceptions
can be analyzed and researched in a target- and estimations on modeling support for blended
ed way, considering different stakeholders’ learning. Analysis of questionnaire data indicates
perspectives. that researchers and practitioners are in need of

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Table 2. coUML feature and application classification

Classification of features
Stratification Layered, as it allows modeling entities of different types and at different levels of detail.
Formalization Semi-formal; it inherits formal elements and semantics of UML, yet it allows the modeler to be creative in
providing additional visual and textual information.
Elaboration The primary intent of coUML is mostly conceptual, but it is also possible to model at the levels of specification
and implementation.
Perspective Multiple, as it is possible to model structural (i.e., goals, roles, and documents) and dynamic (i.e., activities)
concepts from different perspectives and at different levels of abstraction.
Notation system Visual, based on UML, with extensions and additional textual descriptions.
Classification of application
Communication Can be used as a reflective and communicative tool, depending on involved stakeholders’ skills and preferences.
Creativity Can be used for both generative (design-in-progress) and finalist (documentation) purposes. However, Its
origin lies in finalist use.

a visual modeling language to support them in 4. We were also interested in the experts’
their efforts. While the survey was not specifically estimate of the use of visual modeling lan-
focused on coUML, the following general results guages for instructional design. A number
seem noteworthy: of relevant use cases were provided in the
questionnaire, and participants’ responses
1. The use of visual modeling techniques (e.g., are highly supportive for coUML’s focus:
sketches of processes, overview diagrams) According to the experts, the top-three
in supporting the design or reorganization uses of visual modeling for learning design
of a blended learning course is considered are “communication among involved ac-
highly useful; M = 6.88, SD = 1.51, on a tors” (24.7%), “explanation of the design”
scale ranging from 1 (“not at all”) to 8 (“very (18.2%), and “reduction of complexity in the
much”). design process” (15.4%). The full distribu-
2. More than two-thirds of the participants were tion of responses to this question is given
aware of existing visual modeling techniques in the histogram in Figure 45.
and almost as many are using them in their
daily practice: 40% use informal modeling Even though the questionnaire was not di-
notations like sketches or block diagrams; rectly related to coUML, the results show that
another 22% use “real” modeling languages there is considerable attention towards, and ap-
like UML or IMS Learning Design (IMS preciation of, visual instructional design lan-
Global, 2003). guages. Practitioners seem prepared and willing
3. It is sometimes argued that strict and more to use these languages and they are aware of
formal visual notations are interesting and potential support provided by these languages,
useful for computer-science people only. The e.g., for communication among involved actors,
participants unanimously voted against this for explicating, sharing, and documenting learn-
proposition, even though they admitted that ing designs, or for reducing the complexity in the
more formalized languages are often difficult design process. We hope that the current chapter
to understand and use. does convey that these factors were also consid-
ered highly relevant in the development of coUML.

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Figure 45. Experts’ estimate of relevant uses of visual modeling languages for learning design

CONCLUSION abstractions, names, and the provision of mul-

tiple grain sizes have proved essential in com-
coUML is a simple, powerful visual modeling municating cooperative designs in general and
language for modeling instructional designs. Its in contributing to technology-enhanced learning
notational power unfolds best in a blended course elements in particular.
environment, when different modes of presence Future work on coUML will proceed in sev-
are aligned to achieve instructional objectives. eral major directions. First, we want to extend
It is based on UML, which is a standardized our efforts of modeling external courses from
modeling language; we used UML’s built-in ex- more subject domains and “teaching cultures”
tension mechanisms to define required modeling and include these in our pattern knowledge
elements in addition to its basic set of structural base (see http://elearn.pri.univie.ac.at/patterns).
and dynamic elements. In this respect, readers are invited to provide
ID is an exceptionally diverse and complex feedback and share their own course designs
discipline, making it an appropriate application and experiences. Second, we are working on
area for visual modeling support. In this respect, an easy-to-use modeling tool for coUML users,
the primary intended ID application for coUML easing the modeling process with computer tool
is modeling of structural and dynamic aspects of support. Third, we plan to evaluate the use of
blended course designs. We presented results of the language for different cooperative processes
a small study among blended learning experts, outside of the instructional domain, such as pro-
which substantiates our presumption that blended fessional community building, interdisciplinary
learning designers and instructors are in need curriculum development, and project manage-
of a visual, conceptual toolkit to help them ef- ment. Last but not least, through this chapter
fectively create, analyze, and communicate their we want to promote the use of coUML among
designs. We have experienced that the diagram- researchers and practitioners for feedback and
matic notation can help in sharing the learning further improvement.
design with colleagues and in organizing and
researching courses. Also, the choice of proper

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REFERENCES Derntl, M., & Hummel, K. A. (2005). Modeling

context-aware e-learning scenarios. In The Pro-
Alexander, C., Ishikawa, S., Silverstein, M., ceedings of Third IEEE Conference on Pervasive
Jacobson, M., Fiksdahl-King, I., & Angel, S. Computing and Communication Workshops (pp.
(1977). A pattern language—Towns, buildings, 337-342). Kauai Island, Hawaii.
construction. New York: Oxford University Press.
Derntl, M., & Motschnig-Pitrik, R. (2005). The
Bloom, B. S. (Ed.). (1956). Taxonomy of edu- role of structure, patterns, and people in blended
cational objectives—Book 1: Cognitive domain. learning. The Internet and Higher Education,
New York: Longman. 8(2), 111–130. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2005.03.002
Botturi, L., Derntl, M., Boot, E., & Figl, K. Eriksson, H.-E., & Penker, M. (1998). UML Tool-
(2006). A classification framework for educational kit. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
modeling languages. In The Proceedings of IEEE
International Conference on Advanced Learning Garrison, D. R., & Kanuka, H. (2004). Blended
Technologies (ICALT’06)(pp. 1216-1220). Ker- learning: Uncovering its transformative potential
krade, The Netherlands. in higher education. The Internet and Higher
Education, 7(2), 95–105. doi:10.1016/j.ihe-
Derntl, M. (2005). Patterns for person-centered duc.2004.02.001
e-learning. Doctoral dissertation, University of
Vienna, Vienna, Austria. Retrieved from http:// Global, I. M. S. (2003). IMS learning design speci-
elearn.pri.univie.ac.at/derntl/diss fication. Retrieved March 21, 2007, from http://
www.imsglobal.org/learningdesign/index.html

This work was previously published in Handbook of Visual Languages for Instructional Design: Theories and Practices, edited
by Luca Botturi and Todd Stubbs, pp. 154-182, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 3.16
Modeling Learning Units by
Capturing Context with IMS LD
Johannes Strobel
Purdue University, USA

Gretchen Lowerison
Concordia University, Canada

Roger Côté
Concordia University, Canada

Philip C. Abrami
CSLP, Concordia University, Canada

Edward C. Bethel
Concordia University, Canada

ABSTRACT to the core of IMS-LD integration, address the

question of usability and end-user friendliness,
In this chapter, we describe the process of and urge that more research and design needs to
modeling different theory-, research-, and best- be conducted not only to mainstream (a) the use
practice-based learning designs into IMS-LD, of IMS-LD and related visual instructional design
a standardized modeling language. We reflect languages, but also (b) the debate on appropriate
on the conceptual and practical difficulties that and best instructional design practices.
arise when modeling with IMS-LD, especially
the question of granularity and the necessary and
sufficient elements of learning design. We propose INTRODUCTION
a four-layer model both to ensure the quality of
the modeling process and as a necessary step Instructional design is essential for every teach-
towards a ‘holistic’ consideration and integration ing, training, or instructing position. Where other
of the design process. These discussions speak design fields, like architecture, industrial design,
and engineering, have very precise languages to
communicate and share design specifications
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch316

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Modeling Learning Units by Capturing Context with IMS LD

within their respective communities, the field of cluding: (a) the questions of boundaries,
education does not possess such languages (Gib- granularity, and details of the design; (b)
bons & Brewer, 2005). In the field of education, the modularity and reusability of smaller
forms of sharing innovations include lesson plans learning objects within larger learning
and learning objects, products which implicitly objects; (c) sufficient and necessary con-
embed design considerations, but do not explicitly ditions of a successful reuse of a learning
address them. Crucial information on the context, design; (d) the usefulness of detail in the
the embedded instructional strategies, the theoreti- design and reuse of learning designs; and
cal foundations of the design, and the reflections of (e) particulars of mapping of activities
the teachers or designers are either not explicitly through IMS-LD.
captured as in the case of learning objects, or are • To provide a four-layer evaluation model
not accessible through a general standardized for determining the quality of IMS-LD
language as in the case of lesson plans. design. These four layers are: (1) syntax
In the last couple of years, the field of education and grammar; (2) best design approaches
saw several attempts to fill this gap by develop- to model a certain activity; (3) how ac-
ing specific metalanguages or visual instructional curate is the model representing what the
design languages (VIDLs; see Botturi, 2005 for an learning design was; and (4) how well the
overview). IMS-LD, an extension of the educa- models match sound theories or evidence-
tional modeling language (EML) specification, is based research. These two purposes aim to
a prominent representative of VIDL. IMS-LD was reflect on the usefulness of IMS-LD as a
developed to allow lesson plans and best practices communicative device to share and com-
to be structured using a common language based municate learning design issues, including
on a formal representation, to exist within an XML the variety of different ways to design the
schema, and to be archived in a machine readable same instructional activity.
and searchable repository.
As powerful as the design language is, instruc- This chapter describes the experience devel-
tional designers, instructors, or teachers are still oped over a year-long project in which best prac-
left with a variety of design decisions, which are tice, theory-based, and evidence-based learning
not captured by the design language. For example: designs were formally described with IMS-LD.
Which design is the most appropriate for a spe- The presented arguments will be illustrated with
cific learning outcome? How much detail should a variety of designs, modeled from theories and
be included in the design specification? Which activities, including behaviorist, cognitivist, and
elements are flexible or need to be modified by constructivist models, problem-based learning,
the context of the implementation? What context and lesson plans from the area of K–12 education.
information does the design have to include to
provide meaningful and sufficient information
to subsequent designers, instructors, and so on? BACKGROUND
In view of these concerns, there are two purposes
of this chapter: IMS LD

• To provide a critical analysis of different The purpose of educational modeling languages

design decisions that are pertinent for the (EMLs) and the IMS Learning Design (IMS- LD)
use and implementation of IMS-LD, in- specification is to support the crafting of diverse

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Modeling Learning Units by Capturing Context with IMS LD

learning experiences, embodying different kinds properties (additional information about persons
of activities and in different contexts. IMS-LD is or roles) and conditions. Notifications, which are
a metalanguage that focuses on the settings (e.g., added at level C, can trigger new activities, for
courses, course components, programs of study, example, noting whether a teacher has student
etc.), associations of settings with content (e.g., questions to answer. In order to complete these
multimedia, task descriptions, tests, assignments, levels, the best practice guide (IMS Global, 2003)
etc.), and instructional and pedagogical strategies recommends using a narrative description in order
(e.g., roles, relations, interactions, and activities to initiate the analysis of an instructional scenario.
of students and teachers, etc.). In comparison to In the next step, semiformal UML (unified mod-
pure learning object frameworks, which focus eling language) diagrams are drawn. Based on
entirely on content, in IMS-LD, activities and roles the UML activity diagram, the XML document
of students and teachers are directly specified. instance is created.
The IMS Learning Design is a language that IMS-LD stands as a prototype for the “shift in
gives bindings in XML to specify learning content the e-learning focus from content to process—or
and processes. IMS-LD was developed to promote activity” (de Filho Moura & Derycke, 2005, p.
technical specifications for learning technology 2). As de Filho Moura and Derycke (2005) fur-
(IMS Global, 2003). Historically, the basis of ther argue, content issues, the primary focus of
IMS-LD is educational modeling language (EML; learning objects, have distracted and polarized
Tattersall & Koper, 2003), which was developed the e-learning community from other important
by the Open University of the Netherlands. Com- issues and so with IMS-LD, the field could begin
pared to other languages, like “PCeL patterns,” turning its attention not only to what to learn but
for example (Derntl, 2005), it is independent of also how to learn.
any specific pedagogy, and its main focus is to Since IMS-LD claims to be pedagogically
support any kind of instructional design. IMS-LD neutral (for a discussion, see Nodenot, 2006),
models who does what, when and which materials meaning it does not enforce a particular instruc-
or learning services are used to achieve learning tional strategy or model (such as problem-based
objectives. Elements like resources, instructions learning, drill and practice, guided, or inquiry),
for learning activities, templates for interactions, the decisions of design are left to the instructor or
and pedagogical models like problem-based instructional designer. Because different instruc-
learning, learning goals and outcomes, as well as tional models consist of varying assumptions of
assessment tools are included (IMS Global, 2004). what: (a) the teachers’ role is; (b) the learners’
The specification gives a binding in XML, result- role is; (c) activities students are engaging in; (d)
ing in an XML manifest for each learning process. which support structures and activities that need
This XML manifest can then be interpreted by an to be in place; and (d) sequence or path the stu-
IMS-LD compliant application. dents are following or choosing (see an overview
IMS-LD consists of three parts: Level A, B, by Reigeluth, 1999), there can be no template or
and C. There are different XML schemas provided even similar design structures when modeling
for each level, and each level extends the previous different interactions. For example, since group
one. Level A is concerned with the basics. At level work in an inquiry based project is different from
A, time ordered activities, which are performed by group work in a guided Web quest, it becomes
teachers and learners (roles), are specified within additionally important how granular the models
an environment of learning objects and services are and how different interaction patterns can be
(IMS Global, 2003). At level B, there are also best represented in IMS-LD.

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Main Focus tions of the models presented in this chapter were

created using MOT Plus™. We particularly chose
In the next sections, we describe a year-long proj- a graphical interface for our learning designs to
ect in which we formally described best-practice, make our argument more accessible to end users
theory-based, and evidence-based learning like teachers and instructional designers. We felt
scenarios using IMS-LD. The best-practice and the raw XML binding is harder to communicate to
evidence-based scenarios are derived from real novices of IMS-LD than a visual representation.
lesson plans available at the Web site of LEARN
Recit (a service agency for English school boards Context of the Models
in the province of Quebec). The Web address is
http://www.learnquebec.ca. The IMS-LD models The project team decided to work with two different
are available at Paloma (http://helios.licef.teluq. type of scenarios: (1) theory- and evidence-based
uquebec.ca:8080/PalomaWebGlobe/), a learning instructional models and (b) best-practice cases.
object repository maintained by Télé-université, The theory- and evidence-based models included
Québec. We reflect our modeling process, includ- a behaviorist, a cognitivist, and a constructivist
ing our selection process and different learning based model. These models were “translations”
scenarios, which we modeled with IMS-LD. of theoretical literature and research studies into
We worked with MOT Plus™ (Paquette, IMS-LD models. For an overview and a short
Léonard, Lundgren-Cayrol, Mihaila, & Gareau, description of the different models, see Table 1.
2006), an IMS-LD software editor (Level A cur- The best-practice cases were selected from a
rently implemented) that allows a visual modeling publicly available Web site maintained by RECIT/
of learning design and an automatic translation Learn, a nonprofit educational foundation sup-
from graphical designs into machine-readable ported by funding from the Québec-Canada Entente
IMS-LD XML files. All of the visual representa- for Minority Language Education. RECIT/Learn

Table 1.

Title Type of Pedagogical type Model describes Environment Comments

model structure
Figure 1: Model of Best prac- Inquiry-based Communication Two or more Define simultaneous
Fieldtrip tice learning process/Collaborative matched distance interaction
learning separated classes
Figure 2: Snapshot of Theory- Constructivism Generic structure for Nonlinear/ Difficult to model
selected area in IMS- based teaching within a con- flexible flexibility of choices
Model of constructivist structivist design and and sequences
learning teaching paradigm
Figure 3: Model of Theory- Behaviorism Generic structure Linear/sequential Difficult to deter-
behaviorist teaching based for teaching within a mine level of detail
behaviorist design and required for model
teaching paradigm
Figure 4: Snapshot of Theory- Cognitivism Generic structure Linear/sequential Difficult to opera-
model on cognitivist based for teaching within a tionalize the differ-
teaching cogntivist design and ent steps without a
teaching paradigm particular context:
deeper or broader?
Figure 5: Model of Best prac- Cross curricular: Collaboration: Linear/sequential Struggled with ques-
“True Story” learning tice Language Arts, Brainstorming, problem tions of granularity
activity Math, Art solving

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supports and promotes pedagogical collaboration Table 2, we designed a rubric to select existing
and innovation with information technology and lesson plans for inclusion in our project. The rubric
modeling of best practices, primarily by providing contains criteria which were aimed to: (a) assess
teacher professional development in technology the quality of the instructional model and (b) pro-
integration into the new learner-centered Quebec vide quantity and quality indices of the description
curriculum. The cases on the Web site were an- of the activities, roles, content, and so forth. The
notated with links to resources, contributed by rubric served two purposes: (a) to select sound
teachers in the Quebec English Schools Network. models of instructional design and (b) to ensure
Some of the cases included design considerations that enough high quality information is accessible
and reflections by the teachers. As displayed in to transfer the model into IMS-LD.

Table 2. Rubric to select best-practice models

Category 0 1 2 3
Theory/Design Cannot determine pedagogi- Material relies on an Material relies on a Theory and/or design is
cal theory or instructional unstructured com- structured or defined easily identified. Modi-
design. bination or not fully theory or set of ID fications are explained.
realized collection of rules. Could be more
theories and design complete.
principles.
Qualitative Components Example contains material Example contains Example contains Example contains
that is incomplete – offers material that has vague complete mate- complete material that
little to no detail. or sketchy details. rial but is lacking offers detail as well
information related as information related
to teacher and/or to teacher and student
student guidelines. guidelines.
Quantitative Example contains too few Example contains Example contains Example contains
Components components to work with. some elements but has material in all areas enough material to
holes in some areas. but lacks reference create a complete model
to some resources. as well as links to avail-
able resources.
Criteria for Assessment Example contains no criteria Assessment criteria are Assessment criteria Assessment criteria is
for assessment. vague. is complete but is clear and easy to work
missing some infor- with.
mation.
Learning Objectives and/ Learning objectives or out- Learning objectives Learning objectives Learning objectives or
or Learning Outcomes comes are not stated. and outcomes are and outcomes follow outcomes are complete
poorly stated. Vague. theory and design and closely follow iden-
Do not follow theory but could be more tifiable learning theory
or ID. complete. and/or instructional
design models.
Classroom Student– Not applicable or not Only vague or very Guidelines for inter- Comprehensive and
Teacher Interactions discussed. brief guidelines. action are included realistic guidelines for
but could be more interaction are included
complete or more
realistic.
Preparation/Pre-Activity Not discussed. No prepara- Vague or insufficiently Discussion of prepa- Discussion of prepara-
Instructional Design tory ID appears needed or detailed discussion of ration and prepara- tion and preparatory ID
possible, or else discussion preparation needed. tory ID is included is complete. Discus-
of ID includes fundamental Some evidence that but could be more sion of preparatory ID
misunderstandings of the preparatory ID is complete. reflects mastery of ID
process or fallacies. needed, but discussion principles and process.
is vague or lacking in
detail.

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We utilized this rubric to translate existing and the availability of accompanying material.
learning designs, such as lesson plans, so they For this model, we started building the smallest
could be visualized and shared in different “lan- units first, such as how classes were matched,
guages” and modeled with IMS-LD. This rubric how questions were answered, which content
can be similarly employed to evaluate the qual- was available at which stage of the activity, and
ity of existing IMS-LD models and learning ob- so forth. After fine-tuning these individual as-
jects. For all the models we created, one person pects, we designed the overall structure and then
on the team assumed primary responsibility. modeled the relationships between the different
However, project meetings were utilized to co- elements. The smaller units or nuggets (Bailey,
model and discuss components of the models. Zalfan, Davis, Fill, & Conole, 2006) were mod-
In the next section, we discuss the individual eled as autonomous and closed units to ensure
learning designs, the models (which will be at that they made sense by themselves and to avoid
least partially depicted in graphical format), issues later reusability concerns. See Figure 1.
that arose from the modeling, and a preliminary
reflection. After we describe our process through Reflection
a set of models, we will synthesize the reflections
by connecting them to literature on IMS-LD By modeling this activity, we faced many chal-
modeling and instructional design. lenges. The first challenge was to define a unit
or nugget in a way that was consistent and had
boundaries that were set. In this course, the dif-
MODEL 1: CONNECTING A VIRTUAL ferent activities were intertwined, could be em-
FIELD TRIP WITH OTHER CLASSES ployed nonsequentially, but had a fixed timeline
(sequence). In many of the activities, several
The Context groups were supposed to be doing the same ac-
tivity in parallel, and afterwards, they were to
This model describes the design of a collaborative forward their results to the other groups. The
virtual experience, which also includes an actual challenge here was to define these interactions
field trip. A class that takes the field trip invites being precise regarding who is sending and who
other classes, which cannot make the field trip, is receiving information. An additional challenge
to join them virtually. Participating classes can pertained to the distinction between necessary
send questions, hints, and already researched and sufficient information. For example, students
topics to the field trip class in order to uncover were communicating the results back to the other
more information. The classes are in secondary classes via e-mail. For this design to work and for
education, and the model describes the commu- other designers to reuse the design, the decision
nication process and the collaborative work used to use e-mail is not a necessary one. The same
in answering questions. communication could have been achieved via
video-conferencing, chatting, or producing a Web
The Process site. Nevertheless, the concrete activity (e-mail)
requires a different model than the use of a discus-
This model is a best-practices model, meaning sion board or the creation of a Web site. Therefore,
we modeled an existing course activity. The questions remain concerning: (a) how to model the
main selection criteria for the activity were the variety of activities or media that could be used;
uniqueness of the lesson design, the utilization (b) modeling the particulars of the design; and (c)
of a sound, theory-based pedagogical model, communicating the difference between necessary

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Figure 1. Model of field-trip learning activity (based on http://www.qesnrecit.qc.ca/cc/partners/indexen.

htm)

and optional aspects of the design. By modeling lems, nonsequential pathways, and a variety of
just one activity (e-mail), we felt the design was situation and context-sensitive support structures,
not as reusable as it could have been. Additionally, like scaffolding, modeling, and coaching (for
the differentiation between two different classes of an overview, see Jonassen & Land, 2000). The
smaller units seemed important either (a) nuggets, constructivist paradigm cannot serve as a con-
which described a particularly defined activity, or crete design application of how to structure, for
(b) nuggets that served to connect other nuggets to example, a discussion group around a particular
form a larger unit. While the first class is easier to class context. However, the constructivist-based
reuse, the second class is much more contextual design can provide a design template for build-
to the model at hand and harder to reuse. ing nonsequential, open-ended learning activities
within the formalized IMS-LD model. Because it
has a clear theory base, the model is more aptly
MODEL 2: CONSTRUCTIVIST described as a metamodel abstracting concepts
TEACHING MODEL from the many different design and teaching situ-
ations that were used to inform theory building.
The Context
The Process
This theory-based model provides a generic
structure for teaching within a constructivist de- Because constructivism entails many different
sign and teaching paradigm. The constructivist forms, our discourse was dominated by how its
paradigm is characterized by nonlinear content principles can be operationalized in a design
interaction, complex and ill-structured prob- model. Since we worked without the context

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of a particular instructional intervention, the cause the models can have so many variations.
components of the design stayed at an abstract The pedagogical strategies and philosophical as-
level. We struggled with certain components of sumptions of the paradigm we modeled greatly
the process more than with others. For example, influenced our approach to modeling. General
in many constructivist design models, not many questions arose, especially concerning how dif-
fixed sequences exist and many student activities ferent prototypes of the same model looked when
are iterative. This learner flexibility means there created by different people. We realized different
is a great deal of free choice regarding resource ways of modeling and found that the appear-
and activity selections, which are repeated with ance of any one model was dependent on the
different content or different guiding questions. personal preferences of the designer and his/her
Our challenge was to design activities and acts style of modeling. After determining that these
that were coherent within the design, which rep- idiosyncratic, abstract models of constructivism
resented the flexibility of the activities and the were syntactically correct with respect to the
adaptability of the resources and were not restricted underlying coding language and were compliant
by the design model as to when the activities had with IMS-LD, questions arose concerning the
to be completed. Additionally, many microlevel best way to model a specific constructivist learn-
elements were hard to incorporate due to the flex- ing activity. Each one of us developed a unique
ible nature of the theoretical underpinnings. Since style of modeling resulting in multiple ways of
many decisions within a constructivist learning modeling a particular component, each of which
situation are made by students in cooperation with was still compliant with IMS-LD. Modeling of
each other and with the teacher, many conditional learning scenarios was not a standardized activity
aspects needed to be modeled, and many alterna- with a single, clearly described model. It was a
tive ways of achieving the same learning outcomes process that depended more on the expertise of
needed to be included. See Figure 2. the modeler, the anticipated level of expertise of
the audience, and the preferred styles of visual
Reflection arrangement, which were used to highlight key
instructional elements. These constraints and con-
The design of this model raised different ques- ditions, however, did not find their way into the
tions and provided many challenges for the design models or into IMS-LD itself. In short, by strug-
team. The main challenge was whether one model gling with the design of a constructivist model,
would suffice for constructivism, not just because we were in need of an annotation language to
constructivism is an abstract model, but also be- clarify our IMS-LD models, which we were not

Figure 2. Snapshot of selected area in IMS-Model of constructivist learning

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able to do within the model itself. Additionally, the availability of material or insights into the
we found the need for “best-practice” models on design process was often the determining factor,
how to model in IMS-LD. even when we wanted to go into greater depth. In
theory-based cases, the material and approaches
were endless, and it was so much more difficult
MODEL 3: BEHAVIORIST to set the boundaries. See Figure 3.
TEACHING MODEL
Reflection
The Context
The model was a great device for us to develop
This is a theory-based model, which provides a a better understanding of behaviorist forms of
generic structure for teaching within a behaviorist instruction. By engaging in the process, the dis-
teaching paradigm. Though it cannot serve as a cussion became focused on the model itself. A big
template for structuring communication pattern challenge was the syntax and the design process
in courses, it can provide a design template for itself. We found ourselves agreeing on the design
aligning smaller aspects of course design within sooner than on its visual representation and on its
an overall structure. The model is a metamodel compliance with IMS-LD. For the design exer-
abstracting from the many different design and cise, the many different ways of representing one
teaching situations that can be classified as be- element led us to question the validity and utility
haviorist. of a best practices approach to IMS-LD design.

The Process
MODEL 4: COGNITIVIST
In this template, it was important for us to connect TEACHING MODEL
the classroom activities of the instructor with those
of the students along with the preparation of the The Context
instructor. In dealing with instructor preparation,
the model needed to also explicate what follows This is a theory-based model, and we had to make
in the class. To do so, we spent some time explor- deliberate choices regarding which body of litera-
ing different components in the 2/3D dimensional ture to rely on and operationalize. Though it cannot
space of MOT+. The feedback structure of behav- serve to illustrate the design of communication
iorism made it difficult to place every component pattern in courses, the cognitivist approach can
in a way that was visually easy to follow. Although provide an IMS-LD design template for aligning
not as important as the design aspects, the visual smaller aspects of design with overall course
aspects of arrangement, color-coding, and so forth structure. The model itself is a metamodel, which
are challenging ones for novice model builders. abstracts the many different design and teaching
The overall structure of the design was deter- situations that can be classified as cognitivist.
mined by the theoretical underpinnings; never-
theless, the modeling process raised additional The Process
questions especially with regard to the sequence
in which the model had to be expanded. In our The development of the cognitive model proved
experience, determining the level of detail in the challenging. Like the other theory-based ap-
model was always a struggle. How much detail proaches, in a cognitivist model, it is hard to
should the design contain? In best practice cases, operationalize the different steps without having

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Figure 3. Model of behaviorist teaching

a particular instructional context for reference. Reflection

When we attempted to design such concrete learn-
ing situations, the challenge was when to stop vs. A benefit of our own modeling activity was that
when to go deeper or broader in representing key we understand the cognitivist approach in a more
concepts. In contrast, it was quite the opposite with concrete way, although individual steps might
the design of theory-based models. There is not still be hard to operationalize. Within this model,
much chance to go deeper because the deeper one many of the instructor’s activities are preparation-
goes the more contexts plays a role, and different intense. In other models, we tried to incorporate
instructional variations need to be considered. For the design process of the teacher as much as the
further modeling of theory-based approaches, the classroom activities themselves. In this model, it
theory-based models need to be represented as was not easy to do that, and provided a challenge
metamodels, meaning that in addition to represent- that was made more difficult by the lack of par-
ing a generic design, these metamodels need to ticular instructional contexts to draw on.
reference a variety of different nuggets as possible
examples and variations within the larger design.
In the metamodel approach, the broadening of the MODEL 5: “TRUE STORY”
design means being faithful to the original attempt LEARNING ACTIVITY
to design a generic model, while the deepening of
the model means being able to represent particu- The Context
lar learning contexts. Despite these concerns, the
generic model has its benefits because describing This model describes a unit of learning in a K–12
an overall structure and visualizing key theoretical context in which students utilize a variety of dif-
elements helps facilitate designs, which are inter- ferent technologies to represent a story from a
nally coherent. See Figure 4. children’s book. Students were involved in a few

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Figure 4. Snapshot of model on cognitivist teaching

evaluation tasks in which they had to compare one The Process

story account with another. Beyond that particular
context, the model can be utilized as a template This model took a best-practices approach by
to build cross-curricula instruction and allow the modeling an existing lesson. We developed the
integration of math-, language-, and technology- model following the systematic description that
rich class activities. the instructor outlined in the lesson plan. Similar
to most of our modeling, we ran into the problem
of representing depth and breadth of instruction.
Additionally, since we modeled a rather large sec-

Figure 5. Model of “true story” learning activity

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tion of a class activity, we questioned the value to decide which of the elements are pedagogically
of modeling this large section and not just little crucial, exchangeable, or even negligible for his/
nuggets. Other ones could replace most all of the her own teaching. To identify the adaptability or
activities that we built. For example, the discussion redundancy of certain design elements, either
of the book could have been done in a multitude of pedagogical and instructional knowledge of the
ways. Furthermore, by not directly specifying the design is necessary or the original instructional
discussion process, the instructor left a consider- designer should somehow embed appropriate
able amount of detail out of the lesson plan. This alternatives.
detail will need to be determined by the individual
instructor who reuses the model. The value of the Reflection
particular structure lays more in the entirety of
the plan. The challenge for us was how to model As mentioned earlier, the modeling process is a
the activities as independently from each other valuable communicative device to plan and dis-
as possible so other usable nuggets could easily cuss learning design. Additionally, the modeling
replace the existing ones. A particular difficulty process becomes a reflective device. Through the
of modeling in this “object-oriented” way is that modeling of approximately 15 designs, we found
transitional aspects of the model (like leading ourselves questioning instructional decisions in
from one activity to the other) become secondary lesson planning. Unfortunately, it is not very
or redundant. visible within the process how the design grew
For our own modeling purposes, we yet have to before we modeled it. Additionally, since most
come up with a way of consistently and systemati- instructors build and adapt their teaching from
cally distinguishing between core elements of the session to session, we do not see in the modeling
design and redundant, exchangeable, or even neg- process the different alterations and changes the
ligible elements within the model. In other words, instructor utilized. In that sense, the model has no
what are the necessary and what are the sufficient history or is incapable of keeping history.
elements and attributes of certain designs? Another
example might highlight this difficulty. A set of
students (A) is using a discussion board to com- SYNTHESIS AND DISCUSSION
municate the results of a research study to another
set of students (B) who can ask questions or make We described our process of modeling specific
requests for additional research in return. While theory and best-practices learning activities. In
group A utilized a discussion board, they could the following section, we will synthesize issues
have used other forms of two-way communication arising from the modeling experience and discuss
(blogs, e-mails, video-conferencing, etc.). Each and situate them within the larger body of litera-
form of communication would require different ture on learning design and instructional design.
training, calls for different exchange patterns,
requires different preparation time between com- Granularity
munication periods, and so forth. For the overall
design of the course, it is important to model that By breaking down and assembling structures and
students engage in two-way communication, but complex performances of instruction, the question
how important is it to model the specific way of emerges as to what constitutes an “atomic” chunk
communicating and the specific activities associ- or part. In other words, what is the smallest mean-
ated with the means of communicating? Another ingful unit of modeling and what should the degree
teacher trying to adapt the learning design is left of granularity be? The definition of granularity

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has implications not only for the boundaries of a the learning object and so preserve some of the
model but for the reuse of model components in context which learning objects were criticized for
different designs. leaving behind (see Jonassen & Churchill, 2004
The topic of granularity is not new to the field for a detailed criticism).
of instructional design and appears frequently This move to a more “holistic” approach means
in the learning design and the learning objects that granular or smaller objects of design are
literature. Many instructional design guidelines similarly complex as larger pieces, so by break-
argue for breaking down complex structures into ing down complex learning design, we will not
smaller sizes, for example, as argued by learn- facilitate a more manageable task of “divide and
ing taxonomy proponents (e.g., Bloom, 1956) conquer” but create rather hydra’s head, the beast
and as illustrated in instructional design models in Greek mythology which grows two heads for
(see Reigeluth’s 1999 elaboration theory as an everyone cut off. Implications of this “hydra head”
example). Traditional conceptualizations of model are numerous: (a) the size of a learning
granularity are delivery-centric or as Wiley, Gib- object does not communicate something about the
bons, and Recker (2000) call it, “media centric.” simplicity of complexity of the learning object,
In a delivery-centric view, pieces of the design (b) there are no simple learning objects, and (c)
are well-defined by the hierarchies of a course, the larger context or the relationship with other
the course being the largest grain size and a text learning objects become more important in order
element in a course description being the smallest to create or reuse the learning object.
“atomic” element. IMS-LD distinguishes between
the smallest elements, combined small elements Boundaries/Details
(which become level 1), and combined level 1
elements (which become level 2). In many of our models, we encountered the prob-
There appears to be a move away from the lem of specifying the boundaries of a particular
conceptualization of granularity as mainly an issue learning activity (i.e., how to integrate prior or
of the size of a learning object to a more “holistic” subsequent learning activities which are linked to
view in which more factors of the instructional the activity at hand). Similarly, issues of external
design process are considered. “In determining boundaries arose when we debated whether to
the robust granularity of a learning object, one include the teacher’s or instructional designer’s
might ask, ‘what elements of the model, mes- activities within our model of a learning activity.
sage, instructional strategy, representation, and This question becomes particularly important
media-logic layers are compressed within this considering that most models are not blindly
learning object?’ The larger the count, the larger reused but are carefully selected and adapted by
the grain size of the learning object” (Wiley et other instructional designers or teachers, so ad-
al., 2000, p. 5). ditional information on the design process might
The move to a “robust” or “holistic” approach be useful and provide more context.
to granularity would address several issues: (a) In addition to external boundaries (whether
It could provide an alternative picture to the and how to include events and material outside
simplistic view of teaching as delivery of disag- the learning activity per se into the design model),
gregated learning objects assembled in a well- internal boundaries of the design have also to be
defined preconceived combination (the course considered. The question of “how much detail
structure; see Russell, 2003 for a further argu- should the model include?” sets the direction of
ment). (b) It could highlight the very complexity the internal boundary of the design model. The
of the instructional design process embedded in structure of IMS-LD with its stage metaphor, in-

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cluding activities and acts, might be perceived as reusable, especially when certain technologies
already determining the question, however IMS- do not exist.
LD does not provide an answer about the depth Ultimately, this could mean that the learning
of detail. For example, is it sufficient to describe design of an activity would need to draw from a
that students are supposed to work in teams or large bank of substitute components, which could
do details on the structure of the teamwork need replace the actual modeled structure when con-
to be included? straints of a new design require that. Additional
metadata on the necessity of the components and
Sufficient and Necessary an alert on which crucial parts of the design need
Conditions/Possibilities to be expanded are necessary. If in our example,
e-mail communication was exchanged with the
A related question to the issue of boundaries is creation of students’ own Web sites, training for
the determination between necessary and suf- the Web site creation might be a necessary addi-
ficient information. As seen earlier in the model tion when designing the activity.
of the field trip (see Model 1), the design asked Furthermore, an additional distinction can be
students to communicate their field-trip results drawn between two classes of design components.
back to other classes. In this particular instance, There are activity and material components, which
students used e-mail as the communication me- describe which activities students are engaged in
dium. However, the design could have asked the and which material is utilized. The design model
students to communicate via a discussion board, contains also bridge components, elements that
video-conference, or by creating their own Web are necessary to connect activities with other
site. All of these interventions fulfill the goal of activities or with necessary resources. In the
this aspect of the activity—to communicate results. learning design, bridge components are secondary,
When breaking down the activities into smaller, because they do not carry many instructions, but
detailed acts and processes, all of these different rather provide segues between the core designs.
interventions require different kinds of material, IMS-LD does not distinguish between bridge and
training for students, teacher roles, and actions by core components.
students. We argue that the goal to communicate
is a necessary condition to be modeled, meaning Usability and User-
it cannot be missed, but the modeled activity of Friendliness of IMS-LD
e-mailing is only a sufficient condition, meaning
it can be replaced with other activities, which Our experience in the role of end users with IMS-
fulfill the same goal. To illustrate the distinction, LD through a visual editor confirmed previous
consider the following: If somebody is trying to systematic usability testing of formal standardized
reuse the learning design in another context, the languages to capture learning designs. As van
goal needs to be shared (to communicate), but Rosmalen, Vogten, Van Es, Passier, Poelmans,
the designer should also be able to integrate other and Koper (2006) describe, the weaknesses of
technologies, activities, and associated actions to IMS-LD are that the required knowledge of IMS-
fulfill this goal. In IMS-LD, no space is provided LD and the complexity of the IMS-LD specific
to communicate sufficient uses or necessary con- concepts assumes a great deal of knowledge and
ditions. This does not allow designers to share the editor itself requires considerable training.
crucial design decisions. By just modeling one Finally, the interface is based on a technological
activity (i.e., e-mail), the design would not be as view of learning design rather than an educational
view (see van Rosmalen et al., 2006, p. 8 for a

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detailed description). We experienced very similar layers are (1) syntax and grammar, (2) best design
issues with the usability and user-friendly aspects approaches, (3) accuracy of the models, and (4)
of IMS-LD. implementation and compliance.
The usability of both IMS-LD and the graphi-
cal tool cannot be reduced to the techniques, Syntax and Grammar
technologies, and processes of modeling, however
important they are. There are other large questions In the syntax and grammar level, the focus lays
of usability in this context. How does IMS-LD on the correct use of the IMS-LD specification to
connect with the practice and experience of end appropriately design the unit and ensure compli-
users? Is the language mature enough to become ance in the exchange process. This includes the
an every-day tool in the hands of instructors and correct labeling of relationships between indi-
instructional designers? What other barriers ex- vidual components (sequential, free choice), the
ist before IMS-LD is integrated into every-day proper breakdown of the initial unit of learning
practice. These questions go beyond the typical into activities, actions, roles, and the associated
usability questions such as are concepts well- materials and settings (tools and content of the in-
explained, buttons well-placed, and processes structional unit). Additional value is placed on the
well-described. Throughout the work on our appearance of a structured sequence that maps the
particular project, these larger usability questions learning activity and the sufficient support through
moved from the background to the foreground. proper tools and content resources. Quality in this
IMS-LD and its graphical editors in their cur- level is measured by the compliance to the XML
rent stage are not sufficient to support IMS-LD structure and whether the design produces well-
becoming mainstream and becoming usable for formed XML. Through its orientation on XML
instructors or instructional designers. Much lit- compliance, this level is very technically oriented
erature and debate on learning design are still too and does not address pedagogical or instructional
technical for the layperson to understand and are quality issues. Most papers, which address the
lacking a connection to the every-day practices quality of IMS-LD, address this particular level
of designers and instructors. (see for an example Berlanga & Garcia, 2005).

Best Approaches to Model

FOUR-LAYER MODEL OF DESIGN a Certain Activity

Apparent throughout the modeling exercise and the Compliance with the IMS-LD data structure (as
issues addressed in our synthesis, the pedagogical measured in layer 1) does not guarantee the most
neutrality of IMS-LD adds a layer of complexity appropriate breakdown of the unit of learning into
and leaves questions which need to be adequately components that make stronger sense than oth-
addressed. Of particular importance is the question ers. Since everybody in our team was modeling
of the quality of the learning design as modeled components and even the same unit of learning,
by IMS-LD. In this last part of this chapter, we the question emerged: What determines the better
argue for a four-layered model of quality assur- model? Not only could the same activities be mod-
ance when utilizing IMS-LD. This four-layer eled differently, some models use more extensively
model includes pedagogical and instructional bridge components or nested activity structures, in
criteria not addressed by IMS-LD, but essential which activities are embedded in other activities.
for the quality of the learning objects and designs Some modeling solutions of the same activity in
it produces. As can be seen in Figure 6, the four our visual editor became easier to communicate

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 Modeling Learning Units by Capturing Context with IMS LD

Figure 6. Four layers of quality in modeling learning context with IMS-LD

or were more elegant or minimalist in their ap- elements in the learning design are in the spot-
proach. From this level forward, the IMS-LD light either for being vaguely planned or lacking
model should become a communicative device in information on how they were implemented.
that facilitates the process of clarification between Any ambiguities in the process of validation raise
different instructional designers or teachers. additional questions of whether the language is
precise enough or whether the process of design
Accuracy of the Model needs to be more detailed.

Going beyond the compliance with IMS-LD Implementation and Compliance

standard specifications (layer 1) and the question
of the most appropriate way of representing the Since IMS-LD is pedagogically neutral, there is
same learning design (layer 2), the design has no place to discuss the appropriateness of certain
to be verified against the initial description of design choices to the learning process within the
the activities, the interaction of learners, and the IMS-LD model. For sharing instructional design
lesson plan. The actions of learners and teachers, and learning design models to guide reuse and
the interaction between activities and roles, and inform practice, information on the design ra-
the material and resources of the model have tionale in light of appropriate learning theories
to be checked to determine whether they are a and models requires sufficient space. This can be
true representation of what was happening in a captured by either including aspects of the design
classroom or if the model matches the narrative process in the learning design model itself (i.e.,
plans for a particular learning unit. At this level, a teacher planning activity component) or by

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Modeling Learning Units by Capturing Context with IMS LD

supplementing the design with links to theoretical and urge that more research and design needs to
or evidence-based research literature. be conducted not only to (a) mainstream the use
of IMS-LD and related visual instructional design
languages, but also (b) to mainstream the debate on
FUTURE TRENDS appropriate and best instructional design practices.

Our proposed four-layered model integrates IMS-LD

within the larger context of instructional design and ACKNOWLEDGMENT
introduces pedagogically sound design back into a
standard, which was designed and proclaimed to be This project was funded by Industry Canada
pedagogically neutral. Many questions we raised through a contract with Cogigraph Inc. The Con-
concerning the complexity of instructional design cordia team thanks Karin Lundgren-Cayrol, Olga
and the intersection with IMS-LD would suggest Marino, Gilbert Paquette, and Michel Léonard
that IMS-LD’s claim of pedagogical neutrality is from TÉLUQ–L’université à distance de l’UQÀM,
difficult to uphold. Inevitably, when designing mod- Montreal. Thank you to Marie-Claude Lavoie for
els in IMS-LD, pedagogies find their form, but do her contribution to the models.
not yet find a space to be labeled or reflected upon.
While IMS-LD does support different models of
instructional design, the process of evaluation and REFERENCES
sound learning design is not equally supported in
the design of units of learning. While IMS-LD as a Bailey, C., Zalfan, M. T., Davis, H. C., Fill, K., &
technical standard to model learning activities might Conole, G. (2006). Panning for gold: Designing
be mature, the tools available and the standardized pedagogically-inspired learning nuggets. Edu-
language are far from being usable at an end-user cational Technology & Society, 9(1), 113–122.
level, especially for teachers. More research is nec- Berlanga, A., & Garcia, F. (2005). IMS LD reusable
essary to investigate designers’ use of IMS-LD and elements for adaptive learning designs. Journal of
different training strategies to further support IMS- Interactive Media in Education, 11, 1–16.
LD becoming a mainstream application.
Bloom, B. S. (1956). Taxonomy of educational
objectives (Handbook I: The Cognitive Domain).
CONCLUSION New York: David McKay Co Inc.
Botturi, L. (2005). Visual languages for instruc-
In this chapter, we described the process of model-
tional design: An evaluation of the perception of
ing different theoretical and best-practices learning
E2ML. Journal of Interactive Learning Research,
designs into IMS-LD, a standardized modeling lan-
16(4), 329–351.
guage. We reflected on the conceptual and practical
difficulties that arise when modeling with IMS-LD, de Filho Moura, C. O., & Derycke, A. (2005, Sep-
especially the question of granularity and necessary tember 22-23). Pedagogical patterns and learning
and sufficient elements of design. We proposed a design: When two worlds cooperate. In R. Koper,
four-layer model to ensure the quality of the modeling C. Tattersall, & D. Burgos (Eds.), Current State on
process and as a necessary step towards a “holistic” IMS Learning Design: Proceedings of the UNFOLD/
consideration and integration of the design process. Prolearn Joint Workshop, Valkenburg. Heerlen:
Finally, we raised the question of usability and Open University of The Netherlands. RetrievedApril
end-user friendliness of the IMS-LD specification 6, 2008, from http://dspace.ou.nl/handle/1820/474

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Derntl, M. (2005). Patterns for person-centered e- Russell, B. (2003). Learning objects: Weapons of
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1013.2003.00359.x
Gibbons, A. S., & Brewer, E. K. (2005). Elemen-
tary principles of design languages and design Tattersall, C., & Koper, R. (2003). EML and IMS
notation systems for instructional design. In J. M. Learning Design: From LO to LA Educational
Spector, C. Ohrazda, A. Van Schaack, & D. Wiley Technology Expertise Centre. The Open Univer-
(Eds.), Innovations to instructional technology: sity of the Netherlands.
Essays in honor of M. David Merrill (pp. 111-
Van Rosmalen, P., Vogten, H., Van Es, R., Passier,
129). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
H., Poelmans, P., & Koper, R. (2006). Authoring a
Global, I. M. S. (2003). IMS Learning Design best full life cycle model in standards-based, adaptive
practice and implementation guide. Retrieved e-learning. Educational Technology & Society,
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learningdesign/ldv1p0/imsld_bestv1p0.html
Wiley, D. A., Gibbons, A. S., & Recker, M. M.
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Jonassen, D. H., & Churchill, D. (2004). Is there
a learning orientation in learning objects? Inter-
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Jonassen, D. H., & Land, S. L. (2000). Theoretical
foundations of learning environments. Mahwah, Boundaries of Design: Refers to the scope of
NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. the design model and which borders are drawn.
Nodenot, T. (2006) Towards Pedagogically Granularity: Refers to the definition of size
Neutral EML Making Use of De-Contextualized of a learning object. There is a distinction between
Learning Objects: Myth or Reality? in: Proceed- delivery-centric and holistic granularity. Delivery-
ings of the Sixth IEEE International Conference centric granularity is structurally oriented on a
on Advanced Learning Technologies (ICALT), course (activities, assessment). Holistic granu-
pp. 1028-1030. larity is focused on the embedded instructional
design in every object and not just in the role the
Paquette, G., Léonard, M., Lundgren-Cayrol, object plays within a course structure.
K., Mihaila, S., & Gareau, D. (2006, January). IMS-LD: An XML-based language for speci-
Learning design based on graphical knowledge- fying learning content and processes.
modeling [Special issue on learning design]. learning design: The entirety of design that is
Journal of Educational Technology & Society, invested to create a learning environment, includ-
9(1), 97–112. ing material design, media design, instructional
Reigeluth, C. M. (Ed.). (1999). Instructional- design, and activity and assessment design.
design theories and models: A new paradigm Nugget: Refers to small stand-alone learning
of instructional theory. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence objects, which can be combined with others to
Erlbaum Associates. build larger units.

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Modeling Learning Units by Capturing Context with IMS LD

Syntax of Design: In this chapter, the syntax that let instructional designers represent their
of the design refers to IMS-LD specifications as instructional design visually. VIDLs are often com-
implemented in the XML structure. Compliance pared to blue prints of buildings or architectural
with the XML specifications is one step of the drawings. Examples are the Educational Environ-
proposed four-layer model. ment Modeling Language (E2ML) or IMS-LD.
Visual Instructional Design Languages
(VIDLs): Visual languages or notation systems

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Learning Design and Learning Objects: Issues, Applications,
and Technologies, edited by Lori Lockyer, Sue Bennett, Shirley Agostinho and Barry Harper, pp. 352-372, copyright 2009 by
Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 Section IV
Utilization and Application

This section discusses a variety of applications and opportunities available that can be considered by practitioners
in developing viable and effective instructional design programs and processes. This section includes over 30
chapters which review certain utilizations and applications of instructional design, such as Internet citizenship and
expanded access for the visual and auditory impaired. Further chapters show case studies in Africa and Australia,
and the impact of globalization and standardizing languages for instructional design. The wide ranging nature of
subject matter in this section manages to be both intriguing and highly educational.
 809

Chapter 4.1
Wireless Computer Labs
Lawrence A. Tomei
Robert Morris University, USA

INTRODUCTION grammed for yet another much-needed computer

facility and renovations to available space were
In February 2000, three seemingly unrelated events cost-prohibitive.
came together to present a unique challenge at To meet the demands for more technology
one mid-Atlantic university—a challenge that resources, a new multimedia classroom was
is being experienced more and more by colleges proposed. Estimated to cost over $200,000, the
and universities across the country. proposal was rejected by senior administrators due
First, the faculty approved a new undergraduate to budgetary considerations. It was clear that to
teacher preparation curriculum that would include resolve this dilemma, the program director needed
instructional technology in both the first two se- to think “outside the box”.
mesters of the freshman year and three semesters Enter the wireless lab. With 29 multimedia-
in their junior and senior years—12 new sections ready classroom and student computer labs already
of technology-based training. Second, a graduate on campus, weaknesses in pedagogy had been
degree in instructional technology was growing recognized for years. Increasingly, labs contain
beyond even its most optimistic predictions. In outdated hardware and software. The inflexibility
less than four semesters, enrollment increased of scheduling, location, and access to desktop
from 24 to 140 students. Third, funds, staffing capabilities made computer labs unattractive to
support, and classroom space had not been pro- many faculty members. And the cost! For the
price of a single multimedia-ready classroom, a
department can purchase 3-4 portable wireless
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch401

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Wireless Computer Labs

labs, incorporating the power of technology with using instructional technology in the classroom
the more traditional classroom. Wireless carts and was previously taught without technology due
can be rolled into classrooms, making scheduling to space and access considerations. The wireless
conflicts a thing of the past. CDROM, printers, and lab allows students to simulate online quizzes,
overhead projectors can be appended to the cart download test banks, and demonstrate educational
with little hassle. And, perhaps most important, software. The flexibility provided by the wireless
with the deployment of a wireless access point, lab made all the difference in student understand-
only one network connection is required to make ing of the material while providing them the ability
all 24 computers Internet-ready. to work at their own pace.
The wireless lab was identified as the most Two other non-technical courses, Social Stud-
promising technology to address these issues. It ies Methods and Elementary School Administra-
enables an entire class to be online at the same tion, advanced the practical applications of the
time—simultaneously surfing different Wweb wireless lab. Two faculty members needed online
sites, accessing e-mail, creating documents, and access at the same time, so another innovation
swapping files through a single Internet connec- was initiated in the school. The wireless lab was
tion. It seems the perfect cost-effective solution divided into two to serve both classes simultane-
for schools with limited budgets and facilities at ously. Faculty simply rolled the cart into the third
capacity or those who simply want a more flexible floor hallway, distributed 14 machines to one class
networking solution. The specific advantages of and 10 machines to the other—and both classes
a wireless lab are best represented by examining were up and running within minutes.
how it was integrated into six university courses Even more flexibility was demonstrated in the
and programs. Behavioral Disorders course for special education
The university’s Introduction to Educational teachers. Providing a current overview of the field
Technology course is similar to many such of education for persons with serious emotional
first-year familiarization courses. It provides an disturbances, research is paramount as students
introduction to the various classroom technolo- explore diagnosis, assessment, treatment, inter-
gies. Students use the wireless lab to master the vention, and prevention strategies. The course
complete set of basic skills and competencies validated on-demand technology in the classroom.
required before entering the masters program. The wireless lab was used several times during
Using the laptops, students are introduced to word the semester when the class explored factors
processing, spreadsheets, graphics presentation, contributing to behavioral classroom disorders.
and the Internet. The lab offers students more op- The instructor was not always able to plan exactly
portunities for both abstract and concrete, practical when the research phase of each topic would
hands-on experiences. Using wireless labs frees the begin; as a result, scheduling was haphazard and
multimedia facility for more classroom-centered conflicts were common. Using the wireless lab
teaching (and technology-intensive applications) as an on-demand technology resource created the
while offering the complete suite of software, flexibility to re-locate the cart to any classroom
hardware, and network concepts demanded of equipped with a single network connection. Theory
the graduate program in technology. One anec- and “book learning” were the previous means of
dotal comment lifted from a student’s evaluation exploring these topics. With the introduction of
claimed, “When then instructor rolled in that the wireless lab, students were able to conduct
wireless lab, learning really took off.” both individual and group discovery learning
A companion course, Assessment of Instruc- exercises. Initial feedback from students was
tional Technology, evaluates “best practices” for extremely positive, some even claiming that the

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Wireless Computer Labs

portable computers helped them understand the Keeping Laptops Safe

practical side of special education.
A special program for preparing school district Most student desks do not provide adequate space
superintendents found the wireless lab a perfect for a laptop which can lead to accidents. Security
tool for introducing senior administrators to laptop, can also be an issue with laptop computers; their
wireless technology. The lab was brought into size makes them easy targets to slip one out of
their seminar room and, together, the participants the classroom undetected. In fact, a recent theft
explored the Internet locating information perti- from one middle school computer lab reduced
nent to school board issues, budget and funding the number of laptops from 51 to 32 in one week-
school districts, in-service training programs for end incident. Most schools will lock down their
their teachers, computer purchases, student safety carts when not in use and store them in a secure
issues, and so forth. Practicing administrators location. Often theft is reduced by the demand
found a resource suitable for small group learn- for laptops to recharge after each extended use,
ing situations, from 3-5 student seminar rooms making them tied to a power source that is often
with an overhead projection system and printing dedicated only to the cart and contained within a
capability suitable for classroom discussion. The secure area. Laptops are most vulnerable at the
wireless lab was equally effective in this small end of a class period when instructors as well as
seminar room environment. The portable laptops students are moving quickly to their next class.
permitted the instructor to break down the class After school opportunities for theft are also nu-
into focus groups, with each group using the merous. A balance must be maintained with the
computers to access information particular to their flexibility of laptops, the convenience of wireless
assigned topic. Participant comments included: carts, and the vulnerability of both to pilfering. It
“The wireless lab was absolutely wonderful. takes a diligent teacher to keep laptops from being
Convenience and practicality are just two words broken, vandalized, or stolen outright.
to describe this innovation. I would love to have
this in our schools.” (Assistant Superintendent Maintenance Issues
of Schools, Pittsburgh). Here’s another, “…very
innovative approach in linking us to technology to The most time-consuming maintenance task
work together as a team on a grant proposal as we associated with computer labs of any kind is up-
were circled about each at one table. I found that dating software and removing viruses. Although,
the lab provided us convenience (never leaving theoretically, wireless laptops can be updated in
our classroom), accessibility to the Internet, better their cart, often the wireless network bandwidth
communication in working as a team, and personal has not been sufficient to allow the simultaneous
instruction” (Director, Special Education). updates. Although the technology is advancing
geometrically, most schools must connect their
laptops to a local area network in an existing
ISSUES computer lab to appreciate the much higher data
transfer speed (100MB) needed to complete these
Of course, with any technology, serious debates tasks in a reasonable time frame. Another solution
are needed to ensure the appropriate application to this problem is to reconfigure the laptops to use
of the technology for teaching and learning, so, Ethernet for updates, or individually update each
too with wireless labs. Here are some particularly laptop, both of which are time-intensive processes.
poignant concerns for consider.

811
 Wireless Computer Labs

Response Issues new knowledge, collaborate with their peers and

instructors, and provide feedback quickly. In
As mentioned earlier, the technology is moving libraries, they conduct their own research and in
rapidly; however, for most educational environ- physical education courses, they track their fitness
ments, wireless protocols continue to present progress. Carts that contain multiple laptops also
problems, especially in technology-intensive come in handy for faculty in-service and admin-
courses. For instance, 30 laptops accessing the istrative meetings.
access point simultaneously inevitably results in Another benefit of wireless is its ease and
dropped connections or extremely slow transfer speed of installation. Because it is so easy to in-
rates. Slow response rates are also a particular corporate wireless within an existing hard-wired
problem at the end of class when students clamor infrastructure, many schools use it as a backup or
to save their work to the server or when the an extension of their wired local or wide-area net-
instructor leads students through a step-by-step work. If fibers are cut, for example, a quick switch
example. Since the wireless lab is being used in to the wireless network maintains uninterrupted
the classroom, an educational technician is not connectivity. Handheld devices, which many
usually available resulting in frustrated teachers schools are just beginning to use, also integrate
and irate students. A nearby technician ready to easily into a wireless network. From a technical
troubleshoot (or at least recognize and explain) perspective, wireless provides an environment
these issues encourages wider use of mobile labs. where solutions are otherwise not feasible.
Wireless is also an excellent choice for schools
Flexibility and Savings with small classrooms that lack space for station-
ary computers or schools that were built in the era
Although continuously improving, wireless still of brick and mortar where drilling for hard-wire
lags behind hard-wired connections in terms connectivity is cost-prohibited. Wireless carts can
of speed. However, its tremendous flexibility be secured on adjacent locations when not in use,
proves attractive to many school systems. Wire- leaving room for other teaching activities. Further,
less networking removes barriers to school-wide when schools outgrow their facilities and revert
network access and provides more flexibility to temporary classrooms and administrative of-
when designing new school systems and their fices, wireless is the quickest (and least expensive)
desired learning environments with respect to way to provide connectivity. Most institutions
effective technology-oriented learning space lay- have integrated wireless connections into their
outs. Teachers with access to wireless technology long-term strategic plans. While wireless is not
use them much more frequently. When teachers necessarily less expensive than wired connectiv-
can simply roll a cart into a room, plug it into an ity, it is becoming more competitive as schools,
electrical outlet, connect it to a data drop, and pass companies, even cities are opting for this more
out computers to each student, the wireless carts flexible networking environment. Most find that
become an integral part of the daily curriculum. they can quickly recoup any initial investment
The speed of wireless is typically adequate for expenses because of the efficiency of the hardware.
classroom activities (even in higher education) Instead of hard-wired computers sitting idle in
because the communication between the access unoccupied classrooms, a cart of laptops is apt
point and the laptop is minimal. Using wireless to be in constant use as it travels throughout the
laptops, teachers, students, and administrators are educational building.
connected to anywhere and anyone on campus.
In the classroom, students can experiment with

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Wireless Computer Labs

Designing Through the Technology Planning for Technology

The designs of educational facilities are chang- Architects and engineers design buildings and then
ing in response to the increased sophistication consider technology—at least that is how build-
of teaching, learning, and administration. Some ings were planned. With the emphasis and weight
applications require larger classrooms to accom- placed on today’s instructional technology, build-
modate technology. For example, projectors that ings are now designed around specific educational
display data from the teacher’s console take up needs. Engineers integrate conduits for networking
more room than monitors. On the other hand, and communications cabling. Architects are asked
wireless laptops take up much less room than fixed to consider classroom size and width of hallways
machines. Power requirements have increased with technology in mind. And, proper design of
dramatically and air conditioners have increased wireless systems ensures available connectivity
in size because of the tremendous heat generated to cable networks and antennas. The continuing
by the technology, but not so for wireless laptops. rapid changes in technology make planning ahead
A new computer lab once required planning for a true challenge. Many institutions plan 5 to 10
electricity as well as connectivity; with laptops, a years into the future. With technology, that is
dedicated circuit to handle recharging of a cart-full oftentimes impossible. Again, the use of wireless
of computers is all that is necessary. technology contributes to successful long-range
Current and future technology needs demand planning and simplifies upgrades and renovations
careful planning for renovations and new build- along the way. Whether hard-wired or wireless,
ings. Technology can enhance learning and re- institutions can translate student learning needs
lated academic and administrative work only if into functional designs by involving users (e.g.,
it is accessible. Architectural structures designed students, faculty, administrators, and others) dur-
initially with aesthetics in mind may serve a dual ing their engineering, architecture and technology
purpose as ports that accept wireless signals. planning, strategic planning efforts, and facility
The location of data drops is another important upgrade requirements.
consideration. Placed too close to a cabinet or in
some out-of-the-way place and connectivity is
impeded. In wiring a whole new building, current ADVANTAGES/STRENGTHS
thinking is that antennas should not be installed
in classrooms but in hallways so they can cover In the journal, From Now On, author Jamie
the rooms on both sides of the building. For both McKenzie summarizes why wireless networks
hard-wired and wireless applications, schools must utilizing mobile computers have become the media
work closely with architects and engineers in the of choice preferable to the desktop machines in
design of wiring schemes for buildings. All new classrooms and computer labs and, by so doing,
or updated buildings should consider wireless offers readers a list of the key strengths of wire-
networks or, at the very minimum, a combina- less technology (McKenzie, 2001):
tion of hard-wired and wireless infrastructure.
Such environments promotes learning areas that • Ease of Movement: Stand-alone laptops
extend outside the traditional classroom into the are readily moved to any location within a
cafeteria, hallways, student and faculty lounge building without considerations that make
areas, video presentation rooms, and technology desktop machines seem so inflexible.
learning centers. Wiring, electricity, lighting, special furni-
ture, and so forth are non-factors when us-

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 Wireless Computer Labs

ing laptops in a wireless environment. On plications of wireless, the time has come
the down side, battery life remains a strong where the technology itself is becoming
consideration for classes conducted in sev- secondary to the undertaking of learning.
eral-hour blocks of time. Also, connectiv- • Simplicity: The simplicity, comfort, and
ity to other technology resources (backups, reliability of wireless laptops promote a
printers, etc.) also restricts laptop usage. focus on learning rather than the technol-
• Strategic Deployment: Wireless devices ogy. Simple as that.
are deployed on rolling carts (in the case
of laptops) or in a pocket (in the case of
handheld devices). They go where they CONCLUSION
are needed most, creating unique learning
opportunities that traditional methods of Wireless access has become the environment of
placing hard-wired computers throughout choice for educators, corporate trainers, tech-
a school do not provide and are just now savvy entrepreneur, and the ordinary business
being realized by instructors. traveler. In addition to laptop computers, cell
• Flexibility: Wireless laptops are easily phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), two-
re-configurable to changing conditions, way pagers, and other compact gadgets all use the
teaching styles, and learner experiences as same wireless technology that makes hard-wired
well as team, group, or individual prefer- computer labs a technology on its way out.
ences. Wireless laptops place no additional Wireless-enabled laptops make it possible for
demands on furniture or space. students to use their time more efficiently, access
• Cleanliness: Consider how computer labs databases and information from the Internet, and
looked in the past. Cables and electrical work collaboratively. Using conferencing software
cords introduced numerous tripping haz- and portable laptops, learners are able not only
ards, monitors, desktops, keyboards, mice, to electronically store documents and data and
printers, and speakers all presented clutter retrieve them instantaneously, but also to success-
and confusion. The elimination of cables, fully engage in document sharing and collabora-
wires, and peripherals not only removes tive writing from various locations on and off a
many of these hazards but opens the room campus environment. With the implementation of
to better utilization of space for instruction. more flexible learning approaches, they succeed in
• Low Profile: Unlike desktops, students are selectively incorporating critical input from peers
not prone to hide behind large monitors. and instructors, then revise documents based on
The low profile of wireless laptops allows their own interpretation of facts and theory.
better two-way communications and feed- Continuous improvements in wireless tech-
back between instructors and students. nologies will only serve to advance new peda-
• Convenience: Wireless laptops are easily gogical practices that take advantage of the full
stowed in specially-made carts that make range of educational psychologies. Such learning
them more likely to be used. A disadvan- practices incorporate higher-order skills like
tage for some instructors is the unwieldy problem-solving, reasoning, and reflection. The
size and weight of a fully-loaded cart. integration of mobile learning environments and
However, pre-positioning of a wireless lab wireless computing also has implications for
reduces lost classroom time for setup and many other educational venues such as business
simplified technology demands on the part schools, science programs, corporate training,
of instructors and students. For most ap-

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Wireless Computer Labs

medical nursing schools (including nursing), and Lightbody, K. (2001, February). Wireless network-
law schools. ing in schools. Retrieved March 2, 2007, from
In summary, the advantages of wireless com- www.zardec.net.au/keith/wireless.htm
puting include education are its breadth of scope,
McKenzie, J. (2001, January). The unwired
prolific portability, and broad applicability for both
classroom, wireless computers come of age. From
individualized and collaborative learning projects.
Now On, The EducationalTechnology Journal.
Access extends to home, office, classroom, leisure,
Retrieved March 2, 2007, from http://www.fno.
airports—virtually everywhere and all the time,
org/jan01/wireless.html
providing the means to integrate computers into
every aspect of teaching, learning, and research. Meru Networks. (2005). Wireless LANs in higher
Certainly, wireless labs have proven them- education. Retrieved March 2, 2007, from www.
selves highly adaptable to both the personal merunetworks.com/pdf/WLANS_in_HiEd_
teaching styles of classroom instructors and the WP5-0705.pdf
learning strategies of traditional and adult students.
Nair, P. (2002, October). The role of wireless
There are few inherent weaknesses in laptop ca-
computing technology in the design of schools.
pability compared to similarly-equipped desktop
National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities.
computers. Plus, they have added advantages and
Retrieved March 2, 2007, from www.edfacilities.
flexibility only laptop computers provide. They
org/pubs/wirelessII.pdf
seem to support all aspects of teaching and learn-
ing, including abstract values and concrete ideas; Rogers, G. S., & Edwards, J. S. (2003, January).
behavioral, cognitive, and humanistic psycholo- Introduction to wireless technology. NJ: Prentice
gies of teaching and learning; and, all levels of Hall.
human development from elementary through
post-graduate doctoral students.
For considerably less than a multimedia class-
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
room, the wireless lab provides an appropriate
venue for teaching at the college/university level.
IEEE 802.11 Wireless Standard: 802.11 is
With the power and flexibility of today’s laptops
the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics
and the requisite pedagogy on which to base teach-
Engineers) standard for wireless networking—
ing with technology appearing more often in the
sending Ethernet data packets through the air.
research, schools should at least consider the wire-
The standard allows for wireless integration with
less lab for their next technology enhancement.
wired Ethernet networks using devices called ac-
cess points or base stations. IEEE 802.11 wireless
standard supports all standard Ethernet network
REFERENCES
protocols including TCP/IP, AppleTalk, NetBEUI,
and IPX.
Carlson, S. (2000, October 11). Universities find
Access Points: An access point or base station
wireless systems bring them convenience and
is a radio receiver and transmitter that connect
savings. The Chronicle of Higher Education.
to a wired Ethernet network. Through these de-
Retrieved March 2, 2007, from chronicle.com/
vices, wireless nodes such as desktop computers,
free/2000/10/2000101101t.htm
notebooks, and laptop computers equipped with
wireless network cards, have access to wired local
area network services such as e-mail, the Web,

815
 Wireless Computer Labs

printers, and more. Operating range, manage- generally contained within a single room, a single
ment capabilities, wireless network security, and building, or perhaps a small cluster of buildings.
number of users supported are determined by the Operating Range: Factors that affect the op-
capabilities of the access point. erating range of any wireless device include the
Broadband: Faster than modems but slower strength of the access point, the number of walls
than Ethernet, several different forms of broadband inside a building, the construction materials used
access are available from local Internet service within a building (concrete vs. steel vs. wood),
providers, phone companies, and cable providers. and the data transmission speed. Most access
The most common forms of broadband are DSL, point manufacturers offer enhanced antennas for
ISDN, and cable modems. DSL and ISDN use increased range. Manufacturers recommend that
special adapters to send data over your telephone access points be deployed 150ft. (50m) apart to
line without tying it up. Cable modems send data ensure full coverage and maximum data through-
over your cable TV connection. DSL and ISDN put rates for roaming computer users.
availability is limited based on geographic location Soft Access Point: As an alternative to de-
and telephone line quality. Cable modem avail- ploying an access point for wireless connectivity
ability varies with each cable company. to a wired Ethernet network, a computer that is
Data Transmission Modes And Throughput: physically connected to an Ethernet network,
There are two modes, encapsulation and transla- outfitted with a wireless network card, and run-
tion, for transmitting data over a wireless network. ning a software routing solution, can act as the
Encapsulation mode encloses the 802.3 Ethernet gateway between the wired network and the
packets inside 802.11 frames for transmission wireless network.
through the air, where as translation mode converts Wireless: Wireless networks currently operate
802.3 Ethernet packets into 802.11 packets for at speeds up to 11 megabits per second in both
transmission. Recently translation has emerged as indoor and outdoor locations. A great convenience
the defacto standard, but support for encapsulation for mobile computer users, wireless does have
as well ensures maximum flexibility in networks some drawbacks. Because it uses radio waves to
where both addressing modes may be used. transmit data, wireless networking is inherently
Ethernet: The standard individual connection insecure. Also, the bandwidth within each cover-
for many offices, classrooms, labs, and residence age area is shared between all users on that “cell”.
hall rooms as well as corporate office and training Wireless Management and Security: Certain
environments and complexes. Ethernet operates wireless client solutions provide utilities to moni-
at speeds up to 10 megabits per second, is avail- tor the strength of the signal and data throughput
able 24 hours a day, and does not require a phone speeds and provide computing users real-time
line. Fast Ethernet connections that operate at 100 network statistics. Additional wireless network
megabits per second are available but usually management capabilities are incorporated into
reserved for server applications. the access point and depend on the manufacturer
Local Area Network: The term local area net- and model.
work is usually defined by its size; it is small and

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Technology Curriculum Integration, edited by Lawrence
A. Tomei, pp. 983-989, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.2
Personalised Learning:
A Case Study in Teaching Clinical
Educators Instructional Design Skills

Iain Doherty
University of Auckland, New Zealand

Adam Blake
University of Auckland, New Zealand

ABSTRACT numbers; with this in mind the authors discuss

the implications of their pedagogical approach for
The authors consider personalised learning in those educators involved in teaching larger classes.
the context of delivering a specialist postgradu- They conclude their paper with a discussion of
ate course – ClinEd 711, ELearning and Clinical the role of the educator in personalised learning.
Education – at the Faculty of Medical and Health
Sciences, University of Auckland. They describe
the pedagogical theory underlying the course INTRODUCTION
design and their experience of delivering ClinEd
711 with particular reference to the personalised The Learning Technology Unit (http://www.fmhs.
learning process that the course design facilitated. auckland.ac.nz/faculty/ltu/) and the Centre for
They present their research results for the student Medical & Health Sciences Education (http://
experience of ClinEd 711 and discuss changes www.fmhs.auckland.ac.nz/faculty/cmhse/default.
made to the course as a result of student feed- aspx) at the Faculty of Medical and Health Scienc-
back. They make reference to the introduction es, University of Auckland jointly offer a fifteen
of student-led modules to further personalise the week course – ELearning and Clinical Education
students’ learning experience. ClinEd 711 is a (ClinEd 711) – as part of a clinical education post-
specialist postgraduate course with low student graduate degree program. The overall objective
of ClinEd 711 is to bring the learners – who are
typically educators in the field of medical and
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch402

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Personalised Learning

health sciences – to the point of understanding sizes. We conclude our chapter by discussing the
themselves as instructional designers capable of relationship between the role of the educator and
converting one of their traditional face-to-face the independence of the student in a personalised
courses for flexible/distance delivery. ClinEd 711 learning environment before briefly considering
was offered for the first time in Semester 1, 2007 future research directions.
as a fully online distance education course. The
course was offered for a second time in Semester
1, 2008 and at the time of writing (March 2009) PERSONALISED LEARNING
the course is being offered for a third time. From
the outset, ClinEd 711 was designed to locate A key characteristic of personalised learning is
the student at the centre of the learning process that the student is located at the centre of the
in order to provide students with a personalised learning process. Personalised learning meets the
learning experience. However, as a result of feed- individual learning needs of a diverse range of
back from students and after critical analysis of students whilst encouraging independent learning
the first iteration of the course, ClinEd 711 was (Johnson, 2004) through learners taking greater
re-designed to create an even more personalised responsibility for their own learning and through
learning environment. This was achieved through learners being more actively engaged in the
the introduction of student-led modules in which learning process (Hannafin & Land, 1997; Ong
the students had to take responsibility for the cre- & Hawryszkiewycz, 2003). It is the design of a
ation and delivery of a particular course module particular type of learning environment “shaped
to be “studied” by their peers. by its foundations and assumptions about learn-
In this chapter we: outline our understanding ing, pedagogy and the learner” that provides the
of personalised learning; detail the research ap- conditions for personalised learning (Hannafin
proach that we took in designing and evaluating & Land, 1997, p. 197). For example, teachers
ClinEd 711; explain how the course was designed can facilitate personalised learning by adopting
to situate the learner at the centre of the learning teaching strategies that meet the needs, abilities
process; describe the personalised learning pro- and aptitudes of each student thereby providing
cesses that the approach facilitated; outline the for an individual learning pathway (Sun & Wil-
differences between the first and second iteration liams, 2004). This can be achieved through shifting
of the course; and provide the reasoning behind the responsibility from the teacher to the student for
changes that were made for the second iteration discovering, organising, analysing and synthesis-
of the course. Our chapter will make particular ing content (Brush & Saye, 2000; Downes, 2005).
reference to the student-led modules that were Such strategies can maximise student motivation
introduced in the second iteration of the course, and attainment so that students realise their full
as the rationale for this innovation was to provide potential (Johnson, 2004). However, the role of
students with greater learning autonomy and with the educator remains crucial if students are to
greater responsibility for their learning outcomes. succeed (Hannafin & Land, 1997) with the edu-
As we shall see, these are two of the central fea- cator fulfilling the necessary roles of facilitator
tures of personalised learning. We are aware that and mentor (Johnson, 2004; McLoughlin & Lee,
ClinED 711 is a specialist postgraduate course 2007; Ong & Hawryszkiewycz, 2003).
with a relatively low number of student enrol- In cases where class sizes are large with lec-
ments and with this fact in mind we will discuss turers often being “time-poor” (Goodyear, 2005,
the potential challenges of offering this particu- p. 2), it has been said that personalised learning
lar form of personalised learning to larger class must necessarily be about offering students learn-

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ing choices within the framework of a particular their learning and in terms of marking assessed
curriculum or course (Johnson, 2004). In practice work. We will discuss both of these challenges
this means providing a teaching framework that in this chapter. We will also discuss the extent to
offers a solution to the problem of teaching to a which the learning design implemented for ClinEd
large group of students whilst also meeting the 711 might be “scaled up” and implemented on a
diverse learning needs of each particular student course with much larger student numbers. This
so that learners, “are actively engaged in the learn- will involve us in critically considering how
ing experience with their preferred content” (Sun to provide a standard teaching framework that
& Williams, 2004, p. 2). The Harvard University provides a solution to the problem of offering a
virtual world project “River City” – a project to personalised learning environment when student
teach school aged children science – provides an numbers are large.
excellent example of a development that seeks It should not be thought that our conception of
to achieve a balance between providing a stan- personalised learning is synonymous with “indi-
dard framework for learning whilst also offering vidual” learning. Rather, interactional theories of
learners individual choice in order to cater to cognitive development (Bruner, 2006; Vygotsky,
diverse student abilities (Clarke, Dede, Ketelhut, 1978) posit that the social dimension of learning
& Nelson, 2006). In “River City” this balance is crucial in pedagogical terms so that students are
is achieved through providing standardised exposed to a variety of opinions and perspectives
features in the virtual world whilst also offering that will challenge and inform their own perspec-
customisable features within the environment. tives (Hannafin & Land, 1997; McLoughlin & Lee,
For example, “River City” has an individualised 2007). Thus, students might work cooperatively
guidance system in which student activities are so that their learning is “participatory and social”
logged in a database. The database maintains a (McLoughlin & Lee, 2007, p. 664) whilst retain-
personalised history of the activities undertaken ing choice concerning their learning content, their
by each student with levels of guidance in the preferred learning style and their use of particular
form of “hints” being offered for each individual types of social software for communication and
student in terms of the student history of interaction collaboration (McLoughlin & Lee, 2007). Stu-
in “River City”. This – along with other design dents can also be offered flexibility concerning
features – has enabled the creators of “River City” where and when they learn. ClinEd 711 is very
to offer an educational innovation that meets the firmly rooted in a social constructivist pedagogical
diverse needs of learners and educators. framework. Again, despite relatively low student
ClinEd 711 is a specialist postgraduate course numbers, managing the ‘social’ component of the
and the number of students enrolling has been learning process led to distinct challenges that will
relatively low. We did not, therefore, have to deal be discussed in this chapter.
with the challenge of providing personalised learn-
ing opportunities to a large numbers of students.
Even so, we found that it was challenging to create BACKGROUND
and manage a learning environment that allowed
learners to engage in the learning experience in We deemed design research to be an appropriate
terms of a project of their own choosing and with research methodology for our ClinEd 711 re-
their preferred content. Whilst creation of ClinEd search project – particularly when compared with
711 was time consuming, the essential difficulty research approaches grounded in an objectivist
that we faced had to do with the demands placed and scientific methodology (Collins, Joseph, &
on the tutor in terms of supporting students in Bielaczyc, 2004; Reeves, Herrington, & Oliver,

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2005). Whilst design research has had difficulties teaching materials for undergraduate students.
gaining traction in the broader research community In addition, factors at a Faculty and University
(Collins et al., 2004), it is a method that is being ap- level – such as lecturer time to learn new skills
plied successfully and is championed by a number and prepare new content, cultural ethos, pressure
of prominent researchers (Bannan-Ritland, 2003; to engage in discipline research and the question
Clarke et al., 2006; Herrington, Oliver, & Reeves, of incentives for teaching with technologies – all
2002; Kelly, 2003; McKenney, Nieveen, & van potentially impact on whether or not students on
den Akker, 2006; Reeves, 2000, 2006; Reeves ClinEd 711 actually implement what they have
et al., 2005). Our research approach utilised six learned. At the outset, we had a long-term com-
design research tenets as explicated by Reeves, mitment to the ClinED 711 research project with
Herrington, & Oliver (Reeves et al., 2005): the University of Auckland ethics committee ap-
proving the research project for a period of three
1. A focus on broad-based, complex problems years. A long terms commitment to educational
critical to higher education; research is important in order to avoid the mistake
2. The integration of known and hypothetical of conducting an isolated one off study that is of
design principles with technological affor- questionable value in terms of meaningful research
dances to render plausible solutions to these results. The way in which the remaining tenets of
complex problems; the design research approach have been put into
3. Rigorous and reflective inquiry to test and practice will be made evident in the following
refine innovative learning environments as sections as we describe the creation of ClinEd
well as to reveal new design principles; 711 and the revisions that were made in light of
4. Long-term engagement involving continual our teaching experience on the course.
refinement of protocols and questions;
5. Intensive collaboration among researchers
and practitioners, and learning communities; COURSE DESIGN
6. A commitment to theory construction and ex-
planation while solving real-world problems. Both iterations of ClinEd 711 have been based
upon social constructivist theory (Gillani, 2003;
We considered the question of how to engage Mergel, 1998). This pedagogical philosophy
lecturers in a “pedagogically principled way” (Goodyear, 2005, p. 85) “guides learners to
(Burden & Atkinson, 2008, p. 4041) with technolo- conduct and manage their personalised learning
gies for teaching and learning to be a challenge activities and encourage [sic] collaborative and co-
that was sufficiently broad based and complex to operative learning for critical thinking and problem
warrant adopting the design research approach. solving” (Sun & Williams, 2004, p. 2479). At the
We also conceived of the creation of ClinED 711 level of the individual, constructivist theory sug-
as a real world problem. The reasons for coming gests that learning is a search for meaning or sig-
to these conclusions included the fact that the nificance. Students learn in terms of a pre-existing
Medical Faculty is the largest Faculty within the conceptual schema or framework within which
university with five Schools and, potentially, a they ideally fit new knowledge. Constructivism
pool of very diverse students. Teaching with tech- should therefore be understood as a description
nologies is an issue that affects all five Schools of the way in which individuals might go about
because of a demand for delivery of flexible/ their learning rather than as a description of the
distance postgraduate courses and because of a way in which they do in fact go about learning. It
perceived need to produce technology-enhanced is the job of the educator to provide the conditions

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in which constructivist learning might take place. 1983; Mayer, 2003; Paivio, 1986; Spiro,
This is achieved through providing an educational Feltovich, Jacobson, & Coulson, 1995);
framework in which course content and activities • Learning tasks should encourage meta-
might be personally meaningful for the students. At cognitive capabilities and reflective prac-
the social level, interaction with others can serve tice (Bransford et al., 2000; Schön, 1987).
to change an individual’s conceptual structure or
personal interpretation of particular phenomena In line with recommendations for publishing
whilst simultaneously influencing the collective design research as it unfolds, the research basis
interpretation of those phenomena. In the context for implementing these design principles has
of designing a learning environment, educators been reported elsewhere (Blake & Doherty, 2008;
can create experiences that are personalised – that Doherty & Blake, 2007). In this chapter we will be
is individually meaningful, relevant and tailored focussing on those aspects of the learning environ-
as far as possible to a learner’s particular needs – ment that pertain directly to personalised learning
whilst also ensuring that the learning experience and on the challenges of providing personalised
is social thereby exposing individual learners to learning to students.
the perspectives of other learners.
Regarding the second tenet of design research
– the integration of known and hypothetical design COURSE CONTENT AND
principles with technological affordances to render LEARNING PROCESS
plausible solutions to complex problems – ClinEd
711 was designed around six pedagogical prin- The postgraduate degree programme in clinical
ciples with the first principle bearing directly on education within which ClinEd 711 is offered
the constructivist learning philosophy: is aimed at health professionals and academics
(doctors, nurses, pharmacists and others) involved
• Learning should be meaningful for the in clinical teaching. Students might be full time
learner (Ausubel, 1963; Bransford, Brown, academics or they might primarily be clinicians
& Cocking, 2000); with some teaching responsibilities within the
• Learning should be organised around core Faculty. This is an interesting point with respect to
concepts and cognitive flexibility to de- meeting the needs of all learners. Whilst academ-
velop expert rather than novice knowledge ics with some clinical responsibilities will have
(Ausubel, 1963; Bransford et al., 2000; a professional identity defined to a significant
Driscoll, 2005); degree by their teaching, clinicians who teach
• Learning tasks should replicate real only part time are much more likely to have a
world problems in an authentic context professional identity that is defined by their clinical
(Bransford et al., 2000; Lave & Wenger, responsibilities. This point obviously bears upon
1991; Lemke, 1997); offering personalised learning to students since
• Learning should involve the collaborative the course tutors have to be sensitive to the fact
construction of knowledge thereby pro- that some students will not come to ClinED 711
viding learners with multiple perspectives with an understanding of themselves as teachers.
on particular issues and concepts (Bruner, Students participating in the first 2 iterations of
2006; O’Donnell, 2006; Vygotsky, 1978); the course have had the characteristics described
• Learning should employ strategies that ap- in Table 1.
peal to multiple sensory modes and cogni- Whilst student enrolments have been rela-
tive capabilities (Driscoll, 2005; Gardner, tively low, we can see that students on ClinEd

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Table 1. Characteristics of ClinEd 711 students, 2007 and 2008

Field of clinical University of Auckland staff Resident in Auckland?

education practice member?
First course iteration, 2007 (4 students) Psychiatry Yes Yes
Palliative care nursing No Yes
General medicine No Yes
Pharmacy Yes Yes
Second course iteration, 2008 (6 students) Anaesthesia No Yes
Surgery No No
Psychiatry Yes Yes
Mental health nursing No Yes
Physiology Yes Yes
Psychology Yes No
n (total) = 10 UoA staff = 5 Auck. resident = 8

711 have been diverse in terms of their field of ClinED 711 on students creating flexible/distance
clinical practice. We can also see that the major- courses that would lead to, for example, improved
ity of students have been resident in Auckland health care in the workplace. Students were di-
with half of the students being Auckland Univer- rected to take ownership of their learning from the
sity staff. Since this was a wholly distance course, very beginning of the ClinED 711. This situated
the physical location of the students was not a them at the heart of the learning process and as a
factor in the student learning experience since all result the course became personally relevant and
content and interaction was carried out online. meaningful to the students. Students typically
Both iterations of ClinEd 711 required students chose to focus on a course that they were already
to progress through the course in terms of an teaching, although in some cases they chose to
eLearning project of their own choosing. In this create a new course. This provided each student
way, students engaged in authentic, personalised with an individual pathway through ClinEd 711.
and meaningful learning through selecting one of Progression through the modules of ClinEd 711
their own courses for their project and through was centred on two core instructional design
developing that course for flexible or distance documents that are used within the Learning Tech-
delivery. nology Unit at the Faculty of Medical and Health
The emphasis in ClinEd 711 was on the per- Sciences for eLearning project developments.
sonal relevance of the learning for the learner’s The use of these two core documents provided an
teaching and learning philosophy and for their authentic, real-world learning scenario in which
clinical education practice. The reference to clini- learners could learn to think like instructional
cal practice is important as it bears upon the sixth designers.
tenet of design research, “A commitment to theory The first document – Needs Analysis Docu-
construction and explanation while solving real- ment – clarifies the potential social and peda-
world problems”. ClinED 711 emphasised that gogical usefulness of the project and captures key
students needed to consider how their teaching information necessary for converting a traditional
practice would impact on real world health care face-to-face course for flexible/distance delivery.
problems. There was, therefore, an emphasis in The Needs Analysis Document asks for the fol-

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lowing information: project goal; project rationale; provided an example of the document in Appendix
staff who will contribute to course development; One. Completion of this document ensures that the
whether the course is university approved; comple- student’s chosen course is appropriately developed
tion date for development work; current course in terms of meaningful course content, meaningful
format and mode(s) of delivery; new provisions student activities, and meaningful student-teacher
required; available budget; frequency of updates and student-student interaction (Hutchins, 2003;
for the completed development; staff available to Rourke, Anderson, Archer, & Garrison, 1999).
carry out the updates and head of school approval. This is achieved through requiring the student
The document therefore functions to ensure that to detail for their chosen course development
there is a clear reason for converting the course project: module topics and associated learning
for flexible or distance delivery and completion tasks; student roles and activities on the course;
of the document also indicates broadly that the delivery mode or modes; teaching and learning
project is viable in terms of the development work resources; tutor support roles; and methods of as-
required during the allotted timeframe of fifteen sessment and feedback. Students on ClinED 711
weeks. In project management terminology, completed the Course Development Document as
the Needs Analysis Document is the functional they progressed through the course modules so
equivalent of a project mandate document, which that by the end of the semester the students had a
serves to determine in broad terms whether, or a “blueprint” for developing and implementing their
not a project is worthwhile. Students on ClinEd own flexible or distance learning course. We can
711 were expected to complete the Needs Analysis see, therefore, that the student learning was both
Document during the early weeks of the course. authentic and personalised as the module content
The course tutor then marked the Needs Analysis related directly to the students’ own projects in
Document. In the real world of project manage- terms of completing the Course Development
ment the Needs Analysis Document is crucial Document.
as it provides the information required to gauge Subject content for ClinEd 711 was selected in
whether or not the project is viable. The same is terms of key concepts and knowledge required for
true in the context of ClinED 711 and, therefore, the practice of instructional design and the course
students were made aware of the importance of was structured to foster reflective practice (Bruce,
completing the document to a high standard. Edwards, & Lupton, 2006, p. 5). The ClinEd 711
The course tutor marked the Needs Analysis modules included:
Document and if the document did not meet the
required standard – that is, if the document did • The major learning theories of behaviour-
not define the project as both worthwhile and ism, cognitivism and constructivism.
viable – students were given the opportunity to • Instructional design principles and
revise the document. practice;
The Second Document – Course Develop- • Methods for quality assurance in develop-
ment Document – requires students to detail the ing flexible and distance courses; and
pedagogical thinking and development work • Sourcing particular learning objects whilst
required to successfully convert their course for justifying their pedagogical value, and
flexible/distance delivery. This is the project man- demonstrating an understanding of copy-
agement equivalent of a project initiation docu- right issues with respect to their chosen
ment which functions to ensure that the project learning object.
has a sound basis. Since the Course Development
Document is so central to ClinED 711, we have

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The primary theme running through course sort of reflection was particularly challenging for
tasks and assessment was for students to relate students who came to fundamentally question
course concepts to their personal pedagogical their approach to teaching and the tutor provid-
beliefs and their own teaching context. Thus, in ing feedback on the reflective exercises had to
addition to the personal relevance of choosing their exercise a degree of sensitivity and understanding
own eLearning projects, students were encouraged as students questioned beliefs about teaching that
to engage in learning processes that enabled them had not previously been considered.
to see the meaning of what they were learning as it Although learning was personalised for stu-
applied to their own teaching practice. With respect dents in these ways, the tutor extensively man-
to social participatory learning, learners engaged aged the first iteration of ClinED 711. This was
in collaborative exercises through participating in particularly evident in the assessment activities.
online discussions and through engaging in peer Each of modules 2-10 required submission of an
critique exercises. Reflective practice and meta- assessed piece of work. One of the authors acted
cognition were encouraged through peer critique as primary course tutor and assessor, with the
activities, self-reflection activities and through second tutor providing assessment moderation for
comprehensive feedback provided by the course all student submissions. There was, therefore, a
tutor in accordance with detailed marking rubrics. tension between the desire to offer personalised
Finally, the course utilised a variety of media learning – particularly in terms of students taking
including text, images, multimedia resources responsibility for their own learning – and the
and podcasts in order to accommodate different requirement for students to conform to a rigid
learning preferences. assessment schedule throughout the course. The
disjoint between the assessed activities and the
aim of encouraging students to take responsibility
FIRST ITERATION TEACHING, for their own learning only became apparent to
LEARNING AND ASSESSMENT the tutors as the course progressed. The tension
caused by the assessed modules is evidenced by
The first iteration of ClinEd 711 encouraged the following overview of course tasks and as-
personalised learning in terms of students choos- sessment activities provided in Table 2.
ing their own eLearning project and in terms of ClinEd 711 course web pages providing de-
requiring each student to reflect on their own tailed course information and the overview of
teaching and learning perspectives. For example, tasks, interaction, and resources for each module
having chosen their own course to develop for were created using MindManager mind mapping
flexible/distance delivery in ClinED 711, online software (http://www.mindjet.com). MindMa-
discussion of topics prompted students to relate nager was chosen because one of the course tutors
course concepts from each module to their own preferred a visual approach to development work
teaching beliefs and teaching practices. The and had used the software extensively. MindMa-
purpose of this self reflection was to encourage nager further recommended itself because it has
students to think about how their beliefs about an export feature that quickly and easily allows
teaching and learning impacted on their teaching the user to export the Mind Map as a set of HTML
approaches. For example, having learned about pages to be uploaded to a server. The exported
constructivist learning theories students might web pages were hosted within the university’s
reflect on the educational value of constructivist Learning Management System (LMS). Online
learning and on whether or not their own approach discussion was facilitated primarily via threaded
to teaching included constructivist elements. This discussion in the LMS. Students were supported

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Table 2. Overview of ClinEd 711 course tasks and assessment (first iteration, 2007)

Coursework item Module(s)

Online group discussion around course-related material demonstrating critical reflections on your Modules 1-10
learning and linking of learning to your own context (15%)
Completion of Needs Analysis Document (15%) Module 2
(formative feedback provided prior to final completion)
Literature-based development of principles around learning technology and media (5%) (small Module 3
group/pair assignment)
Literature-based development of principles around the role of the teacher (5%) (small group/pair Module 5
assignment)
Sourcing and applying learning objects (10%) Module 7
Course Development Document (50%), comprising:
Reflective commentaries on completion of key aspects of the Course Development Document Modules 4, 5, 6 & 10
(20%)
Critique of a peer’s draft Course Development Document (10%) Module 8
Completion of final document (20%) Modules 9-10

in setting up individual blogs using Blogger (http:// student learning experience. Although the initial
www.blogger.com) in order that they might post intention had been for students to post their Course
their reflective commentaries. For the two small Development Documents to their blogs for peer
group/pair assignments (detailed in the table critique, the inability to post file attachments to
above), students were supported in using PBWi- blogs meant that the LMS discussion forum tool
ki (http://pbwiki.com/) to collaborate, but were was used for this activity.
also encouraged to experiment with any other As detailed in Table 2 above, students were
collaboration environment of choice. For example, required to create a reflective commentary on
in the second small group/pair assignment, one their completion of key aspects of the Course
pair used the collaborative concept mapping ap- Development Document. Students were provided
plication, Bubbl (http://bubbl.us). with a blog to facilitate their reflective practice
Despite the low student numbers (n=4) on the and a ‘blogs’ tab was provided within the LMS,
first iteration of the course, students were rela- with links to each of the student’s blog. Because
tively active in the threaded discussion forums students showed little inclination to post comments
(135 student messages contributed during the in response to their peers’ reflective commentar-
course). Students appeared to have little difficulty ies, the course tutor used a blog conglomeration
with the practical aspects of posting discussion tool, Blogdigger (http://blogdigger.com) to collate
forum messages. Students also found setting up all of the blog entries in chronological order on
their blogs and wikis relatively easy. We would one webpage. The tutor also provided a link to
attribute the lack of difficulty with the various the collated blogs within the LMS. The aim was
technologies to the fact that students were provided to make it easier for the students (and the tutor)
with detailed step-by-step instructions for these to review the postings, and to provide more of a
tasks. This is one of the ways that we ensured sense of connection within the group in relation
that we designed ClinED 711 in terms of the total to their reflective postings. However, students still
student learning experience (Alexander, 2001), did not engage in interaction by way of comment-
taking into account not only course content but ing on their peers’ blogs. One of the reasons for
also supports required to ensure the quality of the this may be that no marks were associated with

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posting comments on other students’ blogs. As activity also took a considerable amount of time.
we shall see below, we attempted to address this Whilst it is not possible to be specific in terms of
issue in the second iteration of the course. the time taken to create ClinED 711 compared with
Students were provided with rubrics detailing the time taken to develop other ClinED courses,
the key areas of performance required for each we are very aware that we committed consider-
assessed task. The rubrics described 5 levels of ably more hours to course creation than tutors
performance for each area ranging from exem- who followed a more traditional route.
plary through to inadequate. The course tutor As we shall see below, the time that we spent
used these rubrics, with an additional column on creating the course was worthwhile with the
added for comments, to provide feedback to each external assessor remarking on the quality of the
student on each of the assessed tasks. Students course particularly in terms of the learning activi-
used the Course Development Document rubric ties and tutor teaching practice. With these points
to provide critique on their assigned peer’s work. in mind we would certainly deem the time and
Using rubrics in this way worked well to provide effort spent on ClinEd 711 to have been worth-
clarity on task requirements and to communicate while. However, the number of assessed tasks
high expectations of performance. However, those throughout the course combined with the detailed
high expectations create a matching expectation feedback entailed by the marking rubric meant that
for quality feedback; if a student was graded as not assessment and feedback activities were extremely
having achieved exemplary performance within time-consuming despite low student numbers. For
a particular area of a task, then the tutor was example, in the first iteration of the course the
responsible for clearly showing how that student tutor spent approximately twelve hours assessing
had failed to meet expectations. The tutor also the Needs Analysis Document and the Course
had a clear responsibility to show students how Development document for the four students.
they might improve their performance. We can see quite clearly that higher enrolments
In our introduction we made reference to the would lead to the need for additional tutors to deal
fact that providing a personalised learning expe- with marking and to monitor the message board.
rience for students was challenging on ClinED There would certainly come a point at which the
711despite the fact that student numbers for each format for this course would become unfeasible
iteration of the course were relatively low. The because we would not be able to commit the
challenge concerned the creation of the course in requisite tutor time to the course. This would be
the first instance as we sought to create a course true even if we employed additional tutors. It is
with both standardised elements and individu- difficult to specify the point at which the ClinEd
alised elements (Clarke et al., 2006). Whilst the 711 format would no longer be feasible. However,
creation of a new course is always time consum- we can safely say that this level of tutor support
ing, the commitment to designing a course that would not be possible with a class of two hundred
would deliver a personalised learning experience students. Whilst this scenario is unlikely to occur
for students entailed a substantial number of hours for a specialised Masters course, the question of
spent in course design. In particular, we spent a appropriate learning designs for personalised
lot of hours creating a learning environment that learning in large classes is a real one.
would be personally relevant for the students. The difficulty with dealing with large class
We also spent a considerable number of hours in sizes comes down to offering students an individu-
creating authentic or “real world” learning activi- alised and authentic learning pathway in which
ties. Finally, the creation of the assessed activities they take greater responsibility for their learn-
together with detailed marking rubrics for each ing in the context of a structured and somewhat

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standardised framework provided by the educator. on ClinED 711 together with research in the area
We believe that there is an issue here to do with would suggest that students engage in online group
course creation – discussed above – as the creation activities only when marks are allocated for those
of a course that offers personalised learning op- activities. In the final analysis, motivation is ex-
portunities is time consuming when compared to trinsic; students want to see tangible rewards for
offering a course that consists solely of standard their efforts. Reducing the tutor workload through
components. The second issue is the amount of putting more of an emphasis on students’ self-
time that the tutor has to spend supporting each learning may not, therefore, be feasible.
student throughout the course and, in particular, The previous paragraph highlights issues that
providing appropriate feedback on assessed tasks. will be encountered when attempting to create
Whilst, as already suggested, this problem might a personalised learning environment for a large
be overcome initially by employing additional class. Whilst we have not offered a solution to the
tutors, this will not always be feasible and even problem, we have identified a core issue to do with
when it is feasible there will come a point when tutor time spent on providing formative feedback
student numbers are too great even with the use and marking assessed activities. It is our opinion
of additional tutors. The question then becomes that the learning design for a large class size would
how to continue to offer an individual learning of necessity look very different from the learning
pathway with authentic learning activities in a design for a small class such as ClinED 711. The
way that does not place impossible demands on specialist nature of our course means that we are
teaching staff. extremely unlikely to find ourselves in a situa-
A peer review process – in which students tion in which we have to fundamentally change
take responsibility for marking the work of our learning design.. However, we know that the
other students – suggests itself as a possibility to learning design is a good one – measured in terms
overcome demands on tutor time. However this of feedback from the external moderator and in
option still requires that tutors oversee the peer terms of student feedback – and it is therefore a
review process with a minimum requirement design that we would look to implement for other
being that they moderate peer reviews across a courses including courses with larger student num-
range of allocated grades. The peer review option bers. We will, therefore, have to continue to think
also requires an appeal process so that students about how to transpose the teaching principles to
who feel that they have not been marked fairly courses with larger numbers.
by their peers have recourse to the tutor. A second
possibility is to reduce the number of assessed
tasks. In the case of ClinEd 711, for example, FIRST ITERATION
we might reduce the number of assessed activi- RESEARCH RESULTS
ties to two; the first assessed activity would be
completion of the Needs Analysis Document and In line with the sixth tenet of design research – a
the second assessed activity would be completion commitment to theory construction and expla-
of the Course Development Document. Other nation while solving real-world problems – the
activities – for example, peer critique of the two research project associated with ClinEd 711
core course documents – might be built in to the was originally designed to allow us to answer a
course structure but not assessed. Students would number of key questions with respect to teaching
then be responsible for engaging with others in clinical educators about developing their courses
order to learn from others and to contribute to the for flexible or distance delivery. In particular we
learning of others. Unfortunately, our experience were concerned with:

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• The preparedness of lecturers to teach with assessment weighting for collaborative tasks to-
technologies; gether with a reduction in the number of assessed
• The success or otherwise of ClinEd 711 components on the course. This bears on the point
in terms of teaching clinical educators in- that the number of assessed activities was at odds
structional design skills; with the desire to provide a personalised learning
• The factors that impacted positively and environment and this feedback from the external
negatively on lecturers’ intentions with moderator was considered to be particularly useful.
respect to flexible or distance learning de- Our experience of teaching the course was one of
velopment once they had completed the finding the teaching experience rewarding whilst
course. being aware of several challenges. It should be
noted that whilst the number of assessed tasks was
For the first iteration of the course, students deemed problematic, the rationale for including a
were given a pre-course survey to determine their large number of assessed activities was sound; we
extant levels of knowledge concerning teaching wanted to provide students with frequent feedback.
with technologies. The same survey was admin-
istered at the end of the course. Students also From a teaching perspective, it was very rewarding
completed a university evaluation questionnaire to be involved with the students as they engaged
concerning the course, and following standard with learning theory and design issues as part of
procedures for first-time delivery, the course un- online discussion, collaboration and reflection
derwent review by an external assessor. Finally, tasks, and to see their insights deepen as they
a one-year follow up telephone interview was developed sound eLearning design blueprints
conducted with students. However, this did not for very worthwhile health education projects.
take place before the development of the second The large number of assessable tasks, each with
iteration of the course and is not reported here. a detailed rubric, meant that students received
The outcomes of our research into the first frequent and detailed personal feedback. The vol-
iteration of ClinEd 711 have been reported in detail ume of course tasks however led to expressions of
elsewhere (Blake & Doherty, 2008). In summary, fatigue by students late in the course and meant a
indications were that the course was very effective fairly high instructor workload despite low student
overall. The external assessor praised the course numbers. Although students were generally ac-
design and teaching practices writing that, “The tive in collaboration and communication, the low
creative and practically-oriented assessment tasks student numbers also meant that for the most part
are to be lauded. It seems that the course teach- there was a lack of the ‘critical mass’ that enables
ers are modelling excellent tutoring techniques.” really productive discussion forum exchanges to
Students reported that: the course motivated develop (Blake & Doherty, 2008, p. 100).
them to learn; was intellectually stimulating; and
enabled them to enhance their teaching practice. In terms of the third tenet of design research –
Each student successfully developed a design rigorous and reflective inquiry to test and refine
blueprint for their chosen course, demonstrating innovative learning environments as well as to
learning outcomes that focussed on improved reveal new design principles – the outcomes of
patient care. Areas of concern on the part of the these initial evaluations together the comments
students related to volume of work and the pace from the external moderator and considered re-
of the course. The external assessor also queried flection on the part of educators, led to a desire to
the assignment load and recommended greater revise the course so that students would:

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• Experience a greater sense of indepen- An overview of the revised course tasks and
dence and control over their learning. assessment is provided in Table 3.
• Maintain and deepen their engagement The ClinEd711 Network for course commu-
with course concepts while dealing with nication and file sharing was facilitated using the
less assessment. open source software, Elgg (http://elgg.org). The
• Engage in authentic communication and software was installed and configured on one of
collaboration with their peers beyond the the university’s servers by a web administrator,
‘standard’ online threaded discussion. and the course tutor was then able to administer
• Gain more experience of ‘hands-on’ teach- student access. Since there were only six students
ing with technologies. this was not a particularly onerous task. One can
• Be inspired to tap into their creativity to see, however, that administering student access
further personalise their learning. for two hundred students would be a somewhat
more time consuming affair. For ease of access,
a tab was added within the course in the LMS,
SECOND ITERATION TEACHING providing a link to the Network. Elgg features
LEARNING AND ASSESSMENT include a personal profile page for each student,
a blog, file storage space, and RSS feeds. All blog
For the second iteration of the course we responded entries were collated and presented in date order
to the assessor and student feedback by: on a scrolling page to enable students to view peer
contributions and to respond by way of comments.
• Removing the two small-scale collabora- The six students who took part in the second it-
tive tasks implemented in the first iteration; eration participated comfortably in the ClinEd711
• Combining individual reflective tasks Network from the beginning of the course. We
within a broader courselong “discussion/ did not, therefore, have to spend time supporting
research/reflection” assessment category; students in the use of the social software. Over
• Providing a new academic social network- the duration of the course a total of 124 original
ing environment (ClinEd711 Network) for blog entries were posted along with 204 comments
course communication; [note however that this includes the course tutor’s
• Restructuring the content to reduce the postings, which the threaded discussion forum
number of modules; total of 135 for the first iteration did not]. One of
• Introducing student led modules. the drawbacks with Elgg was that it did not offer

Table 3. Overview of ClinEd 711 course tasks and assessment (second iteration, 2008)

Coursework item Module(s)

Online discussion/research/reflection throughout course demonstrating critical reflections on Modules 1-8
content and others’ contributions, locating and sharing relevant resources, and linking learning to
your own context (25%)
Completion of Needs Analysis Document (20%) Modules 2-3
Student-led module: Creation/moderation of content/learning activities/discussion for one mod- Module 3, 5, or 6
ule (20%) (small group/pair assignment)
Course Development Document (35%), comprising:
* Critique of a peer’s draft Course Development Document (10%) Module 7
* Completion of final document (25%) Module 8

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a feature to easily view the most recently posted STUDENT-LED MODULES

comments. At our request, the web administrator
reconfigured the software to provide this feature. The second iteration of ClinEd 711 provided for
Combining all discussion and reflection tasks students to lead one of three modules (out of a
within a single discussion/research/reflection total of eight modules) that had previously been
task (with amended rubric) relieved the pressure tutor-led in the first iteration of ClinEd 711:
on students to post reflections at fixed times and in Technologies and Media, Role of the Teacher, or
response to set questions. Pressure on the course Quality in ELearning Design and Teaching. The
tutor to provide rubric-based feedback on these student-led modules were created as collaborative
reflections was also relieved, with feedback being tasks in which a pair or small groups of students
provided more informally by comments in the (up to 4) would be assigned to one of the three
Network from both peers and the tutor. For two designated modules. Students were provided with
of the students, participation levels and depth of only a brief introduction to the module together
reflection were perhaps lower than might have with a set of learning objectives that they were to
been the case if they had been required to post assist their peers to achieve. Each module lasted
reflections. To help focus students on the depth 2 weeks, with students expected to collaborate
of engagement that was expected, the course tutor ahead of the scheduled start date to ensure their
provided each student with formative feedback module was ready to ‘go live’ on the due date. As
half way through the course using the discussion/ we have seen, one of the key aspects in personalised
research/reflection rubric. Unfortunately this did learning concerns students taking responsibility
not solve the problem of lack of engagement for their own learning. Providing student-led mod-
on the part of the students in question. It is the ules, therefore, made a significant contribution to
view of the tutors that the original reflective ClinED 711 as a personalised learning environ-
tasks structure would have obliged the students ment. The social component of ClinED 711 was
in question to contribute. The revised structure further enhanced through the fact that students
meant the students were penalised less for their were also taking responsibility for the learning of
lower level of contribution. This points to a ten- their fellow students. If the students allocated to a
sion between the control exercised through as- particular module failed to complete the learning
sessed tasks and the responsibility students have activity, then their fellow students would not have
for their own learning in a personalised learning the requisite content for that particular module.
environment. Overall, however, the new assess- The overview of the task provided to students is
ment structure and networking environment ap- set out in Figure 1.
peared to provide a greater level of personalised Of the 20% of the total course mark allocated
learning by promoting greater intrinsic motiva- to the student-led module task, 12% was for the
tion to engage with peers and course concepts. creation of a web-based module resource. The
Additionally, the course tutor experienced the description provided in the rubric for the ideal
workload as manageable although it has not be performance for this task was:
noted that marking the Needs Analysis Docu-
ment, the Course Development Document and Group members provide an engaging website,
the student led modules (detailed below) still wiki, blog or other resource for the allocated
took a considerable amount of time. module with original content and links to relevant
scholarly materials together with case studies or
other interactive tasks that can serve to stimulate
discussion and reflection. Taken as a whole the

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Figure 1. Overview of the student-led modules for students in the ClinEd 711 course

resource provides a sound platform for peers to hope – indeed our design conjecture (Sandoval,
successfully fulfil the module’s learning objectives. 2004) – was that the challenge of collaboratively
creating and moderating a module for peers
A further 5% was allocated to moderating would lead to positive intermediate outcomes or
module tasks and online discussions engaged in “observable patterns of behaviour predicted by a
by peers as they undertook the module, and the model of how an embodied conjecture functions
remaining 3% to accurately evaluating the success to support learning” (Sandoval, 2004, p. 215).
of the module design, resource, and moderation. We predicted that these intermediate outcomes
would include student research activity in order
to offer a variety of resources and perspectives,
STUDENT RESPONSE TO THE creative module learning designs, use of a range
STUDENT-LED MODULES of technologies, and engaged moderation of tasks
and discussion during the modules.
As noted earlier, we had initiated our redesign Our predictions were largely fulfilled in the
for the second iteration of the course (including manner in which students engaged with the stu-
introduction of the student-led modules) in the dent-led module task. All three pairs collaborated
hope that students’ engagement with the course successfully to produce online modules that were
concepts, with their peers, and with educational ready on time. The first pair used the open source
technology tools would be enhanced. The student- eXe eLearning editor (http://exelearning.org) to
led modules embodied all of our 6 core learning produce their module resource, and moderated
design principles, but there was a particular peer discussions in the ClinEd711 Network social
focus on the first principle: that learning should networking environment. The second pair used a
be personally meaningful for the learner. Our wiki (http://www.wikispaces.com) to both present

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their resource and to facilitate discussion. The led module whilst others responded in terms of
final pair used an eLearning development tool their participation in the modules that were led by
(CourseBuilder) created by a web developer at the other students. Three of the five respondents
the University of Auckland, and facilitated peer indicated that they had learned more from the
discussions in the ClinEd711 Network. Each pair student-led modules with one respondent referring
took a different design approach to achieve their to the need to actively learn about a module in
module’s learning objectives, and provided a range order to present it effectively and two respondents
of readings and resources for their peers to draw reporting on the value for their own learning of
on in undertaking module tasks and discussions. leading a module.
One of the modules was exemplary when mea- Finally, in engaging with this research over
sured objectively in terms of the marking rubric. two years we have shown fidelity to the fifth
Moderation of discussions was inconsistent for tenet of design research: intensive collaboration
one module, but the student pairs were otherwise among researchers and practitioners, and learn-
active in moderating their modules. Students ing communities. We have achieved this through
reflected well on their learning designs for the working as academic partners in reflecting on
modules that they created, on the moderation that and refining teaching approaches and course and
had been effective, and on what they would do research design, working with ClinEd 711 students
differently next time. as academic colleagues who can offer valuable
At the end of the course, students were asked insights into the effectiveness of the course de-
to complete the revised post-course questionnaire. sign, and through our informal discussions with
This included questions regarding the student-led other researchers about the project. At the time
modules. Five out of six students who undertook of writing we are in the final year of our research
the course completed the questionnaire. Students project and we are committed to carrying out
were asked: evaluations of the their iteration of the course in
order to improve ClinED 711 further.
Was it helpful for your learning to collaborate with
a peer to develop and moderate your student-led
module? Why or why not? THE MORE THINGS CHANGE, THE
MORE THEY STAY THE SAME
All respondents answered in the affirmative
with three of the respondents referring directly to The technologies available today may open up a
the benefit of gaining a different perspective on wider world for information gathering and provide
their topic, two students referring to the benefit of for multiple means of social interaction through,
sharing the workload and one respondent express- for example, the use of Web 2.0 applications and
ing the view that the task provided an insight into services such as blogs, wikis and social network-
expectations that are placed upon their students. ing spaces such as FaceBook. However the fun-
Students were also asked: damental model of personalised learning with a
social dimension, in which students make use of
Did you learn more from the student-led modules multiple media sources to work collaboratively on
(led by your peers) than from those led by the a particular problem, is not new. The issues and
course coordinator? Why or why not? challenges faced in previous implementations of
what can be considered to be personalised learn-
Some students answered from the perspective ing – albeit under the different name of student
of developing and moderating their own student- centred learning (Brush & Saye, 2000; Hannafin

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& Land, 1997) – need to be borne in mind in the from the lecturing scenario in which the lecturer
current educational climate. as “guru” (McWilliam, 2008, p. 266) is distanced
We are all I suspect familiar with the now from the students and transmitting knowledge. In
somewhat tired notion of the shift from the sage contrast, personalised learning brings proximity –
on the stage to the guide on the side and possibly the educator in the midst of the learning – and the
even the meddler in the middle (McWilliam, 2008). concomitant challenges that come with proximity;
However, the question of the changing role of the for example, the educator has much less control
educator in a personalised learning environment over the actual learning process and may find
– and by implication the role(s) of the students – him/herself in unfamiliar territory both in terms of
is significant. Whilst personalised learning may subject matter and technologies. This suggests that
shift responsibility for learning to the student, educators require support (Brush & Saye, 2000;
it is the educator who is designing the learning Hannafin & Land, 1997) in transitioning from a
environment thereby providing the parameters traditional role to a new role in a personal learning
within which the learning takes place. Thus, whilst environment. This is particularly apparent if we
learning may be personal, that learning has to be conceive of a student’s personal learning environ-
focused on something and that something has to ment (Downes, 2005). In this case, the learner is
do with course objectives, learning outcomes, situated at the heart of the learning environment
provision of content and appropriate forms of whilst being connected to communities of interest,
assessment. In other words, there must still be learning communities, communities of practice,
careful course and lesson planning. If not, then social spaces, Web 2.0 tools, multiple sources
students may experience a sense of “frustration” of information and, finally, to multiple forms of
and “disorientation” (Brush & Saye, 2000, p. 79 media. Amine provides an excellent graphical
& 88) with some students failing to understand representation of such a personal learning envi-
the nature of the task or problem that has been set ronment (Amine, 2007).
for them (Brush & Saye, 2000, p. p.90). Whilst Teacher management strategies remain im-
it may not be in vogue for educators to transmit portant in a student-centred learning environment
knowledge, they are still subject matter experts (Brush & Saye, 2000, p. 92). It cannot be assumed
in their particular field and they need to fulfil the that students will simply work effectively either
essential roles of advising, guiding, supporting, as individuals (Hannafin & Land, 1997, p. 191)
discussing and critiquing the student’s learning or in groups (Brush & Saye, 2000, p. 88). Edu-
(Salmon, 2001). cators need to structure activities in terms of, for
Educators need to accept that students who are example, “individual accountability, group goals
engaged in personalised learning are going to find and rewards, and, most importantly in the case of
resources, develop perspectives and create work student-centred learning, methods for providing
that will fundamentally challenge the educator as students with opportunities to learn and practice
subject matter expert. In the opinion of one writer, group management and decision making skills”
the educator will become “a usefully ignorant co- (Brush & Saye, 2000, p. 81). The educator must
worker in the thick of the action” (McWilliam, also retain the role of ensuring that student inter-
2008, p. 263). Whilst the notion of the educator as actions are both socially and academically ap-
an ignorant co-worker is certainly ill considered propriate. For example, maintaining appropriate
hyperbole – a heart surgeon with twenty years decorum on message board discussions or, if the
experience and a wealth of theoretical knowledge learning space is physical, within the classroom
to impart is anything but ignorant – it is true that (Brush & Saye, 2000, p. 88). However, if the
personalised learning is a very different scenario educator is successful in the task of establishing

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an environment conducive to personalised learning understanding” (Loughran, 2002, p. 134). This

then s/he can gradually fade into the background questioning is prompted by something that is com-
as students develop the requisite skills to become mon to all reflection; the centrality of a problem in
self-directed learners (Hannafin & Land, 1997, p. a practice setting (Centre for Support of Teaching
194). It is at that point that we might describe the and Learning, 2008; Loughran, 2002). Reflection
learning environment as truly personal. We would would differ from a more formal research approach
note, however, that the tutor still has a role at this in terms of the fact that changes to particular
stage. That role covers both the affective activities courses would be made in terms of the judgment
conducive to good teaching – encouragement, and experience of the practitioner. Furthermore,
support and understanding for example – and the reflective practice does not necessarily result in
‘intellectual’ activities that are a part of teaching peer reviewed publications of any sort. Whilst we
well. Examples of such activities would include have not focused on research methodology in this
providing students with sources of information, paper, the point is an important one in terms of
assessing their work at both a formative and Sum- the feasibility of carrying out this sort of research
mative level and providing constructive feedback on a larger scale. Just as there would be problems
to help students improve. scaling up the pedagogical approach of ClinED
711 in order to offer the course to much larger
class sizes, so there would be problems scaling
FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS up the research.
Our second issue with our research concerns
It is time perhaps for a slight confession. We have where to go next. The fact is that ClinEd 711 has
two issues with our future research direction. The been rated very highly by both the external ex-
first issue concerns the use of design research aminer and by students. We have made a number
as an appropriate research methodology. We are of changes to the course with the result that we
fundamentally questioning the value of this ap- have provided a more personalised learning ex-
proach to research. Our concerns in this area lie perience for students and our current judgement
with whether or not the research results warrant is that whilst we might make minor revisions to
the time and effort that has to be spent analysing the course, ClinED 711 provides a quality learn-
the quantitative and qualitative data. Despite ing experience for students. Furthermore, ethics
the fact that student numbers have been low approval for our research comes to an end this
on ClinED 711, we have put considerable time year (2009) and we are not envisaging asking for
into analysing student coursework, student blog an extension. It is time to look for a new research
postings and student discussion board postings in direction. We have made mention throughout this
order to determine whether the changes that we chapter of the fact that student numbers on ClinEd
made to ClinED 711 resulted in an “improved” 711 are relatively low. However, the Learning
learning experience for students. Whilst we would Technology Unit produces distance postgraduate
say that our changes have led to improvements in courses where student numbers are considerably
the course – particularly in terms of personalising higher. Nursing, for example, regularly offers
the learning for students – we are of the opinion postgraduate courses with student numbers ap-
that reflective teaching practice might have proaching two hundred. One logical direction for
achieved the same results with considerably less our research would be to consider how we might
work. Reflection can be understood as “learning take the learning principles applied in ClinED
through questioning to lead to a development of 711 and apply them to courses with much larger

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class sizes. In essence this would entail consider- in considering this question since the heart of
ing how we might offer meaningful and authentic constructivist learning theory is the notion that
learning tasks with students taking responsibility student learning is a search for significance or
for their own learning whilst also learning ac- meaning. If this is the case, then one of the key
cording to their preferred learning style. Taking roles of the educator would be to understand the
over the pedagogical tactics (Goodyear, 2005) or student, particularly in terms of what motivates
the specific learning activities from ClinEd 711 each student to learn. This would be – in part at
is unlikely to work for reasons already cited; the least – a question of eliciting already held beliefs
demand on the teacher’s time would simply be from the student. It would also be a question of
too great. The challenge will be, therefore, how understanding student attitudes. For example,
to apply our pedagogical philosophy (social con- which students are taking the course simply
structivism) and high level pedagogy (meaningful to progress their careers? Which students are
and authentic learning tasks) whilst changing our taking the course because they are passionate
teaching tactics (Goodyear, 2005). about learning? Which students prefer to learn
If we are to scale up the pedagogical approach individually rather than in a group situation?
that we have taken in ClinED 711 then there are These seem to be important questions if one
number of key areas that we need to consider. adheres to a constructivist teaching philosophy
At the level of the learning activities in which and yet these questions are seldom asked (Holt,
students engage we will have to address the issue Smissen, & Segrave, 2006).
of monitoring blog entries and discussion board
postings. In a course of two hundred students
or more the potential workload for the teachers CONCLUSION
responsible for monitoring discussions and post-
ings is enormous. We would also have to look at In this chapter we have described the process of
the nature of our assessed activities. With large designing and delivering a personalised learning
student numbers it would just not be feasible to be environment for students. We have acknowledged
marking – for example – two hundred discussion that the course in question – ClinED 711, EL-
board postings against a detailed marking rubric earning for Clinical Educators – is a specialised
that required extensive feedback for students. postgraduate course with relatively low enrol-
It is interesting that the idea of students taking ments and we have discussed the difficulties of
responsibility for their own learning is one of the “scaling up” the course design in order to deliver a
key elements of a personalised learning environ- course based on similar principles to much larger
ment. If students really did take responsibility student numbers. Finally, we have recognised that
for their own learning – and by extension the there are two areas that require further research;
learning of others in a social constructivist frame- the first is the implementation of constructivist
work – then the tutor role might be reduced to learning theory and the second is how to offer
one of providing guidance throughout the course personalised learning to larger classes. Overall,
whilst also providing extensive feedback on two student feedback together our own experience of
major assessed activities. Taking this direction teaching ClinED 711 suggests that personalised
would make the teacher workload much more learning is a valuable approach to teaching that
manageable. The core research question would results in a rewarding learning experience for
then be one of how to increase the intrinsic students.
motivation of students. There is a certain logic

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REFERENCES Burden, K., & Atkinson, S. (2008). Beyond con-

tent: Developing transferable learning designs
Alexander, S. (2001). E-learning developments with digital video archives. In J. Luca & E. R.
and experiences. Education and Training, 43(4/5), Weippl (Eds.), Ed-Media 2008 World Conference
240–248. doi:10.1108/00400910110399247 on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Tele-
Amine, M. (2007). My PLE/PKM. Retrieved 11th communications (pp. 4041-4050). Chesapeake,
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APPENDIX

Table 4. Course Development Document

Outline the learning tasks students will complete for which you seek LTU development support:
Module/Topic, Student Role/ Delivery Resources Tutor Role (how will you support Assessment/Feedback
Learning Objec- Activities (what Mode(s) (what the students as they undertake the (how will you assess or
tive and will students do?) materials or task?) provide feedback on the
Learning task information students’ work?)
Text-Based Sup- Personal
will students
ports Supports
draw on to
complete the
task?)
e.g. Microbiol- e.g. Students will e.g. Online, e.g. e.g. Instructions e.g. e.g. Assessment of disease
ogy module work in groups via LMS Lecturer’s outlining task and Facilitate summary based on rubric
- Small group of 3; each group small group PowerPoint student roles small group (12%)
collaboration (1 will be allocated discussion summaries Rubric for disease discussions Assessment of participa-
week) to produce one of 3 disease forums of disease summary online by tion based on rubric (3%)
individual sum- organisms; will organisms Rubric for partici- moderating
mary of particular individually Journal pation as required
disease organism develop summary articles Disease processes
and process of organism and Weblinks template (Word
disease process doc)
and submit to Announcements
group members at start/midpoint/
for critique; will completion to
refine and submit keep students
to lecturer for focused
marking

This work was previously published in Technology-Supported Environments for Personalized Learning: Methods and Case
Studies, edited by John O’Donoghue, pp. 212-234, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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840

Chapter 4.3
Creating Supportive
Environments for CALL
Teacher Autonomy
Renata Chylinski
Monash University, Australia

Ria Hanewald
La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia

ABSTRACT tives, one of them an online portal containing

resources for teaching and learning as well as
This chapter reports on a study undertaken on tools for reflection on practice and opportunities
the impact of pedagogical and technological for professional development. Language teachers
innovations in language teaching and language have been building this intranet portal site using
learning, with a special focus on creating online the theoretical frameworks of practitioner-based
institutional environments to support teachers’ inquiry and organizational change management.
autonomy in computer assisted language learn- The evaluation of this study reflects the duality
ing (CALL). This study took place at MUELC, of the research aims; namely, the features of the
a self-funded teaching institution that belongs developed product and the learning process of
to a network of Australian universities offering the teachers involved. This may be of value to
English Language Courses for Overseas Students other language institutions embarking on similar
(ELICOS). Significant expansion in student en- online projects.
rollments has resulted in programs across four
locations with all language teachers involved in
CALL delivery. Fostering and supporting teacher INTRODUCTION
autonomy became the key premise for the creation
of multifaceted in-house CALL support initia- The research site is a university English language
center established in 1988, initially with about 80
to 100 students. The first CALL classroom was
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch403

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

fitted in 1992 with a CALL specialist employed BACKGROUND

to promote the value of computers in language
learning. Since then, the center has been offer- There is a large number of acronyms and terms
ing weekly language sessions in a computerized used to describe teaching and learning with new
environment that aims to equip students with technologies. For this chapter, the term Computer
computer literacy and lifelong learning skills to Assisted Language Learning (CALL) was chosen,
assist them in diverse sociolinguistic contexts. as it emphasizes “the whole range of possible roles
Increased student enrollment resulted in a seri- the computer could play in language learning”
ous shortage of specialist CALL teachers, ensu- (Levy, 1997, p. 82) and because this is the term
ing a conscious decision to involve all language by which computer-aided instruction is referred
teachers in the delivery of CALL. In order to to at the language center in question.
achieve consistency and quality of CALL delivery The theoretical grounding and literature for
across programs, language teachers needed to be this chapter focus on professional development in
adequately prepared and supported. This was (and CALL informed by the fields of second language
continues to be) achieved by removing barriers to acquisition, adult learning theories, Information
using technology for teaching and, specifically, and Communication Technology in Education
through organizational efforts supporting teacher (ICTE), diffusion of innovation theory, and action
autonomy. As a direct result of these activities, research methodology. Figure 1 depicts this chap-
teachers’ attitudes to CALL have become more ter’s focus, main knowledge fields, subthemes,
positive. CALL in-house training, support pro- and how they intertwine.
grams, and other means of removing barriers to
teaching with technology have been a major con- History of CALL with Some Insights
tributing factor to this change (Chylinski, 2005). to Teacher Professional
The current study has directly evolved from Development
these organizational initiatives aimed at support-
ing teachers in CALL delivery and professional Warschauer and Healey (1998) identified three
development. Due to continuous expansion, the phases of CALL in their overview of the use
center now operates on four campuses. This neces- of computers for language teaching in the last
sitated some of the support structures for CALL 30 years. They observed gradual but irregular
programs to become independent of their physical transition from the behavioristic phase of CALL
locations. The main project aim was thus to cre- through to the communicative and, most recently,
ate a common space online that would centralize its integrative phase. An alternative and, we would
access to CALL materials, ensure consistency of like to argue, more encompassing attempt at the
information available to all campuses, and assist analysis of the history of CALL is provided by
with professional development in CALL, thus Stephen Bax in his paper titled CALL—Past,
supplementing current work practices. The other Present and Future (Bax, 2003). Rather than de-
aim was to record all factors that influenced the scribing phases, Bax provides three approaches
instructional design process and record thoughts, to CALL teaching; namely, restricted, open, and
feelings, actions, and behaviors of the research integrated. He argues that this helps to alleviate
members. The qualitative, practitioner-based confusion with time periods and methodologies
inquiry approach chosen for this study meant all and allows for a better description of teaching and
these factors could be meaningfully interpreted. learning practices.

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

Figure 1. Literature focus, themes, and subthemes and their overlap

Leaving these discussions aside (not because of the technique, whether it was appropriate from
they are unimportant but because analyzing them a pedagogical point of view or not.
is beyond the scope of this chapter), the follow- According to Warschauer and Healey (1998),
ing section will briefly review developments the introduction of microcomputers and, more
in CALL with particular emphasis on language importantly, the shift at the theoretical and
teachers and their professional relationship with pedagogical levels toward the communicative
computer technologies. approach, allowed for the second phase of CALL
Initially, CALL was influenced by behaviorist to commence. Dissatisfied with behaviorism and
theories of learning in the 1950s, with repetitive realizing that learning was not just a stimulus-
language exercises based on drill and practice response reaction, researchers actively investi-
courseware. During the 1960s and 1970s, main- gated other theoretical frameworks. The concept
frame computers were used, with computers being of individualistic learning began influencing
seen as a patient tutor able to give instantaneous educational practice and gradually became the
feedback for repeated vocabulary drills, grammar dominant learning theory of the time (Jones &
exercises, and translations. These were relatively Mercer, 1993). This concept had implications for
easy to program by early CALL software develop- software design and evaluation of computer-based
ers, as they utilized set instructional sequences. classroom learning and created a problematic re-
Each step required a learner response, followed lationship between language learning theories and
by computer feedback (Ellis, 1997). Professional educational computer programs (Jones & Mercer,
development for CALL teachers focused on com- 1993). This significant pedagogical shift resulted
puter operating skills, labeled by Jackson (1971) in moving from the paradigm of an instructional
as the defect view because this development fo- approach toward a collaborative and facilitative
cused on helping teachers overcome deficiencies approach. This move has been reflected in the
in their computing skills. This remedial type of terminology of the field: language instruction was
professional development was mechanical and now seen as language acquisition, and the term
consisted of a singular event focusing on the use foreign language teaching and learning changed
to second language acquisition (Krashen, 1982).

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

In CALL, skill practice was provided through the late 1990s offered a cheaper, easier, and more
courseware that offered language games, paced convenient means for using language across all
reading, and text reconstruction. These choices aspects of the curriculum. Initially, materials on
were giving learners numerous options, decision the Internet were textbooks, grammar exercises,
power, and interaction in discovering the correct and collections of random activities. Using e-mail
answers. The previous view on computers as tutors to share messages, documents, graphics, sounds,
was reconceptualized, with the computer being and video files offered other meaningful, authentic,
seen as a stimulus and a tool. Software was used to and immediate language learning opportunities
provoke discussion and critical thinking as well as (Warschauer & Healey, 1998). Currently, the
to teach language aspects through the use of word immediate access to authentic materials in the
processors and their features (Warschauer, 1996). target language on the WWW (i.e., newspapers,
The previous defect approach to professional radio broadcasts, podcasts) and opportunity for
development of CALL teachers gradually lost its publication of texts and multimedia materials by
appeal since it emphasized the latest educational learners (i.e., blogs, wikis, and digital storytelling)
fads and prescriptive techniques concentrating on created by the Web 2.0 social software, facilitates
simple or behavioral aspects of teaching. Instead, an even more communicative approach to using
the growth approach (Jackson, 1971) was observed CALL. No longer restrained by difficult and
more frequently. This approach recognizes that time-consuming authoring shells and the static,
teachers are continuous learners who desire to self-contained courses on CD-ROMs, language
solve instructional and organizational problems professionals increasingly use these new, user-
and wish to be involved in the decision-making friendly technologies in their teaching (Godwin-
processes. Jones, 2003).
The next historical phase of CALL was facili- Current technologies have opened up possibili-
tated by advances in technological developments; ties for creative development of language learning
namely, multimedia computers and the Internet. and teaching materials, thus enhancing and also
Numerous media (e.g., text, graphics, sound, ani- necessitating increased teacher autonomy.
mation, video) could now be accessed and used
by the learner through the keyboard or the mouse, Supporting Teacher Autonomy
or by listening through headphones or speaking Through an Online CALL Portal
into a microphone. Authentic on-screen environ-
ments allowed application of all four macro skills As previously stated, MUELC is committed to
within one activity while giving learners control CALL teacher support and provides a range of
over the pace and path of their learning. This was in-house initiatives in this area. These aim for
achieved through revising or skipping specific teacher autonomy through structured professional
parts as desired and by managing the levels of development opportunities, provision of relevant
difficulty. The main focus of instruction was not teaching resources, flexibility in the choice of
merely on the content and language forms but materials and methods, and opportunities for
also increasingly on learning strategies. However, reflection on practice. In this study, the MUELC
the quality of available programs, combined with research team wanted to test whether providing all
technological limitations, prevented hypermedia these support functions through an online portal
having a significant effect on language learning was at all possible or desirable, and whether it
(Warschauer & Healey, 1998). would aid CALL teachers’ autonomy.
In contrast, the expansion of electronic com-
munication and the World Wide Web (WWW) in

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

Research Aims and Questions Would they reflect on their CALL practice
using the new Web-based environment?
The key axiom, frequenting all practitioner-led
inquiries is the identification of a problem emerg- The graphic representation of these aims in
ing from the tension between research and practice Figure 2 demonstrates how they evolved from con-
(Dick, 1999). Similarly, the context of this research temporary CALL support structures at MUELC
was not purely academic but also pragmatic. The (Chylinski, 2005) and their placement within
aim was to involve teachers at the language center the theoretical and pedagogical assumptions of
in creating a Web-based CALL teacher portal that teacher autonomy.
would support teacher autonomy through profes-
sional development provisions, transparent access Research Methodology and
to resources, and reflection on CALL practice. Supporting Literature
The overarching research question was “Can
online portal support teacher autonomy in The emphasis of this study was on instigating a
CALL?” with the following three lines of inquiry: process of positive change and on the recording of
factors influencing the research and the research
1. In what ways do teachers feel that the Web- subjects. Most fitting for this purpose was action
based CALL teacher environment can assist research, defined by Geoffrey Mills as follows:
them in their professional development in
CALL? [A]ny systematic inquiry conducted by teacher
2. Can access to resources, from the teacher’s researchers to gather information about the ways
point of view, be improved with this online that their particular school operates, how they
environment? teach, and how well their students learn. The
3. Do teachers feel the need for professional information is gathered with the goals of gaining
discussion and collaboration in CALL ? insight, developing reflective practice, effecting

Figure 2. Research aims in relation to current MUELC practice and underpinning theory

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

positive changes in the school environment and on The design of the CALL Teacher Portal re-
educational practices in general, and improving search was informed by a wide range of literature
student outcomes. (Mills, 2003, p.4) on Instructional Design Models (IDMs) and
specifically by works of Andrews & Goodson
Action-research, or practitioner-based inquiry, (1991), Sims (2000), and Sheely, et al. (2001).
usually assumes participation and is occupation- Gustafson and Branch (2001) surveyed instruc-
ally relevant and responsive (Dick, 1999). Par- tional development models and categorized them
ticipation of the teaching staff was of significant according to scope and purpose into Classroom
importance during this project; team members Oriented Models, Product Oriented Models, and
were expected not only to use and evaluate an Systems Oriented Models. In accordance with their
online environment but also to engage in its design definition, the design of the CALL Portal is likely
right from the conceptual stage. Their active in- to fall into the Systems Oriented Models focusing
volvement had better potential to deliver a product on analysis of a large environment and assuming
that would meet CALL teachers’ needs. It was also a large scope. The articulation of such a model
hoped that a collaborative and collegial exchange usually encompasses the process of theoretical
of ideas would foster greater understanding of conceptualization (Conceptual Stage/Analysis);
ICT in language education, thus contributing to the process of designing of a platform (Product
teachers’ professional development. This inten- Design/Prototype); the process of production,
tion was in line with the views of Moon (2000) dissemination, and adoption (Development, Dis-
on professional reflection as an effective learning semination/Adoption); and finally, the process of
tool for practitioners. evaluation.
The choice of action research for this particular These stages, according to Sims, rarely oc-
project was further supported by two other bodies cur in a chronological manner. His dynamic I3D
of literature; namely, managing organizational model (Interactive Instruction Influence Model)
change and instructional design. describes particularly well project management
The literature on managing change at educa- and quality control practices at MUELC (Sims,
tional institutions stresses the importance of staff 1997).
involvement in the process of instigating change. An important element of the way the design of
Such involvement of colleagues increases the the CALL Teacher Portal was managed was the
ownership, improves understanding of the process context analysis (added as an important ingredi-
of change, and builds a critical mass of change ent of IDMs to the analysis stage by Tessmer and
agents (Eckel & Kezar, 2003). Richey in 1997). Focusing on context allowed
The literature on instructional design strength- us to analyze learner background, incentives,
ens this view and proves that in order for multime- resources, organizational culture, and available
dia projects to be successful, collaboration should group support.
occur between experts of the content and experts The CALL Teacher intranet has been designed
of multimedia design (Clark & Mayer, 2002; to provide for, among other functions, teachers’
Sinclair, Alfred & Smith, 2002). Researchers also professional development in CALL. Therefore, the
advise against educational technology projects quality of the interactivity constructs have been of
being totally dependent on individuals or a few significant importance to the project. Designing
impassioned professionals. Such projects are usu- interactivity may seem to belong more to a world
ally short-lived because they are not entrenched of computer games. However, it plays a promi-
in the work culture of the place (Sheely,Veness nent role in all instructional design environments.
& Rankine, 2001). There is more to interactivity than just the physical

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

interaction with software. Sims (2000) seconds Data were gathered in several ways: detailed
Aldrich, Rogers and Scaife (1998) to move “the notes from the team meetings with verbatim quotes
emphasis away from the level of physical inter- from participants, journal entries, questionnaires,
activity at the interface (i.e. button pressing and and field documents (archived CALL reports and
mouse clicking) to a consideration of cognititve in-house publications). In keeping with action
interactivity (i.e. learning activities which are research approaches to data analysis, once data
supported when interacting with the software)” collection was complete, a theoretical framework
(p.331). Sims (2000) provides an in-depth analysis was used to enable analysis and evaluation. All
of interactivity through taxonomies and levels data were categorized and evaluated according
while defining four dimensions of interactive to the conceptualization of the action research
constructs: interactivity and learners, interactiv- process in relation to teaching a language with
ity and content, interactivity and pedagogy; and ICT and teacher autonomy frameworks.
interactivity and context. It is within those four The research took six months in all, with the
dimensions that the interactivity constructs of the main part of the project having three distinctive
CALL Teacher intranet will be discussed later in stages: conceptual design, platform design, and
this chapter. (Table 1) project evaluation. On average, team members
worked one hour a fortnight over four months on
Account of the Process and Data the main research component. There were nine
Summary meetings in all. The purpose of these meetings
was to set an action plan and decide on priorities,
The Action Research Team consisted of six read excerpts of relevant literature and discuss
teaching English as a second or other language its understanding, explore thoughts and feelings
(TESOL) experts with various degrees of CALL as reflected in the journals, and review the data
experience and proficiency. The selection process gathered from previous meetings to clarify ac-
was completely voluntary. curacy if necessary.

Table 1. Research and action elements at various stages of the project

Research Action
Project Stages Process → People Product → Online Portal
(as researchers and adopters) (as a learning environment)
Stage 1 What is its purpose/rationale?
Conceptualization Who is involved?
How do they work?
What paradigm do they associate with?
What is their educational context?
What are their skills, knowledge, and theoretical
framework?
What do they want to achieve?

Stage 2 Who are the users?

Platform Design What are their needs? What will the interactivity constructs be?
What is their IT context What media should be deployed?
(expertise, access, and support)? What is the publishing model?
What is their CALL context (expertise, access, and What are the quality assurance procedures?
support)?
Stage 3 Do users feel the product meets their needs? Is the product being used as intended?
Project Evaluation

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

The main characteristics of action research are, needs and how, and what functions should it
as its name suggests, action and research (Dick, fulfill? The list of desired functions and items
1999). The action aspect of this research was for inclusion was then matched against the aims
to create an online environment that empowers of the research. Then, the team reflected on the
CALL teachers, while the research aspect was to discrepancies between the project aims and the
instigate and evaluate the learning process and proposed project’s design thus far. The exercise
to reflect on practice with a view of professional revealed that the collaborative and reflective func-
and organizational growth. tions of the intranet portal had not been sufficiently
During the first stage of the project (Concep- addressed by the team. The general discussion
tualization), the team engaged in discussion of that followed aimed to ascertain if teachers regard
research background, context, and aims, while collaboration in teaching and teaching CALL in
reflecting on their reasons for joining the action particular as important.
research group. Responses revealed that all team Finally, teachers had input into the proposed
members regarded this as an opportunity for site structure, learning some basic principles
professional development and wanted to make governing Web design and usability issues (Krug,
a contribution and be part of positive change, 2000). The team members also took part in a
believing in research as a way of implementing hands-on session on the functions of the discus-
new ideas. sion board settings and blogs, which for some
Reading of Patton’s Common Principles Un- was the first encounter with online collaborative
dergirding Qualitative Inquiry and Humanistic environments.
Values ensured common understanding of qualita- During the final, evaluation stage of the proj-
tive methods of action research and, particularly, ect, participants were asked what they judged as
understanding the idea of process use (the process measures of success and/or failure in assessing
as important as the outcome) as opposed to findings both the product and the professional develop-
use, the former being of a greater learning value ment benefits of the project. Finally, the future
to the process participants and to the program of the CALL intranet portal was contemplated
being developed (Patton, 2002). and the recommendation for further evaluation
The focus then moved to defining types, or and development discussed.
categories, of CALL teachers in the language
center and specifying their respective needs in
order to become autonomous. The distinction was DISCUSSION
based on teachers’ CALL experience and skills
(Novices, In-Transition, Experienced/Confident, The two-step process of a final evaluation re-
Power Users), attitudes to CALL (Luddite or flected the duality of the research aims; namely,
Debutante, Chrysalis, or Explorer), and mode of the learning process of the teachers involved
employment, which intertwined with time and and the features of the developed product. The
access factors (Sessionals, Contract, Emergency next section of this chapter aims to ascertain
Teachers, Part-Time, and Full-Time). whether subjects of this study felt participation
During Stage 2 of the project, the Platform in the research developed them professionally as
Design stage, needs for each CALL teachers’ hypothesized and whether the designed product
category were prioritized and the issue of a model was indeed perceived as supporting teachers’
design considered through questions such as “Can autonomy in CALL.
or should the online portal meet these particular

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

The Teachers There was also a consensus that meeting the

needs of novices and in-transition CALL teachers
Providing for CALL teacher autonomy was a would simultaneously meet the needs of a much
principal theoretical concept behind the design wider group: emergency teachers, teachers with
of the CALL teacher portal. Team discussions on limited access to technology, and those new to
autonomy during the first stage of the project found the center.
teacher autonomy important, though difficult to The needs of the Experienced/Confident and
achieve, and perhaps in some circumstances not Power Users (i.e., professionals specializing in
entirely desirable: CALL) were not seen as a priority by the team:
“It is not relevant to them” (Participant C), “they
• “it is essential for teacher satisfaction” are already autonomous” (Paricipant A), “they
(Participant B) are power users” (Participant C). This issue was
• “essential in our environment, due to vari- revisited when the Power Users voiced their hope
ability in course structure and programs” for their needs to also be considered in the project.
(Paticipant F) When the issue of the missing collaboration
• “too much autonomy may not be desirable and reflective functions in the design of the CALL
to teachers with no CALL experience” intranet portal surfaced, we probed into their
(Participant C) importance to the research participants. Some
• “not all teachers want CALL autonomy (in observations made on this issue included:
particular novices, those not confident)”
(Participant D) • “it is important especially in technology
applications” (Participant A)
These discussions led to specifying needs of • “I believe in collaboration” as it “enriches
CALL teachers according to their position on the our teaching but doesn’t preclude individu-
path to full autonomy. Members agreed that the alization and autonomy” (Participant B)
needs of novices and in-transition teachers were • “is essential to understanding of both rela-
quite similar, these needs being immediate, highly tive and absolute values” (Participant C)
specific, and of a survivalist nature. Without trying • “increases both variety and cohesiveness
to patronize, the team felt these teachers needed of teaching” (Participant D)
to be closely guided through lesson plans for • “broadens ones own outlook,” supports
technically uncomplicated CALL classes. These “learning from others”(Participant E)
lesson plans “should not only explain what to do, • “reflection on practice brings the biggest
but also how to do it” (Participant E) to ensure benefits” (Participant F)
the greatest possibility for success, thus boosting • collaboration in CALL is “more important
the confidence of a novice teacher. Providing ac- than other areas of language teaching be-
cess to technical information, a ready-made list cause there is more to know and the knowl-
of logins and passwords, instructions on the use edge base is expanding exponentially”
CD-ROMS and other resources were also seen as (Participant F)
paramount. The need for access to CALL theories
and research was ranked low on the list of priori- The collaboration function, it was therefore
ties, although the need for explaining differences decided, should be an integral part of the portal
between CALL and non-CALL language classes and would take a form of either an asynchronous
was seen as important. discussion board or reflective blogs. After learn-
ing more about Web usability principles and in

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

order to ensure consistency of layout, the team provide easier access to resources, professional
decided to adopt the global university template development opportunities, and reflection on
as the template for the CALL portal. practice. This initial conceptualization of the core
Finally, issues of quality control and proofread- intranet portal areas might suggest that they form
ing led to major decisions that all student handouts discrete elements of the site, accessed perhaps
should be produced using a special template and through distinctively separate points of entry.
that an editorial panel for the project should be However, in the design developed by the team,
formed to decide on priorities for further develop- this is not the case. The intranet portal was created
ments, to proofread the texts, and to assist with within the learning theory of constructivism, and
recordkeeping. so it is ultimately its users who determine what
role each design element plays in the process of
The Product their learning.
The resources area, for example, can be ac-
The process of conceptualizing and analyzing cessed as a separate entity, giving an overview as
the unique needs and circumstances of CALL well as details of digital resources (CD-ROMs and
teachers at MUELC resulted in a development online) available to CALL teachers (see Figure
of a prototype that avoids lock-step and linear 3). However, it can also be accessed through the
progression and allows for the model to be adapted Lesson Bank area, where specific lesson-related
for a variety of CALL programs, to be able to resources are discussed. The Lesson Bank itself
expand as new resources become available, and can be considered a resource, but it can also func-
to be developed further when the context analysis tion as a professional development tool through
prompts such a necessity. the provision of lesson exemplars and models.
The CALL teacher intranet model also borrows Similar blurring of function boundaries applies
on the cognitive apprenticeship theme, reflecting to the reflection on practice area, as professional
situated cognition theory and adhering to a number reflection can now occur not in one, but in many
of its principles (Anderson, 2000). First, it aimed ways. Teachers may reflect on their methodology
at presenting knowledge in an authentic context; by analyzing lessons submitted to the lesson bank,
namely, settings and applications that would nor- by reading publications on CALL theories, and
mally involve that knowledge. Second, it provided by collaborating through internal and external
modeling and explanation on the how and why of discussion boards.
the learning process. Third, it encouraged learn- Sims (2000) defines four dimensions of inter-
ing through social interaction and collaboration. active constructs: learners, content, pedagogy,
In addition, it was hoped that the environment and context. He advises instructional designers
would gradually reduce assistance in favor of to analyze these interactive constructs in detail in
encouraging independent performance (Vygotsky, order to ascertain how effective the user-software
1978). Finally, it aimed to provide opportunities interactions (and therefore the learning process)
for reflection where tacit knowledge becomes might be. Looking at the CALL intranet portal
more explicit, helping teachers to analyze their through these lenses provides a number of obser-
performance and making the computer a cognitive vations: first, that the platform was designed with
tool (Lajoie, 2000). the explicit underlying philosophical and peda-
One of the aims of this research was to build gogical concept (teacher autonomy), and there-
an online environment that would enable teacher fore, its content elements and the media used were
autonomy in CALL. To facilitate this goal, this selected to serve that purpose; second, that the
online site was to perform three main functions: underlying pedagogy is based on a constructivist

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

Figure 3. CALL Teacher Portal home page (© 2008 Monash College Pty Ltd., used with permission)

learner model, and therefore, the resulting design center, which greatly enhances its prospects for
allows for the learning focus to change for differ- wider adoption.
ent users; and third, we can observe that the design The following section should be viewed as
caters to different users because its interactive a commentary on screen captures of various
constructs are a function of the stage at which areas of the intranet CALL portal. The first to be
teachers (as learners) find themselves (e.g., shown there is the resources area, which contains
Novice, Explorer, Power User and/or Emergency, a description of in-house digital resources and
Sessional, Full-Time/Part-Time). This also deter- examples of their applications in CALL classes
mines the when and where of the learning process, (see Figures 4 and 5).
the contextual elements of the intranet. The second area, the professional development
If analyzed in the context of diffusion theories area of the portal, contains tutorials on various
(Rogers, 1995; Surry, 1997), the product displays aspects of teaching languages with ICT tools such
four attributes that increase its likelihood of suc- as word processing, animated presentations,
cess. First, it has been designed and trialed on a electronic publishing, and electronic communica-
limited basis, with the opportunity for improve- tion. These tutorials are accompanied by examples
ment before the product reaches a wider group of linguistic applications and teacher-developed
of users. Second, it has an advantage over the classwork materials that utilized these tools.
status quo by providing more flexible access to Figures 6 and 7 provide sample pages from the
CALL resources, professional development, and professional development area, titled Teaching
discussion completely independent of time and English with a Word Processor, and one of its
place. Third, the system is not overly complex and subtopics, Dragging.
caters to any level of CALL expertise. Finally, it To cater to novice CALL teachers, a lesson
is compatible with existing practices and values; bank for all programs and levels was established.
namely, current Second Language Acquisition It is a steadily growing area of the intranet portal,
theories, CALL pedagogy, and CALL profes- where all contributing teachers are acknowledged.
sional development practices at the language It contains handouts for students with step-by-step

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

Figure 4. List of resources for one of the language programs on offer (© 2008 Monash College Pty Ltd.,
used with permission)

Figure 5. Example of a resource description (© 2008 Monash College Pty Ltd., used with permission)

instructions and additional resources for the ample of the page encouraging exploration of an
teacher. The lessons are technically uncompli- online discussion board (Nicenet.org).
cated and do not require multitasking (see Figure
8).
The CALL Teacher Portal, as was previously EVALUATION
explained, also enables teachers to access both
in-house and external communities of practice, At the first meeting, members stated that the
and to set up and maintain their own blogs for main reasons for joining the action research team
reflection on practice. Figure 9 depicts an ex- was their willingness to contribute to the process

851
 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

Figure 6. One example from the “professional development” area: “Teaching English with word proces-
sor” (© 2008 Monash College Pty Ltd., used with permission)

Figure 7. “Teaching with word processor”: Ex-

• “Yes, because (i) I feel I had input into the
ample of a “dragging” exercise supplied (© 2008
final prototype, (ii) I learned about how to
Monash College Pty Ltd., used with permission)
design/ implement a project in a CALL en-
vironment, and (iii) I expanded my theo-
retical basis of understanding in this field”
(Participant A).
• “Insofar as I expected that there would be
a tangible outcome—the intranet—and
that it would be a collaborative process”
(Participant E).
• “Yes, I am aware more about the process
and the product” (Participant D).
• “I wasn’t sure of what to expect at first—I
thought we were going to ‘put things on
of change and willingness to learn more about the intranet,’ but I was happy to be in-
CALL. Their comments during the final stages volved in the ‘how’ rather than the ‘what’”
of the research confirmed their satisfaction in (Participant C).
achieving both of these goals. When asked if the
involvement in the action research process met The participants commented on their increased
their expectations, they provided comments such awareness of the complexities behind developing
as the following:

852
Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

Figure 8. Example of a lesson bank for pre-intermediate levels (© 2008 Monash College Pty Ltd., used
with permission)

Figure 9. Invitation to join teacher discussion board on Nicenet (© 2008 Monash College Pty Ltd., used
with permission)

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

a worthwhile instructional design environment, These findings confirm the common knowl-
especially one that aims to cater to a range of user edge of time-pressures and their effect on teachers’
types. Some team members found it beneficial to professional development. Results highlight the
learn about action research methodology and to tension between the necessity for thoroughness
extend their knowledge of Web design principles. and adherence to the required stages (analysis,
All teachers found the most rewarding aspects product design, dissemination/adoption, and
of their ivolvement to be the team approach to the evaluation) and the need to maintain interest and
research and to the portal design process. They momentum to deliver tangible outcomes within
appreciated the fact that many points of view were a reasonable time frame.
expressed and taken into account, which resulted The teachers saw this research as a “goal-ori-
in a comprehensive needs analysis and, it can be ented, cohesive and targeted” process (Participant
inferred, a superior product. Some comments on B), which resulted in a “tangible gain” (Participant
this issue were the following: D) and was “a rewarding and productive experi-
ence” (Participant A). They all believed that the
• “Views and opinions of all people involved project achieved its aims and catered to their
at the various stages were represented and needs as CALL teachers. In relation to the three
responded by the researcher. It was a com- fundamentals of teacher autonomy (i.e., knowl-
mittee, and the ‘chairperson’ was in charge, edge, choice, and reflection), they felt that the
but in a good way—kept us on track and self-designed intranet portal holds the potential
took on board design changes, and so to support them in professional development, in
forth” (Participant C). selecting teaching materials and resources, as
• The strength of this process was “team and well as in sharing experiences and on reflecting
the task orientation” (Participant E). on CALL practice.
• The strength of this process was ”team- At the time of evaluation, the system had been
work and great direction and super well- in place for only a few weeks. Not surprisingly,
structured (i.e., we knew exactly what when asked to establish measures of project suc-
was required and no pressure given” cess, team members initially thought of an external
(Participant D). evaluation; that is, an evaluation achieved through
another study and conducted with a group of teach-
The main weakness, as the team repeatedly ers not involved in the intranet portal design. This
stated, was the difficulty in arranging team meet- was beyond the scope of the research in question
ings and time allowance: and would certainly require another research cycle.
There are at least three other strong indica-
• “How to ensure team members all had tors suggesting this process was successful in
enough exposure prior to each meeting to implementing positive organizational change.
contribute and how much time was avail- The first indicator is the product, the intranet
able for team members to experiment be- portal itself, and its superiority when compared
tween meetings in a class environment” to earlier environments created without teachers’
(Participant D). input and accompanying research. The second is
• “Not everyone is able to put in time the members’ clear interest in the future devel-
commitment as required (time factors)” opments of the intranet portal and their ongoing
(Participant E). willingness to contribute to the process as a means
• “Time for group meetings” (Participant A). of keeping abreast of its changes, adoption rate,
usefulness, and relevance in promoting teacher and

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

student independence. All members voiced that as most effective for professional development
the action research process should be an integral (Borko, 2004).
part of further intranet portal developments, and The project’s predicted future developments
most expressed their interest in maintaining their are collaborative material development, raising
involvement, although with a lesser degree of teacher awareness, a review, an external evalua-
engagement or under a condition of time release. tion, and adapting the model to other programs at
This last caveat is symptomatic of the professional MUELC. The process of evolution, according to
development program’s intensity if conducted the team, should continue for as long as it will be
in the way it was and considering its impact on required and for as long as it will serve its purpose.
teachers’ busy schedules.
The third indicator of success is the grassroot
aspect: the upward direction of this change, the CONCLUSION AND
voice and strength it gives to the efforts for im- FUTURE TRENDS
provement. This is no longer the voice of a lonely
impassioned individual, but rather the voice of a The promise of CALL—the utilization of comput-
team of language teachers interested in their pro- ers for teaching or enhancing second-language
fessional development with the goal of improving acquisition—remains largely unfulfilled. Barriers
the learning experience of their students. are the technical problems and the limited capa-
bilties of computers, which still lag behind the
way language teachers and learners would like
SUMMARY them to perform, and administrative constraints
(Felix, 2003). Issues to do with the role of the
The analysis of the evaluation feedback is very teacher in CALL, effects of the technology on the
encouraging, proving that the intranet portal has methodology, integration, and evaluation, remain
fulfilled its professional development aims by central (Levy 1997).
providing relevant and immediate, just-in-time The previous lack of consensus on second-
training opportunities (McKenzie, 2001). language acquisition (Nulman, 1996) is bridged
The research process and the product of by the re-emergence of the eclectic approach
this research were equally important, and both (Mellow, 2002) and the incorporation of cultural
achieved or have the potential to achieve tangible dimensions (Liddicoat, Papademetre, Scarino &
professional development outcomes for MUELC Kohler, 2003). Despite epistemological differ-
teachers. These outcomes include increased aware- ences, language specialists agree on the most basic
ness of CALL principles; better understanding principles or conditions under which language
of teacher autonomy in light of second-language instruction should take place: students should be
acquisition theories; greater acceptance of action exposed to rich language and cultural input, have
research methodology as a method for professional authentic opportunities to interact, and be actively
reflection; and finally, improved appreciation of involved. They should be encouraged to reflect on
research processes required for collaborative de- their learning and to take responsibility for their
velopment of instructional design environments. own learning (Liddicoat et al., 2003).
This study corroborated the findings of other When new and emerging technologies are jux-
proponents of action research who have stressed taposed with these basic conditions for language
the relevancy, active participation in the learning learning, they do indeed hold great promise. There
process, knowledge focus, and collegial support is no question that the Web and other technolo-

855
 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

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Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

denotes teaching English to NESBs in countries ers, early majority, late majority, and laggards)
where English is not the official language. in his 1962 book titled Diffusion of Innovation.
Teachers of English to speakers of other Practitioner-Based Inquiry (PBE): Small-
Languages/Teaching English as a Second or scale, applied educational research activity by
other Language (TESOL): Both interpretations practitioners in fields such as school teaching,
are used for the abbreviation, causing significant nurse education, and social work to address pro-
confusion. The first refers to the professional as- fessional concerns.
sociations and their members, whereas the second Second Language Acquisition (SLA): The
construct is often used as the umbrella term for process by which learners acquire an additional
ESL and EFL. language, often termed the target language. SLA
Instructional Design Models: Robert Mills focuses on the language system and learning
Gagné (1916–2002) is one of the leading theorists processes of naturalistic acquisition of language.
in models of instructional design. Models offer Stephen Krashen used the term “language ac-
structure and meaning to Instructional Design quisition” to differentiate from formal language
problems by helping negotiate the design task learning.
through sequenced components. The context of use Teacher Autonomy: Involvement in and
determines the value of a particular Instructional ownership of the change process. It encompasses
Design Model. professional freedom, self-directed professional
Diffusion of Innovations Theory: Everett development, transformation through dialogue,
Rogers (1931–2004) suggested a five-stage model critical reflection, and analysis of the teaching
for the diffusion of innovation (Knowledge, Per- process.
suasion, Decision, Implementation, Confirmation)
and five types of adopters (innovators, early adopt-

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 Creating Supportive Environments for CALL Teacher Autonomy

APPENDIX

Description of Participants in Relation to Their (Self-

Perceived) CALL Experience and Training

Participant A. Usually teaches CALL in a few five-week courses a year and considers herself a teacher
who had some limited experience in CALL and only through her work at MUELC. She did not study
CALL as a university subject or as a short course. Her only training was received through MUELC’s
Professional Development workshops.
Participant B. He teaches CALL at least once a week in a few five-week courses a year and believes
he posseses practical knowledge of CALL with some past experience, which he considers “very out of
date,” gained by choosing CALL as a unit at a postgraduate level. He also attended short courses in CALL.
Participant C. Teaches CALL at least once a week in almost every course, seeing it as good fun for
students as well as an opportunity to be creative in learning English and increase their computer skills
in a nonthreatening way. She did not study CALL at a tertiary level and did not attend any short courses
in CALL.
Participant D. The fourth member of the team is involved in teaching a few CALL courses a year and
thinks he has a practical knowledge of CALL, which was also a subject he has done at a tertiary level.
Participant E. He teaches mainly CALL and has a sound theoretical and practical knowledge of
CALL gained through his Master’s degree course.
Participant F. He teaches CALL regularly, one or two classes in almost every course in the year.
He sees himself as a teacher with sound theoretical and practical knowledge of CALL. He completed
a semester unit in CALL at a university level, which was quite in-depth, and though some years have
passed, this knowledge is still functional.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on E-Learning Methodologies for Language Acquisition, edited
by Rita de Cássia Veiga Marriott and Patricia Lupion Torres, pp. 387-408, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference
(an imprint of IGI Global).

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 861

Chapter 4.4
Learning Object Based
Instruction
Alex Stone
VLN Partners, LLC.,* USA

INTRODUCTION This vision has been the driving force behind a

form of instructional technology called learning
Imagine a vast repository of digital materials objects (LOs), and it is becoming an increasingly
that includes an unlimited supply of instructional relevant topic within the field of instructional
videos, interactive multimedia exercises, links to technology today.
Web sites, reading exercises, recorded interviews The idea that instructional content can be sys-
with experts, interactive graphs, charts, diagrams, tematically encapsulated, retrieved, transmitted to
photographs and maps—and nearly any other form others, and then reused is the driving force behind
of digital instruction—all organized according to the LO movement. In the face of such enormous
academic standards, instructional objectives, and potential, the field of instructional technology has
specific topics addressed. Teachers could log in made little progress since 2002 when it comes to
to the repository via the Internet, type a simple defining a practical method for populating LOs
search string and instantly access hundreds of with meaningful instructional content and research
pertinent instructional sequences that they could that addresses the pedagogical effectiveness of us-
use to enhance their teaching practices in both the ing LOs in the K-12 learning environment is scarce.
classroom and in the virtual learning environment. As yet, no practicable model for implementing
this technology in a “real world” setting exists.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch404

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Learning Object Based Instruction

BACKGROUND James Gosling introduced a derivative of C++

called Java that has gained increasing popularity
Perhaps the most widely accepted definition of with the expansion of the Internet.
the term learning object comes from David Wiley While the effective implementation of learn-
(2002). Wiley (2002) states that a learning object is ing objects (LOs) will undoubtedly continue to
any digital resource that can be reused to support require formative input from the field of computer
learning (p.7). While Wiley’s definition and other science, the fields of instructional technology and
attempts to define the true nature and function education will need to add more formative input to
of learning objects are important efforts, vary- the conversation if LOs and learning object based
ing views regarding the true nature and function instruction (LOBI) are to reach their full potential.
of learning objects have caused a great deal of To date, the majority of work concerning LOs has
confusion within the field of instructional technol- been focused upon establishing metadata refer-
ogy concerning this technology (Sosteric, 2002; encing and retrieval schemes that can be used to
Welsch, 2000). In any event, the fundamental quickly access LOs. In the 1980s and early 1990s,
theme that ties every perspective together is the several metadata referencing initiatives began to
basic idea that digital instructional content can be address the need to categorize and quickly retrieve
encapsulated, stored, and reused in the appropri- digital content and various tagging schemes began
ate context. To put it more succinctly, learning to emerge. In the fall of 1997, the U.S. Department
objects are reusable and interoperable. These core of Defense, the White House Office of Science and
attributes make learning objects both appealing Technology, the Department of Labor, and others,
and controversial. kicked off the Advanced Distributed Learning
The term “learning object” appears in the (ADL) initiative that established the metadata
vernacular sometime around 1994 and is often referencing standard called the Sharable Content
attributed to the work of Wayne Hodgins (Wiley, Object Referencing Model (SCORM). Since it
2002, p. 4), but the basic concept of reusing digital was introduced, SCORM has come to be the most
resources to streamline computing practices for prominent metadata referencing standard in the
programmers and to introduce uniformity of expe- United States, but other metadata standardization
rience for end-users can be traced back to the work efforts—like the IEEE’s LOM project—also ad-
of Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard from the dress the same need.
Norwegian Computing Center, Oslo, Norway, in The introduction of, and further refinements
the mid 1960s with their work on a programming to metadata referencing standards like SCORM
language called SIMULA. This work led to a form and LOM are a critical step that must be taken to
of computing called object oriented programming allow different content publishers to create learn-
that has had a profound impact upon the field of ing objects that can interoperate within different
computer science and information technology. learning management systems (LMS), but these
Object oriented programming gained momentum efforts have little or nothing to do with pedagogical
in the 1970s with the work of Alan Kay and be- effectiveness of the LOs themselves. These efforts
came increasingly popular as a result of the work were an important first step because they addressed
conducted in the 1970s and in the early 1980s by the need to ensure that LOs are retrievable and
Bjorn Stroustrup with his efforts to apply the basic interoperable, but they do not address exactly
concepts of object oriented programming to the what instructional materials a LO should contain
C computer language to create the commercially to be instructionally effective (Welsh, 2002, p.2).
successful and widely accepted C++ computer The first attempts to address the need for LO
language. Soon after that, a group at Sun led by content standards are typically attributed to the

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Learning Object Based Instruction

work of M. David Merrill from Utah State Univer- learning environment (Haughey, 2005). While
sity in his work in the 1990s. Other early pioneers these repositories represent a great deal of progress
in the effort to devise a content model for LOs and they are, indeed, a critical accomplishment;
include L’Allier (1997) and his efforts with the they are only a first step toward widespread imple-
NETg Learning Object Model and Barritt (1999) mentation of LOBI in the K-12 environment, and
and others from CISCO who introduced the RLO/ ultimately into every day learning and teaching
RIO content models. Verbert and Duval (2004) practices in public schools across America.Table
present a thorough overview of such efforts. 1 Includes some of the more prominent learning
In 2002, Macromedia released a white paper object repositories that are available today.
that clearly identifies SCORM as a referencing Each of these projects has made significant
standard only and acknowledges the fact that contributions to the advancement of LOBI. They
are, however, only a first step toward implement-
the intent of SCORM is not to promote uniform ing LOs into the main stream of the field of in-
content, but to enable conformant content to work structional technology and, ultimately, into every
better in a technical level. What content goes into day teaching practices.
the Learning Object (LO) is determined by the
learning designer and not governed by SCORM. The Need for a Widely
(p. 4) Accepted Content Model

Other efforts at around the same time, like The SCORM imposes few restrictions upon the content
Masie Center’s white paper (Masie, 2002), the to which it refers and the position that SCORM
Learnativity content model (Duval & Hodgins, is a referencing model only (Brown, 2002) is an
2003), and the SCORM content aggregation important one because it underlines a need to
model (Dodds, 2001) all attempted to meet the somehow define the parameters of the instructional
demand for a content model that addresses the content contained within the learning objects
actual instructional media contained within an to which it refers. Just like the Dewey Decimal
LO. Despite these early efforts, the confusion be- System refers to all kinds of different media in
tween the function of SCORM and how it does (or your local library ranging from microfiche, to
more appropriately, does NOT) affect the content encyclopedias, magazines, and classic novels,
of a LO remained—and it is still present today. and so forth, the SCORM metadata referencing
Soon after this flurry of activity, the collective model is concerned with brief descriptions and ac-
attention of the field of instructional technology cess—it has little-to-nothing to do with the quality
moved toward the formation of LO repositories and/or the quantity of media to which it refers.
and the issue of how best to populate LOs with Friesen (2001, p. 2) acknowledges the dichotomy
instructional content still needs to be addressed between function (metadata) and form (content)
in a practicable way. by noting that metadata standardization efforts
Much of the recent activity in the LO com- are a start, but there remains a need to answer
munity has been devoted to building LO reposi- the basic question “What is the relation between
tories like MERLOT, Wisc-Online, EduSource in learning object metadata and content?”
Canada, CELIBRATE in Europe, and the newly The responsibility to practically answer this
introduced commercial product from Discovery question and provide some guidelines for popu-
Learning, Inc. called Cosmeo; but, there has been lating LOs with meaningful instructional content
surprisingly little research and discussion sur- falls upon the shoulders of the field of instructional
rounding the use of learning objects within the technology. The questions remain, however, ex-

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 Learning Object Based Instruction

Table 1. Partial list of existing LO repositories

Organization LO URL
Repository
Name
California Merlot http://www.merlot.org/Home.po
State Univer-
sity
Discovery Cosmeo http://www.cosmeo.com
Education
EduSource Canadian http://www.edusource.ca/
Canada Network of LO
Repositories
European Celebrate http://www.eun.org/eun.org2/eun/fr/Celebrate_LearningObjects/entry_page.cfm?id_area=1008
SchoolNet
The Remedia- ExtraLearning http://www.extralearning.net
tion Training
Institute, Inc.
The Monterey The National http://www.montereyinstitute.org/nroc/nrocworking.html
Institute for Repository of http://hippocampus.org/
Technology Online Courses
and Education Hippo Campus
Utah State Instructional http://ia.usu.edu/
University Architect
Wisconsin Wisconsin- http://www.wisc-online.com/
Technical Col- Online
lege System

actly how that content model will be formulated that stored digital media like movies, songs, and
and how it will be embraced by the educational television shows adhere to at least three types
community as a whole. of guidelines that make them meaningful for us.
First, they meet the technical requirements of the
A Suggestion for Meeting the delivery mechanism—they must be recorded in a
Need for a Content Model way that can be broadcast so we can experience
them. Second, they fit within the publishing norms
Hodgins and Connor (2000, p. 1) claim that for their respective medium, and third, they must
revolutionary changes do not take place without meet an intrinsic need in the target audience.
widespread adoption of common standards, but, First, there is typically an elaborate process that
ultimately, those standardization efforts have to ultimately results in the creation of a physical
address a common need in a delivery environ- artifact that is compatible with projectors, CD
ment. The fact that resources currently exist (LO players, and/or TV broadcast equipment. Second,
repositories) and that there is a growing demand the content of that particular production adheres
within the K-12 learning environment for a prac- to established standards for publishing content in
ticable model for teaching K-12 online learners that particular medium (it is rare to come across
underlines the need for such an environment that a 12 hour movie, a song that is so high-pitched
accommodates the natural evolution of this LOBI. that only your dog could hear it, or a TV produc-
Consider how various forms of recorded media tion without characters or a plot line), and finally,
are interwoven into our daily lives. It can be argued each of these forms of recorded media meets an

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Learning Object Based Instruction

intrinsic need within the target audience. They fit the proposed theoretical framework is what C.S.
into our lives in such a way that they have value Peirce calls abduction, or the creative process of
for us—they are used. reasoning to a satisfactory explanation, of creating
In each of these examples, guidelines, or a structure in which our observation makes sense
standards, have emerged that drive distribution, (Buchler, 1955).
content production, and adoption. Ultimately, it is
the iterative interplay between content production Curriculum Directors:
and adoption within a target delivery environment The Missing Link
that refines the adoption of the particular form
of recorded media—and the content publishing Every lesson that uses learning objects needs to
standards themselves. To date, the field of in- be assembled. Just like any other well designed
structional technology has (perhaps necessarily) lesson, someone has to analyze instructional goals
focused its attention upon the interplay between and learning objectives and then create a strategy
distribution (or retrieval) standards and content for conveying information to the learners that will
production standards. But like any other form of help them meet those objectives. The fact that LOs
recorded media, it will be the interplay between are self-contained, meaning that the instructional
content production efforts and adoption in the message is already inherently part of each learning
delivery environment that will have the greatest object greatly streamlines the process of creating
impact upon the development of standards that a lesson and, as search techniques become more
will guide the widespread implementation and and more refined and repositories become more
acceptance of LOs. To facilitate this formative and more standardized, it may be possible for
process, a theoretical framework that accommo- classroom teachers piece learning objects together
dates the interplay between published artifacts to make online lessons, but this is not presently
(LOs) and the intrinsic needs of learners in the a practical reality.
target delivery environment must emerge. In the meantime, LOBI will be implemented by
Rather than continuing to rely upon rigid and a select few curriculum directors who work with
abstract theoretical perspectives to guide the classroom teachers to “hunt and gather” pertinent
development of learning objects and the imple- learning objects from existing repositories and
mentation of LOBI, the field of instructional deliver them online in a learning management
technology has evolved to the point where more system. This development process is an extension
pragmatic approaches to instructional design (Vis- upon Wiley’s (2002) manual assembly techniques
ccher-Voerman, 2004) can be employed. Shank and has come to be known as the collaborative
(2002, p. 4) suggests that a good opportunity for model for distance education. This process effec-
semiotic research in education will be to create tively enables classroom teachers to “broadcast”
an a-priori set of meaningful concepts that can lessons online that mirror the instruction that
serve as the basis for a new model for educating they present in their classrooms. Ultimately, this
in a particular setting. Rather than a “one size simple assembly process opens the door to many
fits all” approach to creating a content model for exciting possibilities for students who are absent
LOs, several types of native interactions will be from the classroom for any number of reasons
identified and then specific types of LOs that ac- because it effectively blends virtual instruction
commodate those interactions will be developed. with traditional classroom instruction in such a
The specific methodology that will be employed way that effectively accommodates the existing
to transform and translate these different types of infrastructure of public schools and utilizes stored
native interactions into LOs that are woven into

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 Learning Object Based Instruction

media as a performance support tool for classroom instruction that opens the door to many exciting
instructors. opportunities for educating K-12 students, but
By analyzing native instructional design docu- also poses fundamental challenges to paradigms
ments like lesson plans as a guide, curriculum that guide existing classroom practices. More
directors can employ rapid prototyping techniques specifically, if facilitators in a computer mediated
(Tripp & Bichelmeyer, 1990) and situated instruc- learning space that accommodates LOBI can rely
tional design methods (Wilson, 1995) to quickly upon stored and reusable instructional content to
assemble online learning object based lessons that convey the instructional message to their students,
mirror the instruction presented in the traditional it becomes possible for them to devote their ener-
classroom environment. More recent advocates gies to other critical aspects of the teaching and
of this approach include Suhonen and Sutinen learning process (like behavior support and more
(2005) with their work on formative methods in individualized instruction). This interplay between
sparse learning environments. Other instructional stored media and facilitated learning is one of the
technology visionaries like Hodgins (2000, p. great strengths of LOBI that makes it more suitable
14) agree that the best way to arrive at a future for the K-12 audience than other forms of distance
that embraces LOBI, it is most practical to adopt education because children often need more guid-
a backward approach, and more mainstream in- ance in learning activities than adults.
structional designers like Wiggins and McTighe Haughley and Muirhead (2005, p. 2) suggest
(2005) advocate this approach as a practicable that “learning objects do not have value or utility
way to achieve results in a learning space. outside of instructional contexts and that their
value is in their application to classroom settings
and to online learning environments where teach-
FUTURE TRENDS ers may or may not be present.” Currently, teachers
in the traditional classroom setting follow a model
The apparent benefits of decoupling stored, reus- for presenting information that simply does not
able, and self contained digital instructional content accommodate the use of LOBI. The very nature
and retrieval and delivery mechanisms is a funda- of how information is presented in the ideal de-
mental aspect of LOBI and computer mediated livery environment differs so dramatically from

Figure 1. Using the collaborative model for distance education to refine a content model for LOs in the
K-12 online learning environment

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Learning Object Based Instruction

traditional classroom practices (lecture-based REFERENCES

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Dodds, P. (2001). Advanced distributed learning
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approaches to learning and teaching that view search agenda. Paper presented at the WWW2003
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can mediate the link between the social and the
Friesen, N. (2001). What are educational ob-
individual construction of meaning (Hung, 2002,
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doi:10.1076/ilee.9.3.219.3573
and development of LOBI. Ultimately, LOBI
will be defined by the environment in which it is Haughey, M. (2005). Evaluating learning objects
delivered and, like any other form of instruction, for schools. E-Journal of Instructional Science
its efficacy must be determined by the effect it and Technology, 8(1).
has upon learners themselves.
Hodgins, W. (2000). Into the future. Retrieved
September 16, 2007, from http://www.learnativity.
com/download/MP7.PDF
CONCLUSION
Hodgins, W., & Connor, M. (2000). Everything
Since the introduction of learning objects in the you ever wanted to know about learning standards
1990s, the field of instructional technology has but were afraid to ask. Retrieved September 16,
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Hung, D. W. L., & Nichani, M. R. (2002). Bringing
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communities of practice into schools: Implications
nearly all instructional designers and technologists
for instructional technologies from Vygotskian
currently acknowledge the nearly endless possibili-
perspectives. International Journal of Instruc-
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ficult. At this point in the evolution of computer L’Allier, J. (1997). Frame of reference: NETg’s
assisted instruction, LOs and LOBI are being under map to the products, their structure and core be-
utilized and only when these barriers are isolated liefs. Retrieved September 16, 2007, from http://
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and teacher reap the benefits that LOs can provide.

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Masie, C. (2002). Making sense of learning speci- Wiley, D. A. (2000a). Connecting learning objects
fications and standards: A decision maker’s guide to instructional design theory: A definition, a
to their adoption (pp. 40). The Masie Center. metaphor, and a taxonomy. In D.A. Wiley (Ed.),
The instructional use of learning objects: Online
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
BF02298246
Verbert, K., & Duval, E. (2004). Towards a global Collaborative Model for Distance Edu-
architecture for learning objects: A comparative cation: The term used to describe the process
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Visscher-Voerman, I., & Gustafson, K. L. (2004). Content Model: A commonly accepted set
Paradigms in the Theory and Practice of Educa- of specifications that developers can use to guide
tion and Training Design. Educational Technol- their efforts when they create media. Commonly
ogy Research and Development, 52(2), 69–91. used interchangeably with the term publishing
doi:10.1007/BF02504840 standard.
Welsch, E. (2002). SCORM: Clarity or calamity? Curriculum Director: In the collaborative
Online Learning Magazine, 07(1), 4. model for distance education, the curriculum
director is the person who is responsible for ana-
Wiley, D., Gibbons, A. S., et al. (2000). A refor- lyzing classroom instruction, searching through a
mulation of the issue of learning object granularity repository to collect learning objects that address
and its implications for the design of learning the same topics, and then delivering those learn-
objects. In D.A. Wiley (Ed.), The instructional ing object to end users in a learning management
use of learning objects: Online version. Retrieved system.
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read/chapters/wiley.doc can be reused to support learning.

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Learning Object Based Instruction

Learning Object Based Instruction (LOBI): Rapid Prototyping: The process of quickly
The process of utilizing assembled learning ob- analyzing instructional needs in a learning en-
jects to teach in a learning environment. LOBI is vironment and selecting relevant instructional
a form of facilitated instruction, or performance materials that meet those needs.
support, as opposed to direct instruction and/or Shareable Content Object Reference Model
lecture based models for presenting information (SCORM): A set of guidelines that The Learning
to learners. Technology Standards Committee of the IEEE
Metadata: The standardized information that began their efforts to come up with one set of
is used to describe learning objects. Typically metadata guidelines that can be used to system-
metadata comes in the form of completed form atically categorize digital content. Currently, this
fields that describe the formative characteristics effort is being refined by the U.S. Department of
of a learning object. Defense’s Advanced Distributed Learning Divi-
Metadata Referencing Scheme: A shared, sion (ADL).
syntactical approach to the use of metadata that Situated Instructional Design: Brent Wil-
programmers can use to ensure that learning ob- son’s theory for instructional design that posits
jects are retrievable and interoperable. that implementation and design are ultimately
Publishing Standard: A commonly accepted inseparable.
set of specifications that developers can use
to guide their efforts when they create media.
Commonly used interchangeably with the term ENDNOTE
content model.
Pragmatic Paradigm: An instructional design
*
www.vlnpartners.com
approach that emphasizes environmental factors
like adoption and use in the test when evaluating
the validity and efficacy of learning materials.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Technology Curriculum Integration, edited by Lawrence
A. Tomei, pp. 518-524, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.5
Teaching Technology to
Digital Immigrants:
Strategies for Success
Danika Rockett Carrice Cummins
University of Maryland Baltimore County, USA Louisiana Tech University, USA

Tamara Powell Janis Hill

Kennesaw State University, USA Louisiana Tech University, USA

Amy Massey Vessel Richard Hutchinson

Louisiana Tech University, USA Kennesaw State University, USA

Kimberly Kimbell-Lopez David Cargill

Louisiana Tech University, USA Louisiana Tech University, USA

ABSTRACT their experiences, the authors and researchers

have isolated seven key practices that make such
Someone has to prepare faculty who are in need training successful. This article describes those
of technology skills. For example, in Louisiana, practices and supports the findings of the primary
in response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, every research with secondary research on andragogy
faculty member at the university level has to have and Marc Prensky’s ideas of the literacy divide
a Blackboard presence and a disaster plan so that that exists between “digital natives” and “digital
classes can continue in the event of a catastrophe. immigrants.” By considering the basic tenets of
Those faculty called upon to assist their peers in adult education, we can be better facilitators of
complying with the directives are often chosen valuable training sessions that will bridge the
only because they are more comfortable than digital divide.
others with technology. Often, trainees are un-
comfortable in such training, and senior faculty,
often later “digital immigrants,” can be resentful. INTRODUCTION
The researchers and authors of this paper have
garnered $443,658 in grants involving training John Dewey was a pioneer in the field of educa-
faculty in instructional technology. Through tion, namely with his contribution to educational
theory. One of the basic tenets of Dewey’s 1938
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch405 publication Experience and Education is the idea

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Teaching Technology to Digital Immigrants

of a democratic educational experience, also ment Grant Program ($120,159), Louisiana Board
known as the progressive movement. Dewey of Regents SELECT Grant Program ($89,258), and
believed that education should be both “accessible Louisiana Tech University Research ($11,500).
and [enjoyable]” (p. 34) rather than the traditional The result of our primary and secondary research
authoritative experience in which the teacher is the is a list of seven key “do’s” when training faculty
holder of all relevant knowledge and the student is in instructional technology.
an empty vessel to be filled with that knowledge.
Like Freire (1977) decades later, Dewey valued
the prior individual experiences of the learner and BACKGROUND
claimed that “all genuine education comes about
through experience” (Freire 1977: p. 25). When the term “digital divide” was first mentioned
In 1973, another educational pioneer, Malcolm in a 1995 report from the National Telecommuni-
Knowles, introduced us to his theories of educa- cations and Information Administration (NTIA),
tion. While Knowles’predecessors theorized about physical access was the primary topic of discussion.
learners in a more general way, Knowles himself The subtitle alone, “A Survey of the ‘Have Nots’
focused on the adult learner. With Dewey’s pro- in Rural and Urban America” attests to the goals
gressive theories in mind, Knowles established of this report on the digital divide (Falling, 1995).
the “groundbreaking” idea of “andragogy and the But since the publication of this report, research-
concept that adults and children learn differently” ers (Warschauer, 2002, 2003; Cooper & Weaver,
(Knowles, et al, 2005, p. 1). Knowles and his co- 2003; Solomon, et al, 2003; van Dijk & Hacker,
authors define andragogy, in part, as “’an honest 2003; Enoch, Y. & Soker, 2006) have noticed
attempt to focus on the learner’” (p. 1). Whereas other trends—cultural ones rather than physical
Knowles pioneered the actual theory of andragogy, ones—that prevent certain people from reaping the
Galbraith (1990) and others have made significant benefits that technology has to offer. Some of these
contributions where actual teaching methods are barriers include gender, social class, urban versus
concerned. In Galbraith’s Adult Learning Meth- rural community, and age. In US society, as some
ods text, eight chapters focus on foundational researchers (van Dijk & Hacker, 2003; Warschauer,
perspectives of adult education, a few center on 2003) have discussed, physical access to technol-
instructional design, and this text, currently in ogy is widespread; therefore, “the key issue is not
its third edition, clearly has college instructors in unequal access to computers but rather the unequal
mind, which is the focus of our research in this ways that computers are used” (Warschauer, p. 46).
article. Specifically, we will examine, in part, Indeed, there exists a clear gap between digital na-
the literacy divide that exists between “digital tives and digital immigrants in terms of how these
natives” and “digital immigrants,” terms coined groups utilize available technology.
by Marc Prensky (Prensky 2001). Then we will In Prensky’s words, “Today’s students—K
use that information to support and explain what through college—represent the first generations
we have found to be best practices in educating to grow up with this new [digital] technology”
digital immigrants in instructional technology. Our (2001, p. 1). So if we think about this fact from
best practices are derived from over ten years of the perspective of established faculty members,
educating high school and college-level faculty in it is apparent that many of us are the immigrants
instructional technology. This training was funded whereas our students are the digital natives. This
by $443,658, total, in grant funds from Louisiana potential dilemma places faculty members in the
Systemic Initiatives Program (LaSip) ($222,741), interesting position of being behind the learning
Louisiana Board of Regents Traditional Enhance- curve when it comes to our students and technology.

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Educational theorists such as Dewey and faculty members specifically—or those faculty
Knowles have already established that we as who have “’settled in until retirement in terms of
educators do not really know as much as we career, institution, rank, and work responsibilities
might think. Rogers goes so far as to say that (in Sorcinelli, 1999, p. 63)—Journet’s ideas easily
the role of the teacher is “vastly over-rated” carry over to digital immigrants in general, whether
(Rogers, 1969, p. 103) and that we should view they are new faculty, mid-career, or senior faculty.
ourselves as mere “[facilitators] of learning” (pp. Of course, newer faculty members are less likely
164 – 166). But what happens when university to fall into the category of “digital immigrants”
instructors, perhaps because of the age factor of than are their more seasoned colleagues.
the digital divide (because they might be “digital It is important to remember that learning new
immigrants”), are unable or unwilling to try and technologies benefits not only us as faculty but our
bridge the gap between them and their students students as well. If the instructor is well-versed
in terms of technological literacy? The problem in digital literacy, then he or she can act more ef-
here is not that the instructors are merely behind ficiently as a facilitator to help prepare students to
their students when it comes to digital literacy; the make the most of the available technology in the
problem is that these instructors may be missing classroom environment. However, if the instruc-
out on the potential benefits that technology in tors themselves are not using available technol-
the classroom can afford them. ogy, then it is not possible to facilitate this type of
learning; moreover, these digital immigrants may
not even have the very basic technological skills
BENEFITS OF TECHNOLOGY that are becoming more and more commonplace,
such as use of Blackboard, email, and presentation
Knowles, et al, (2005) “see technology as a force software. Hence, the remainder of this paper will
that presents great opportunities for andragogical focus on the importance of training university
adult learning” (p. 236). According to the authors, faculty (at least those of us who fall into the “digi-
enhancing classroom instruction with technology tal immigrants” category) to be more skilled in
“directly caters to adults’ desire to be self-directed various areas of digital/technological literacy, not
in their learning;” it allows students opportunities only so they can become better facilitators within
“to tailor the learning experience to fit [both] their the classroom, but also so that they can gain the
prior experiences” as well as “their real-world more basic digital knowledge that will keep them
problems;” and “it often allows them to access on par with new (and probably younger) faculty.
‘just enough’ to solve the problems that led them One might wonder how teaching technology
to the learning in the first place” (p. 237). Build- relates to college writing—that is, perhaps one
ing on and valuing prior experience might be key might if one did not actually teach college writing.
when it comes to engaging digital immigrants in Writing is no longer the province of the pen and
technology workshops (Knowles 2005). typewriter. For students to be successful writers
In terms of experience, Journet (2007) suggests in the college classroom, they must be able to
that to engage digital immigrants in learning new use the tools of the college classroom—often the
technologies, we (the facilitators) should “recog- computer. Research happens as often in cyber-
nize the expertise senior faculty bring and make space as it does in a library. And dictionaries are
connections between their interests and yours” often accessed via computer. Not all composition
(Journet 2007:117). In other words, the prior ex- instructors are fresh out of an electronically-
periences of the trainees must be valued. While saturated graduate school environment. Someone
she discusses digital literacy in terms of senior has to prepare college instructors who are in need

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of technology skills, for example, in response lowing participants access to the technology. This
to the Blackboard initiative in Louisiana (every “don’t” came from one researcher’s experiences:
faculty member at the university level has to have the first instructional technology workshop she
a Blackboard presence and a disaster plan) insti- attended as an instructor was a lecture on various
tuted as a result of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. types of technology—with no demonstration, and
Many of us as university faculty who are more certainly no hands-on activities. We felt that sort
comfortable with technology than our peers might of training was a waste of time and were sure
be have been called upon offer faculty develop- that others would, too. Our list of “do’s” became
ment workshops on a variety of topics, including
• Do tell participants to bring some type of
• Blackboard storage device—floppy, jump drive, etc.
• email basics If possible provide participants with such
• PowerPoint devices as a prize for attending the session.
• webpage creation using html coding and • Before the training session, contact partici-
various html editors such as Adobe Go pants or potential participants and tell them
Live and Dreamweaver what the software can do for them and give
• Hot Potatoes them ideas to come to the session with.
• MS Word’s comment feature Tell participants to come with some sort of
• Adobe Photoshop project in mind to work on. Plan for par-
• Tegrity ticipants to have a “take away”—either a
• Taskstream completed project, or a project under con-
• Inspiration struction for a class they are working on or
• Camtasia currently teaching.

Obviously, as university faculty members, The preceding two “do’s” are in line with
we appreciate the extra time and effort faculty Thorndike’s notion of “teaching as the control
are giving to gain new skills to better instruct of learning by the management of reward” (in
students. In addition, we also know that they want Knowles, et al, 2005, p. 76). In other words,
the shortest, most efficient, and most effective providing participants with a storage device as
training they can conceive of—nothing dissolves a a prize, albeit a useful one, could prove to be
faculty development’s session participant’s patient a good incentive for participation in the first
goodwill more quickly than a general feeling that place. Of course, if participants are not “inter-
the participant’s time is being wasted. ested, problem-oriented, and attentive” (p. 76)
to begin with, then our task as trainer may be
daunting. Nonetheless, with a practical topic such
TRAINING FACULTY: A as learning new technology, perhaps we can, as
BASIC LIST OF “DO’S” Knowles, et al, suggest, “manipulate the learning
situation so that the learner accepts the problem
When we began training faculty to use instructional posed because of the rewards involved” (p. 76).
technology, we drew upon the closest resource Sorcinelli, in discussing “measures of reward and
we had for do’s and don’t’s—our own experi- recognition” for faculty development workshops,
ences as participants in instructional technology suggests that recognition in campus publications,
workshops. One first don’t was clear—don’t run plaques, or some other form of acknowledgement
an instructional technology workshop without al- might be good incentives for the amount of time

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faculty put into these kinds of training workshops The preceding “do” will, in part, satisfy one
(1999, p. 69). of the typical challenges of training or teaching
Of course, a physical reward, such as a stor- adults: “to discover the problematic element that
age device or a plaque, is only part of the actual will arouse and maintain the interest of adult learn-
prize; the practical knowledge gained is as much ers regardless of their global or specific motives
of an incentive, even if we have to convince the for learning” (Long, 2005, p. 28). If the trainees
trainees of this fact. But the topic of incentives can actually see in advance what they will learn
is certainly worthy of consideration. To engage in the session, then they will be more likely to
digital immigrants in learning new technologies, participate actively in the session. So it would
we might need to specifically address the question be wise to include not only a schedule of events,
of “What’s in it for me?” but also some clearly stated ways that the training
It is interesting to point out that certain col- will benefit the learner.
leagues might be less inclined to attend training
sessions. In terms of faculty development, studies • Do limit training to two hours, and when-
“indicate that senior faculty are somewhat less ever possible, try to make the second hour
likely than junior faculty to seek out individual a voluntary workshop targeting partici-
consultation or partake in teaching development pants who need more help or who just want
workshops on their own (in Sorcinelli, 1999, to keep working on projects with the avail-
p. 67). Therefore, as facilitators of technology ability of assistance.
workshops, we must provide an answer to the
above question. Journet suggests offering digital The preceding “do” is partially in line with
immigrants “chances to engage in both the pro- Long’s (2005) list of physiological variables that
duction and the analysis of their own multimodal must be considered when teaching adults. These
compositions so that they can get a sense, for variables apply mostly to older faculty members,
themselves, of the powerful affordances of dif- or senior faculty, but these physical characteristics
ferent modalities” (2007, p. 117). In other words, are nonetheless important to consider, even if only
we must help them to see firsthand how digital a portion of our trainees fall into this category.
literacy can benefit them. However, it is these senior faculty who of-
ten fall into the category of digital immigrants;
• Do allow participants access to the tech- therefore, we should consider the possibility that
nology being presented, and make sure many of the learners in technology workshops
they will have access to the technology will be senior faculty who may exhibit one or
for their own use later (either give them more of the characteristics Long discusses,
the software at the presentation or let them such as “diminished auditory and visual acuity,
know how to download it or access the reduced energy levels, and increasing frequency
computer lab with the software when they of health problems” (pp. 28-29). So the point here
need to use it). is that we should not expect all of our learners
• Do present the schedule of activities and to be physically comfortable sitting through an
session goals at the beginning of the train- all-day workshop, and if participants are not
ing session—a hard-copy detailed sched- comfortable, then they will not learn efficiently.
ule is not too much to give adult learners. But regardless of the preceding physiological
It’s also useful if they have to write a report concerns, it is important to “Offer professional
on the training later (in case they are being development opportunities that meet the needs of
reimbursed, for example). senior faculty” (Journet, 2007, p. 117) or of any

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faculty members who are in need of technology DIGITAL IMMIGRANTS VS.

training. One simple way to do this is to consider DIGITAL NATIVES
“scheduling between terms or in the summer
months” (Journet, 2007, p. 117). At the 2006 Beyond Boundaries: Integrating Tech-
nology into Teaching and Learning conference at
• Do make yourself available to participants the University of North Dakota, we heard Marc
after the training in case they have ques- Prensky, CEO of games2train in New York and
tions, run into difficulties, or just want author of Don’t Bother Me Mom—I’m Learning!
more information. The training doesn’t presented two sessions, one entitled “Engage Me
end when the session ends. Or Enrage Me: Educating Today’s ‘Digital Native’
• Do encourage participants to veer off Learners.” While we actually disagree with a lot
course and play or move ahead in the of what Prensky says about students and student
training. Participants will learn more and needs today—for example, none of us are going
have more fun if they are in charge of to consider letting our students use their cell
their experiences. phones to call their friends during exams—we
think everyone was struck with the accuracy of his
The preceding “do” is in line with some example of digital immigrants vs. digital natives.
theories of self-directed learning (Brookfield, Just as natives are born in a country and speak
1986; Candy, 1991; Knowles, 1975; Knowles, the native language and are comfortable with the
et al, 2005). Here, we will use Knowles, et al’s native customs, digital natives are the generation
definition of self-directed learning, which “is born in the digital age, the students who grew up
seen as self-teaching, whereby learners are never knowing a world without computers. They
capable of taking control of the mechanics and are comfortable with technology and have handled
techniques of teaching themselves a particular and used it all their lives. And just as persons who
subject” (Knowles, et al, p. 185). Citing Candy’s immigrate to another country at a young age may
(1991) ideas of autodaxity, Knowles, et al (2005) adapt very well to the new environment, they are
state that when learners take ownership over still immigrants. They may still have accents and
their learning, it “leads to an internal change of still think along the lines of the native country and
consciousness in which the learner sees knowl- not the new country. It has been commented that
edge as contextual and freely questions what is digital natives use their cell phones to tell time,
learned” (p. 186). So in these technology training while early digital immigrants may be very techno-
sessions, we would encourage faculty to work at logically savvy with the latest cell phone gizmos,
their own pace and to practice self-teaching as but will still wear watches to tell time. Another
much as possible. Another benefit of this “do” test to tell the digital native from the early digital
comes from Journet’s own experiences, which immigrant and later digital immigrant involves
suggest that “the allure of pleasure or creativity” handing the test subject a digital camera and ask-
(2007, p. 117) when engaging learners in new ing the subject to perform a desired function. A
technologies should not be underestimated. In digital native, understanding that the technology
other words, if we allow trainees the opportunity should be intuitive, would begin to play with the
to play with the technology and to see that it camera. The early digital immigrant may also
might actually be fun, then they might be more begin to play with the camera, or may Google
likely to learn it. the instructions for the function on the Internet.
The later digital immigrant may likely look for

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the box the camera came in to attempt to find the was informed that it was an Adobe file. He called a
instructions. Those who immigrated at a young colleague into his office to ask about the situation
age can be contrasted to recent immigrants who and asked, “Do I know Dr. Adobe? Is that a new
have thick accents and a hard time figuring out the dean?” Those of us who “immigrated” at an earlier
ways of the new country. We think many instruc- age, when presented with an unknown file form,
tors at this point in time are digital immigrants would probably turn to the web to help us access
in some form—even though we may have very the information needed to solve the problem. We
slight accents. After all, when we want to know can function in the old country, but we are usually
what time it is, we look at our watches, not our comfortable in our chosen digital home.
cell phones. We know our cell phones display the The digital natives, however, our students
time, but we are still used to the ways of the “old” (with some exceptions), are fluent with the new
country. We want watches. and ever-changing technologies in a way that the
The problem encountered throughout the immigrants can never be. It’s a different way of
research into best practices in teaching faculty thinking and functioning, and it has some bearing
instructional technology was that those who are on different types of adult learners in instructional
tapped to lead such faculty development work- technology workshops because those of us running
shops are often tapped because they are “good” the workshops—the earlier digital immigrants—
with technology. Their first reaction is to play can make assumptions that are frustrating to
with the technology in an unstructured way, and the faculty who have the most to gain from the
since instructors often create teaching materials instructional technology workshops—the later
to meet their own learning styles, early faculty digital immigrants.
development workshops in the research were The key difference in the two types of faculty
unstructured to cater to the early digital immi- stems from the last “do.” Earlier digital immigrants
grants. The result was frustration on the part of are like digital natives in that when we receive a
learners because they were generally not early new piece of technology or software, we “play”
digital immigrants, but later digital immigrants. with it until it works. It’s not uncommon for a col-
The learning materials did not match the intended league to hand one of us a digital camera or cell
audience, and this problem led to the research and phone and ask us to make it perform a function.
resulting key “do’s” that we found. We can do it—usually in a few minutes—but we
As stated previously, many of the faculty who have great difficulty telling the owner how we
fall into the later digital immigrants category are made the technology perform the desired task.
considered senior faculty. We all have heard the Why? We understand that the road to achieve
clichés which suggest that we as humans tend to the goal is not linear. The technology has been
become set in our habits, that we often fear change. programmed to be intuitive. We’re comfortable
Such is the case for senior faculty members (and with looking for the logical buttons to push until
even some faculty who are mid-career) who avoid the goal is achieved. And we are having so much
technology of any kind. We all know our colleagues fun in solving the problem, that we forget that
who are recent, and perhaps unwilling immigrants this knowledge needs to be translated into a series
into the digital country, who never think about of linear steps for our more recently immigrated
“Googling” to find out the weather for tomorrow. colleagues. In other words, those of us who are
One of our digital immigrant colleagues recently more akin to digital natives tend to forget the very
received an Adobe file as an attachment and could theories of adult education that we have studied,
not get it open. When he returned it to the sender the methods that will better ensure assimilation
with a message that the file would not work, he into the digital society that is upon us. Fortunately,

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we have put aside this forgetful tendency because • Do present the schedule of activities and
we realized the potential benefits that technology session goals at the beginning of the train-
can afford to all faculty members. ing session. Make it printable so the par-
ticipant can make a hard copy and refer to
it throughout the training, if desired.
FUTURE TRENDS • Do limit training time and make desktop
training in easily accessible segments tai-
Faculty will likely always need professional de- lored to suit the immediate needs of the
velopment in instructional technology because in- participants. Ten minutes is a good time
structional technology constantly grows, changes, limit for a desktop training session.
and improves. For example, operating systems • Do make a real person available to partici-
upgrade, and with those upgrades come new pants after the training in case they have
interfaces on old software standbys or even new questions, run into difficulties, or just want
features and functions. Old programs are phased more information. The training doesn’t end
out and new programs are phased in. Another when the session ends.
training opportunity arises when an expensive • Do encourage participants to veer off
favorite piece of software becomes available for course and play or move ahead in the
free in a similar form via open source software. training. Participants will learn more and
Training is here to stay. However, face to face have more fun if they are in charge of their
training such as the type advocated here for later experiences.
digital immigrants is becoming a thing of the past.
Many companies and universities have already
made widespread use of Just in Time (JiT) or CONCLUSION
desktop training, where employees access the
technological training they need from the desktop. Journet (2007), who considers herself to be senior
As this trend grows, the seven key “do’s” could faculty, “[came] to digital media later in [her]
be adapted thus: career,” (p. 107), and she has discovered, as no
doubt many faculty members have, the multiple
• Provide participants with portable stor- benefits of learning digital media. Journet, a
age devices such as jump drives or flash composition teacher, lists a few concerns typical
drives as incentives for completing desk- of digital immigrants when it comes to learning
top training. new technologies:
• Provide participants with a real person be-
hind the desktop training. Before the train- • How do new media mesh with what many
ing session, that person should contact par- of us have traditionally (and over a life-
ticipants or potential participants and tell time) considered our responsibilities as
them what the software can do for them. If composition teachers?
possible, design the training to assist par- • How do we negotiate difficulties attendant
ticipants with projects they are currently on becoming a learner in areas where we
working on. are accustomed to being experts?
• Do allow participants access to the tech- • How can we find appropriate opportunities
nology being presented, and make sure for professional development? (p. 108).
they will have access to the technology for
their own use later.

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If we consider the basic tenets of adult educa- Candy, P. C. (1991). Self-direction for lifelong
tion, then perhaps we can become better facilitators learning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
of training sessions that will help bridge the gap
Cooper, J., & Weaver, K. D. (2003). Gender and
between digital immigrants and digital natives. A
computers: Understanding the digital divide.
digital divide does exist in terms of age, and often
Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
mid-career and senior faculty fall into this gap,
becoming what has been termed “digital immi- Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New
grants.” It is important to remember that becoming York: Simon and Schuster.
more technologically literate will benefit not only
Enoch, Y., & Soker, Z. (2006). Age, gender, eth-
the faculty members themselves, but also their
nicity, and the digital divide: University students’
students. If we can bridge the gap, even partially,
use of Web-based instruction. Open Learning,
between digital immigrants and digital natives, then
21(2), 99–110. doi:10.1080/02680510600713045
all of us will be better off. Therefore, it is crucial
to address the concerns of our colleagues, and by Freire, P. (1977). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New
adhering to the preceding list of “do’s,” we hope York: Continuum.
to do address the above concerns (and any other
Galbraith, M. W. (Ed.). (2004). Adult learning
concerns that arise) as well as possible.
methods: A guide for effective instruction (3rd
The most successful method of directing instruc-
ed.). Malabar, FL: Krieger
tional technology workshops with faculty requires
that the facilitators provide printed out, step-by-step Knowles, M. S. (1975). Self-directed Learning:
instructions relevant to exactly what the faculty will A Guide for Learners and Teachers. New York:
be learning. In addition, faculty should be advised Cambridge Book Co.
to arrive at the workshop with a storage device, a
Knowles, M. S. (1989). The making of an adult
syllabus, a textbook, and a specific goal—and the
educator: An autobiographical journey San Fran-
facilitators should suggest specific goals to help the
cisco: Jossey-Bass.
instructors best prepare. Whenever possible, faculty
should be provided with “prizes” or incentives such Knowles, M. S., et al. (2005). The Adult Learner,
as software, thumb drives, or other desirable items (6th ed.).
as a “thank you” for attending training.
The authors would like to thank the following Long, H. B. (2004). Understanding adult learners.
grant granting agencies for their support of this In M. W. Galbraith (Ed.), Adult learning methods:
project: Louisiana Systemic Initiatives Program A guide for effective instruction (3rd ed.). Malabar,
(LaSip) ($222,741); Louisiana Board of Re- FL: Krieger.
gents Traditional Enhancement Grant Program Lonsdale, A. (1993). Changes in incentives, re-
($120,159); Louisiana Board of Regents SELECT wards and sanctions. Higher education manage-
Grant Program ($89,258); and Louisiana Tech ment, 5, 223-35.
University Research ($11,500).
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, dig-
ital immigrants. Horizon, 9 (5), 1–6.
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Rogers, C. R. (1969). Freedom to Learn. Colum-
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facilitating adult learning. San Francisco: Jossey-
Bass.

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Sorcinelli, M. D. (1999). Post-tenure development: Warschauer, M. (2002). Reconceptualizing the

What linking senior faculty and technology taught digital divide. First monday, 7(7). Retrieved March
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doi:10.1023/B:IHIE.0000008146.68462.e5 issue7_7/warschauer/index.html.
van Dijk, J., & Hacker, K. (2003). The digital Warschauer, M. (2003). Social capital and access
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This work was previously published in Adult Learning in the Digital Age: Perspectives on Online Technologies and Outcomes,
edited by Terry T. Kidd and Jared Keengwe, pp. 178-187, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of
IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.6
Internet Citizenship:
Course Design and Delivery Using ICT
Henry H. Emurian
University of Maryland – Baltimore County, USA

Malissa Marie Carroll

University of Maryland – Baltimore County, USA

INTRODUCTION The title of the course was “The Voice of an

Engaged Citizen: Vote, Advocate, Volunteer, Re-
This article presents the design of an undergradu- spond, Act…How?” This course was one of 14
ate course that focused on how the Internet1 may first-year seminars2 (FYS) intended to be taken
be used as a medium for discovering information by high-achieving freshman at the University of
about citizenship, in general, and for advocating Maryland–Baltimore County (UMBC).3 These
and practicing citizenly conduct, in particular. The seminars, which are limited to 20 students, are
goal is to share with the reader a set of guidelines intended to create an active learning environment.
to specify course objectives and requirements, to The students’ development of effective oral and
select relevant materials, to engage students in written communication skills and the mastery of
self-directed learning, and to appreciate the pro- techniques to seek and evaluate information are
cess of working with the students over a semester. the cornerstones of these seminars. This particular
Applications of information and communication course was intended to explore the ways that ICT
technology (ICT) were integrated into the course could foster the practice of citizenship. The course
management and delivery, and they also formed also had the objective of teaching students to use
the basis of the topic for the course content. the Internet to search for reputable evidence in
support of the Internet’s use in such an applica-
tion area.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch406

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Internet Citizenship

COURSE DESCRIPTION evolved because there was flexibility in the pacing

and type of assignments required from the students;
First, the students taking part in this course should typically, the due dates for written essays and
use the Internet to learn what citizenship is. From presentations were posted two weeks in advance.
there, they can look for ways that the Internet However, the most important use of Blackboard
can be used to practice citizenship. Practicing was its function as a forum for students to provide
citizenship via the Internet may include, but is immediate written comments on class events,
not limited to, finding and evaluating Web sites whether led by the instructor or by the students
that provide information about important issues themselves. Furthermore, Blackboard was also
and that provide the opportunity to communicate used for students to post their PowerPoint pre-
with our representatives. Likewise, students are sentations, their review essays of journal articles,
also encouraged (1) to look for research that has and their evaluations of Web sites so they could
been done to see if and how citizens are using the be reviewed by the instructor as well as other
Internet to participate in democracy, (2) to seek members of the class.
information about political activist groups on the
Internet, and (3) to determine how effective those
groups are in attracting members and influencing COURSE CONTENT
decision making. Students should then attempt AND STRUCTURE
to find out if the Internet has information about
character development and the learning of moral This particular seminar course met twice each
values. week for 75 minutes over a 14-week semester.
The overall objectives for the coursework are Class time was devoted to the following types
formulated as the class progresses. This way, the of activities.
class will allow itself the flexibility to pursue First, the instructor (HHE) posted on Black-
an avenue it finds interesting. The format of the board a collection of journal articles (Evans & Yen,
work should include group discussions and seek- 2005; Froomkin, 2002; Thomas & Streib, 2005),
ing out information on the Internet. During some related reports (Best & Wade, 2005; Clift, 2002;
of the classes, students present their findings for Emurian, 2004; Noveck, 2004; Vance, 2000), and
discussion, ensuring that the students learn how to surveys (Horrigan, 2004). This material was used
prepare and deliver PowerPoint presentations and for reading and discussion in class. The preferred
how to write evaluative essays of journal articles style for engaging this material was found to be a
and other material. type of “round robin” where each student would
lead and read several paragraphs, later passing
that role to another student. The student leader
COURSE MANAGEMENT and reader was free to make comments and ask
AND DELIVERY questions as he or she engaged the material, and
other class members were encouraged to present
A Blackboard site was available in support of this their own questions and comments. At the con-
course where material, such as readings and Web clusion of a reading and discussion, each student
site links, were posted for the class to review. It posted his or her own thoughts on the reading
should be noted that the “syllabus” of this course on a designated Blackboard discussion forum.
evolved in the form of an “Assignments Log” Students were encouraged to give an evaluation
posted on the Blackboard site that specified the of the material read and discussed in relationship
requirements for each particular class. This log to the overall objectives of the course. These class

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 Internet Citizenship

exercises, which were interspersed throughout the 1. http://www.advocacyguru.com/

semester, provided the occasion for open discus- This site contains a wealth of Web sites orga-
sion and the rehearsal of tools of analysis that nized into the categories below. From
were applicable to the students’ written reviews among the many sites presented within
of journal articles that they themselves selected. a category, one example is presented
Second, as briefly mentioned above, each for each category.
student reviewed six journal or other reputable ar- a. Advocacy Resources
ticles throughout the semester (Coleman & Norris,
2005; Gil-Garcia, 2005; LaVigne, Simon, Dawes, CITIZENOUTREACH
Pardo, & Berlin, 2001; Lourenço & Costa, 2006). (www.citizenoutreach.com)
Each review was based upon a set of guidelines4
for evaluating an article, ultimately resulting in b. E-Government General
a two-to-three page, single-spaced essay. The
articles selected by the students were posted on E-DEMOCRACY
the Blackboard site for approval, and the review (www.e-democracy.org)
served as a basis for a PowerPoint presentation
to the class. The set of guidelines was discussed c. Communicating with Elected
in class, and anonymous examples of reviews Officials
written by students in similar seminars were also
presented and discussed. For the first review, the YOUR CONGRESS
instructor met with each student individually to (http://www.yourcongress.com/)
provide feedback on a draft of the review. This
meeting ensured that both the students and the d. Nonprofit Resources
instructor were in agreement with regard to what
was expected from the review; consequently, NONPROFIT BASICS
both the instructor and students found this initial (www.nonprofitbasics.org)
feedback session to be invaluable to the produc-
tion of subsequent quality essays. e. Online Political Networks and
Third, several classes were devoted to examina- Conversations
tion and open discussion of various Internet portals
and Web sites thought to be relevant to the course E-THE PEOPLE
topic of Internet citizenship. This activity was (http://www.e-thepeople.com/)
made feasible since the class was able to meet in
a PC lab or in a seminar room, depending upon 2. http://first.gov/
the needs for each particular class. Based upon ◦◦ This is the U.S. Government’s official
the feedback from the students during these open Web portal.
discussions, it was decided that PowerPoint pre- 3. http://www.regulations.gov/fdmspublic/
sentations would be delivered by each student to component/main
evaluate a Web site. Consequently, each student ◦◦ On this U.S. Government Web site,
shared his or her findings with the class. The pace you can find, view, and comment on
of this course allowed each student to make three regulations for all federal agencies.
of these PowerPoint presentations. Among the 4. http://www.nifi.org/
cornerstone sites investigated, in open discussion ◦◦ The National Issues Forums help
or by student presentations, were the following: people of diverse views find common

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Internet Citizenship

ground for action on issues that con- tion of a site. Therefore, embodying the student
cern them deeply. led nature of the class, the students decided that
5. http://www.studycircles.org/en/index.aspx the presentations of the Web site should follow
◦◦ The Study Circles Research Center the PowerPoint presentation format similar to
helps communities develop their own that used for presenting the review essays. By
ability to solve problems by explor- using this format, screen shots of the features of
ing ways for all kinds of people to the Web site were able to be included into the
think, talk, and work together to cre- presentations, and it became easier to point out
ate change. the strengths and weaknesses of a site. Figure 1
6. http://h2oproject.law.harvard.edu presents an example of a screen shot used for a
◦◦ The stated vision is to encourage the student presentation. The screen shot was more
growth of a more open set of intellec- beneficial than an open navigation Web site pre-
tual communities than those spawned sentation because it allowed the student to focus
by the traditional university system. on a specific aspect of a given Web page. In this
7. http://www.americaspeaks.org/ example, the student chose to focus on the types
◦◦ AmericaSpeaks is developing a na- of study circles offered in the state of Maryland.
tional infrastructure for democratic In addition, classes that were scheduled be-
deliberation that institutionalizes the tween assigned deliverables consisted of such
links between decision- makers and exercises as the investigation of Web sites that
citizens in determining public policy. occurred during the third class of the semester.

An initial attempt was made for the student 1.Overview in class

presentations of the Web sites to be a demonstra- a.Congress.org
tion; that is, the student would show the features (http://www.congress.org/congres-
of the Web site by navigating through it in front of sorg/home/)
the class. This approach turned out to be awkward b.U.S. Senate Portal
and unsupportive of communicating the evalua- (http://senate.gov/)

Figure 1. Slide from a Web site PowerPoint presentation on StudyCircles.org

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 Internet Citizenship

c. U.S. House of Representatives Portal Another one of these instructional events oc-
(http://www.house.gov/) curred during the second class of the seminar. It
d.The White House Portal consisted of a lecture by a reference librarian5 who
(http://www.whitehouse.gov/) taught the students how to search for information
using the library’s various databases, research
These portals were investigated and discussed portals, and search engines. The importance of this
in class and the students used them to express an lecture cannot be overemphasized. Students were
opinion, anonymously to the other students and familiarized with access to electronically avail-
instructor, on a topic of interest. able journal articles and other material that were
essential to their success in seeking information
related to the topic of this course. Although most
STUDENT MILESTONES, students were highly experienced in using Internet
CONTRIBUTIONS, AND FEEDBACK search engines, the library offered additional and
secure paths to information that many students had
In administering the course, there were several yet to explore. Other instructors would be well
milestone instructional events that provided the oc- advised to offer this type of lecture early in the
casion for the students’ acquisition of background academic careers of students, to include graduate
skills and knowledge that became instrumental students where necessary.
to the successful deployment of this seminar to One very important class milestone occurred
undergraduates. during the fourth class, as given in the Assign-
One such instructional event was posted on the ments Log:
Blackboard site on the date of the second class,
and it was due on the date of the fourth class: 1. Founding Documents
This assignment is to prepare a PowerPoint a. http://www.constitution.org
presentation covering the below three topics. Find b. We will read in class the Declaration
sources on the Web for this exercise. of Independence and parts of the
Constitution, to include the Bill of
a. Give a definition of citizenship, Rights.
b. Give core values needed for the practice of c. Assignment: Post your comments today
citizenship, and about your reaction to reading these
c. Give specific behaviors regarded as exhibit- formative documents.
ing the practice of citizenship.
The instructor and students shared the read-
Give your opinion on the quality of the sources ing of these documents, accessed via the Web
of information and defend your opinion. What site above. As it turned out, the Declaration of
makes a resource of information have high quality? Independence and the entire Constitution were
Give the links on your PowerPoint presentation. read during the 75-minute class. This class event
This was the first major assignment for the turned out to be a vital as well as inspirational
students in this class, providing the occasion for milestone for the students and the instructor.
each student to express his or her opinions on Last, the final milestone, which, as the sched-
the course’s content while challenging each one ule would have it, occurred during the last class,
of them to provide reputable support for those consisted of student presentations of “Reflections
opinions. on Internet Citizenship.” These presentations
were summative evaluations of the course by the

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Internet Citizenship

students in terms of what was accomplished by ◦◦ The ability we had to discover such a
each learner. Through these presentations, stu- variety of information in such detail
dents were given the opportunity to share lessons through the presentations of topics
they learned while taking this seminar as well as we each went out and chose on our
express their opinions about how they believed own was really neat.
the course could be improved for future classes.
The strengths and weaknesses addressed in those
presentations even served to aid the writing of this CONCLUSION
instructional article. A collection of observations
made by several students is given below: This article presented an effective design for
structuring and implementing an undergraduate
• The Future of E-Government: seminar course on the topic of Internet citizenship
◦◦ Overall, E-Government seems to through the applications of ICT.
have a bright future It is very important to note that the evolution
▪▪ People are “getting out of line of this course from a flexible “Assignments Log”
and getting online” allowed the students to undertake a wide variety
▪▪ “E-the-People” of activities, from writing those aforementioned
• Article Reviews: journal article reviews to giving Web site presenta-
◦◦ One of the best parts about this class tions using PowerPoint technology. Furthermore,
▪▪ Very unique activity for a FYS the types of activities pursued in this seminar
class class (as well as in most other seminar courses)
◦◦ One activity provided tons of knowl- served to strengthen the students’ overall writing
edge for future reference and presenting skills, which will continue to be of
▪▪ Learned a new writing format use to them as they proceed with their education.
▪▪ Improved critical thinking skills In the same sense, the student-led nature of the
◦◦ Preparation for graduate school course allowed the class to pursue topics within
▪▪ Really enjoyed the fact that this the concept of Internet citizenship that they saw as
activity will be of use to me in particularly intriguing, ensuring that the students
furthering my education—kind remained actively involved in the course content
of like a “heads up” throughout the entire semester. This was easily
▪▪ Excellent “plan-as-we-go” class accomplished, as much of the coursework was
that developed us as writers, designed for the individual student (e.g., allowing
presenters, and analysts of aca- each student to select his or her own journal articles
demic writing. to review). As a result, while one student may
▪▪ All assignments had a pur- have chosen to investigate the security concerns
pose and we achieved the goals surrounding Internet citizenship, another student
together. could have decided to research the technology
▪▪ I also learned how to critique. needed to further the practice of Internet citizen-
◦◦ Finding trustworthy articles and sites ship. Such material variety kept the coursework
◦◦ Determining methodology fresh and interesting as the semester progressed.
◦◦ Finding strengths and weaknesses Overall, student feedback indicated that the
▪▪ Enjoyed going over articles in approach described here regarding the instruction
class. of an undergraduate seminar course on Internet
▪▪ I liked the course. citizenship was highly effective. Both the stu-

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dents and instructor gained valuable insights on Froomkin, A. M. (2002). Technologies for democ-
the course content through the interactive group racy: Conference draft of Habermas@discourse.
activities that became one of the cornerstones of net: Toward a critical theory of cyberspace. Har-
this class. Similarly, having the opportunity to vard Law Review 2003, 116(3), 751-820. Retrieved
make several presentations clearly had a positive September 27, 2007, from http://osaka.law.miami.
impact on the students’skill level as it was observed edu/~froomkin/discourse/ils.pdf
that students’ presentations increased in length
Gil-Garcia, J. R. (2005). Exploring the success fac-
and quality over the semester. Therefore, it is the
tors of state Web site functionality: An empirical
hope of the authors that, after reading this article,
investigation. In Proceedings of the 2005 National
the reader will have gained a better understanding
Conference on Digital Government Research,
of the undergraduate seminar program offered at
ACM International Conference Proceeding Series,
the University of Maryland–Baltimore County
89, (pp. 121-130).
and will also be able to execute successfully the
methods previously described to create an Internet Horrigan, J. B. (2004). How Americans get in
citizenship seminar of his or her own in the future. touch with government. Pew Internet & Ameri-
can Life Project. Retrieved September 27, 2007,
from http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_E-
REFERENCES Gov_Report_0504.pdf

Best, M. L., & Wade, K. W. (2005). The Internet LaVigne, M., Simon, S., Dawes, S., Pardo, T., &
and democracy: Global catalyst or democratic Berlin, D. (2001). Untangle the Web. Delivering
dud? The Beckman Center for Internet and Society municipal services through the Internet. Center
at Harvard Law School, Research Publication No. for Technology in Government. Retrieved Sep-
2005. Retrieved September 27, 2007, from http:// tember 27, 2007, from http://www.ctg.albany.
cyber.law.harvard.edu/home/2005-12 edu/publications/guides/untangle_the_web/un-
tangle_the_web.pdf
Clift, S. (2002). The future of e-democracy – the
50 year plan. Retrieved September 27, 2007, from Lourenço, R. P., & Costa, J. P. (2006). Discur-
http://www.publicus.net/articles/future.html sive e-democracy support. In Proceedings of the
39th Hawaii International Conference on System
Coleman, S., & Norris, D. F. (2005, January). A Sciences. Retrieved September 27, 2007, from
new agenda for e-democracy. Oxford Internet http://csdl2.computer.org/comp/proceedings/
Institute, Forum Discussion Paper No. 4. hicss/2006/2507/04/250740065c.pdf
Emurian, H. H. (2004). Fostering citizenship via Noveck, B. S. (2004). The future of citizen par-
the Internet [Editorial]. Information Resources ticipation in the electronic state. Retrieved Sep-
Management Journal, 17(1), i–iv. tember 27, 2007, from http://www.is-journal.org/
Evans, D., & Yen, D. C. (2005). E-government: V01I01/I-S, %20V01-I01-P001,%20Noveck.pdf
An analysis for implementation: Framework for Thomas, J. C., & Streib, G. (2005). E-democracy,
understanding cultural and social impact. Gov- e-commerce, and e-research: Examining the
ernment Information Quarterly, 22, 354–373. electronic ties between citizens and govern-
doi:10.1016/j.giq.2005.05.007 ment. Administration & Society, 37(3), 259–280.
doi:10.1177/0095399704273212

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Vance, S. D. (2000). The impact of the Internet on Instructional Design: In the present context,
representational democracy. Retrieved September this refers to the techniques that were adopted to
27, 2007, from http://www.llrx.com/features/ encourage the students to seek and evaluate in-
impact.htm formation and to provide written and oral reports
to the instructor and to the class.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS

ENDNOTES
Citizenship: Although the typical definition 1
Internet is used here to include the World
of citizenship refers to the rights and privileges of
Wide Web because that is a common way
those designated legally to be citizens, the concept
to refer to the media for electronic commu-
was extended in this article to include motivation
nications and exchanges of information.
to participate in shared governance. 2
http://www.umbc.edu/undergrad_ed/fys/
First Year Seminar: At UMBC, outstanding
index.html
freshman are allowed to enroll in a course that 3
The junior author (MMC) was a student in
has a seminar format similar to what graduate
this seminar. The senior author (HHE) was
students might experience.
the instructor and is an associate professor
ICT: Information and communication technol-
of information systems.
ogy was used as the medium studied for political 4
http://nasa1.ifsm.umbc.edu/courses/Re-
engagement and for course delivery and manage-
viewGuidelines/ReviewGuidelines.html
ment with Blackboard. 5
The authors appreciate the lecture by Drew
Internet: The term “Internet” includes the
F. Alfgren to this and other classes and his
World Wide Web because that is a common way
ongoing support of our students’ develop-
to refer to the media for electronic communica-
ment of research skills.
tions and exchanges of information.
Internet Citizenship: This reflected the
use of the Internet for political engagement and
empowerment, from local, state, and national
perspectives.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Technology Curriculum Integration, edited by Lawrence
A. Tomei, pp. 476-482, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.7
The Real World Buffalo*:
Reality TV Comes to a Charter School

Marion Barnett
Buffalo State College, USA

Kim Truesdell
Buffalo State College, USA

Melaine Kenyon
Buffalo State College, USA

Dennis Mike
Buffalo State College, USA

ABSTRACT findings suggest that students acquired positive

attitudes toward teaching in urban classrooms
Videoconferencing is one form of distance learn- and preferred this virtual field experience to a
ing that can enhance teacher-education programs traditional in-school placement.
by linking students in higher education with Pre-
K–12 schools. As part of a Preparing Tomorrow’s
Teachers to use Technology grant (PT3), a teacher- INTRODUCTION
education program utilized distance learning to
link college classes with an urban school. Mediated Two children collide and tussle over some props
observations of specific literacy practices were in the dramatic play area of a kindergarten class-
integrated into a traditional introductory literacy room. Tempers flare and arms begin to flail.
course. Preservice teachers observed urban teach- Twenty teacher-education students are sitting in a
ers teaching literacy. Immediately following these campus distance learning room miles away from
observations, the preservice teachers were granted the classroom. Their eyes are fixed on TV moni-
the opportunity to reflect on the lesson by convers- tors watching for the teacher’s response to the
ing with the teachers via distance learning. Initial children’s struggle. The teacher calmly intervenes
and mediates the struggle. The college instructor
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch407 “voices over” the ongoing scene, describing to

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
The Real World Buffalo

the students the importance of body position and Though the nature and frequency of early field
eye contact, and explains the conflict resolution experiences is changing and expanding, the diver-
strategy of active listening and validating feelings, sity, quality, and consistency of the experiences
which the students are observing. She prompts can be greatly enhanced (from what existed in the
them to listen to the teacher’s language and to past) by using the technology available to students
watch the children’s faces for signs of what they and faculty in teacher-preparation programs. The
might be thinking and feeling. The college in- videoconferencing technology described in the
structor briefly connects what the teacher is doing opening scenario is just one means of using tele-
with points made in the chapter on guidance and communications. The range of technologies and
discipline from the course textbook. Ten minutes their use in teacher-education programs is growing
later, the kindergarten teacher, on site at the school, and expanding to include both videoconferencing
enters a distance learning room (the collabora- and Internet protocol videoconferencing.
tory) and spends fifteen minutes answering ques- This chapter describes the collaboration be-
tions and commenting on the 30-minute lesson. tween a teacher-education program and a unique
Students question the teacher about the conflict, urban charter school equipped with the technology
and the teacher provides answers interspersed to broadcast live teaching episodes from four pri-
with her own reflections, a critical component in mary classrooms. The project began using video-
understanding teacher behavior. She returns to her conferencing technology with preservice teachers
classroom, and the live video session concludes. to conduct guided observations of children and
The college instructor urges the students to think teachers working and learning in an inner-city
more about the conflict scenario. She queries them: charter school. Encouraged by positive feedback
“In your experiences, what are some of the ways from students and faculty who used the technology,
you have seen teachers resolve conflicts among a pilot program was implemented examining the
children? What did this teacher do that worked? potential of the technology to mediate reflection
What did she say? What else might she have with preservice teachers. Two different Preparing
done? How do you think the children felt at the Tomorrows Teachers to Use Technology grants
end? What will you need to know and be able to (PT3) from the U.S. Department of Education
do to resolve a conflict with children?” funded the work. The first grant, Project Access1,
The setting above describes an ongoing enabled the development of the consortium be-
transformation in teacher preparation programs. tween higher education and a high-need urban
Research suggests that the more classroom experi- school, and provided the technology for real-time
ence that preservice teachers have, the better it is video linkages with four primary classrooms. The
for their expanded repertoire of teaching strategies, second PT3 grant, Reflective Mediation Through
by providing for more thoughtful decision-making the Use of Technology2, continued the work of the
when responding to children (Darling-Hammond, first with the development of a research-based set
1998). Experiences over time are needed for pre- of best practices for supporting reflection with
service teachers to acquire teaching confidence, technology.
make connections from theory to practice, and
engage in reflection on teaching; however, time
constraints, lack of access to classrooms, school CHANGING FIELD EXPERIENCES
safety issues, and liability concerns are some of AND THE ROLE OF TECHNOLOGY
the issues prompting teacher-education programs
to find alternative ways to design and structure Teacher-preparation programs in the sixties and
early field experiences (Adcock & Austin, 2002). seventies often had the luxury of a laboratory

889
 The Real World Buffalo

school on campus (usually attended by the chil- instructors, preservice and in-service teachers,
dren of faculty and staff). Eager, inexperienced and the students and their families) in helping to
preservice teachers were able to observe and oc- reduce disconnect between theory and practice.
casionally participate at the lab school for short Darling-Hammond (1992) identified professional
field experiences, testing their “teaching wings” development schools as positioned to provide
prior to the student teaching year. Many of these accountability “by ensuring that they (preservice
schools had rooms equipped with one-way mirrors teachers) have the tools to apply theory in practice
and microphones allowing guided observations to and by socializing them to professional norms and
occur for a whole college class. The sixties ver- ethics” (p. 91). Others (Levine, 1992) argued that
sion of “high-tech” classrooms enabled students typical schools are ill-suited to provide the right
to unobtrusively see and hear the culture of a environment and support for professionalization,
classroom under the interpretation and mediation and that the cooperating teacher/student clinical
of an instructor. If time permitted, the teacher practice model implemented in most teacher-
might join the college class to talk about their education programs does not support the “reflec-
teaching and answer any questions. This provided tion in action” necessary for the preparation of
a less intrusive way for an entire class to watch quality teachers.
teaching in action. In the movement for professionalization of
Evidence suggests that labs schools have been teaching, teacher-education programs seek accred-
in a steady decline since the 1970’s. In 1964, a itation to improve outcomes for teacher-education
survey had responses from 186 schools, while in candidates and to distinguish their programs. In
1980 there were around 100 lab school respondents the past, teacher-education programs could be-
(Levin, 1990). As college budgets tightened, lab come accredited if they could demonstrate their
schools became financial burdens and less of a curriculums provided the appropriate experiences
priority. Faculty began seeking natural settings for candidates to become knowledgeable in both
for fieldwork more representative of the increas- content and pedagogy. There was little emphasis
ing diversity of modern classrooms. Laboratory on early field experiences before the student
schools were converted into child development teaching year. Current standards from accredita-
centers, office, and classroom space, and teacher tion organizations like the National Council for
educators turned to the schools in the community Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE)
to provide classrooms and teachers for early field call for field experiences that are clearly defined
experiences in addition to the capstone semester by individual teacher-education programs. Can-
of student teaching. didates should have “diverse, well-planned, and
MacNaughton and Johns (1993) suggest that sequenced experiences in P-12 Schools” (NCATE,
the professional development schools (PDS) 2002, p. 4). The PDS Standards Project of NCATE
movement was the next step in the evolution to has identified 28 highly-developed PDS sites,
improve connections between university-based which in a survey described their practices, goals,
and field-based teacher-preparation components. and funding sources. These data, along with a
College faculty began negotiating with schools literature review and other commissioned papers,
interested in forming collaborations for the pur- were used to develop a set of standards for PDS
pose of mentoring preservice teachers by provid- endorsed by the Unit Accreditation Board Stan-
ing early field experiences, methods classes, and dards Committee in March, 2001 (Teitel, 1999).
student teaching on-site in school buildings. Work of the PDS movement, along with more
Professional development schools made sense clearly-defined statements from accreditation
because they involved multiple players (college councils and state boards of education, seems

890
The Real World Buffalo

to suggest that preservice field experiences are watch a common teaching episode while an
equally as important for preservice teachers as instructor mediates what is being observed?
the student teaching year and should be given 3. Can students be encouraged to use a higher
careful attention. Teacher education programs are level of reflection if the field experience
encouraged to give consideration to the quality of is technologically-mediated instead of ac-
the setting, number of hours, and how the place- tively participating in a randomly-assigned
ments are supervised. classroom?
With the challenge to meet high standards, 4. How have technology-mediated observa-
teacher-education programs have been pushed to tions reduced students’ stereotypes of work-
improve in many areas simultaneously. Technol- ing in an urban classroom?
ogy, diversity, and quality field experiences are
three areas that have been targeted as needing These are some of the questions under inves-
improvement (Cochran-Smith, 1995; Irving, 2000; tigation in a project using technology to mediate
NCATE, 1997). Research has documented the reflection involving teacher-education students
value of using technology in teacher-education and the teachers and children at one charter school.
programs, and teacher educators are asked to
model the integration of technology to ensure
that future teachers will include technology in A UNIQUE URBAN SCHOOL: THE
their own classrooms (Strudler & Wetzel, 1999). KING CENTER CHARTER SCHOOL
Many have documented the effectiveness of early,
ample, and well-supported field experiences and In the mid 1980’s, a 100-year-old church scheduled
focused observations in urban schools in order to for demolition in inner-city Buffalo was given
facilitate confidence, commitment, and readiness “historic landmark” status, thus saving it from
to succeed in teaching in urban schools (Groulx, destruction. A committee was commissioned to
2001). Classroom observations are enhanced study possible adaptive reuses for the building. It
when preservice teachers are able to engage in was agreed, since the hope for reviving this com-
collaborative reflection with urban teachers and munity would reside in ensuring the education and
college faculty (Fountain, 1994). well-being of its children, that the facility would
With increased emphasis on enriching the be used to provide the highest quality of educa-
number, quality, and diversity of preservice school tion for this predominantly African-American
experiences, and preparing preservice teachers to community’s youngest children. Support from
utilize technology, the following questions could local colleges and universities would be essential
be posed to assess the effectiveness of any changes to the project.
as to how teacher education programs implement After years of fund raising and planning, a Pre-
and structure field experiences: K through Grade 2 program, designed to model
a high-quality, research-based, holistic education
1. How have technology innovations been able opened as the King Center, and was housed in an
to reproduce and improve the experience of early childhood center in a public school until the
the guided observation (allowing students to church was renovated and ready for occupancy.
observe a common teaching episode) as it In 1993, Yale University’s Bush Center in Child
unfolds live and unedited? Development and Social Policy designated the
2. Can the quality of students’ reflections be King Center as New York State’s first “School of
changed and enhanced by the opportunity to the 21st Century” (Hoot, Massey, Barnett, Henry,

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& Ernest, 2001). As New York State joined other Teacher Participation
states in passing a charter school law, the King
Center submitted a proposal to the SUNY board The PT3 grant project relied on teachers from
of trustees for a charter. The King Center School’s the school to volunteer. In the beginning, all
application to begin a K–3 school for 80 children classrooms were equipped with cameras, but only
was approved, and the school opened in August, two teachers agreed to participate. After several
2000. Grade 4 was added in 2002. guided observations, the two teachers shared their
enthusiasm with the rest of the staff at the school.
Phase I: Videoconferencing All were continually encouraged and invited to
Technology and Guided join when they felt ready. Within two years, all
Observations at the King teachers were hosting guided observations for
Center Charter School students in teacher-education programs.
The four participating teachers have two to
The school’s virtual learning collaboratory (dis- fourteen years of teaching experience. One was
tance learning room) has the capability to bring designated as a “master” teacher when she was
professors from area colleges/universities and their employed in the public school system. Two of the
students together with teachers and children for the teachers have been with the school since it opened
purpose of observing “real-time teaching” using a in 2000. The school enrolls 100 children in five
distance learning environment. Four classrooms classrooms, with the same building leader since
(K-3) are equipped with corner-mounted cameras. inception. There is cohesiveness in the philosophy,
The teacher is provided with a microphone and teaching strategies, and behavior management
camera remote pack. A laser-tracking device fol- that preservice students see during each virtual
lows the teacher’s movements in a limited range observation.
within the classroom. The microphone picks up Participating teachers comment that they get
conversations between the teacher and children. nervous before each session begins and are con-
Typically the children know when the camera is stantly aware that twenty to twenty-five preservice
on for an observation, but within minutes they are teachers are watching every move and hanging on
usually absorbed in their work, easily ignoring the their words. Every teacher expressed the realistic
presence of the camera. worry that a child might have a “meltdown” while
The school utilizes the technology for many the camera was on. On the positive side, teachers
projects. For example, the director of the school state that participating in the guided observations
has asked each teacher to videotape several lessons makes them conscious of teacher language, lesson
and decide on one to use for performance evalua- materials, and student feedback.
tion and assessment of teaching skills. From the
initial installation of the cameras, however, the I try to model appropriate and logical conse-
school was primarily interested in linking with quences for students’ misbehavior. I try to make
higher-education institutions for consultation and sure that I model various strategies for motivating
to serve as a virtual urban lab school. Buffalo State and engaging students in a lesson.
College responded to the invitation to partner and
subsequently included King Center Charter School I find that I try to stress positive teacher language
in two PT3 grants acquired in 2001 and 2003. and consistency when the college students are
watching me teach. I try to be explicit with logi-
cal consequences.

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I try to model using a quiet voice and redirecting class meetings to have students participate in this
in a neutral tone. I try not to become emotion- unique new format for guided observations. After
ally charged when students make poor choices a campus-wide mailing, posting flyers, scheduling
regarding behavior/conduct. I try to model a deep a demonstration seminar, describing the project,
sense of respect and reverence for the individual and inviting people to sign up, the project has
humanness of each student. I model my relation- sustained a small group of regular participants
ship as a nurturer/caretaker. who typically requested one observation each
semester. Once instructors had a direct experience
In spite of the pressures and responsibilities of using the technology, they were eager to repeat
normal classroom teaching, the added complica- the process with students each semester.
tions of scheduling videoconferencing sessions, The teacher education classes that participated
and the need to leave the classroom and their came from several departments, including Elemen-
children to talk with the college students, the teach- tary Education, Early Childhood, and Art Educa-
ers continued to volunteer because they believed tion. The students enrolled in the classes were in
in professional development and giving back the first three years of their teacher-education pro-
to teacher-education programs by sharing their gram. For most students, the guided observation
experiences and expertise, even at a beginning or experience represented only one piece in a collage
emerging level. Their continued willing participa- of early clinical field experiences prior to student
tion highlights the critical importance of trust in teaching. The college instructor of the class and
relationships between partners. This seemed key the project liaison mediated every distance learn-
to sustaining the work. For the teachers in this ing session. As is the case with all college/school
project, knowing that a person who knew both their collaborations, the project was possible because
work and them professionally and personally was a level of trust had been established between the
stationed in the college distance learning room, teachers at the charter school, their director, and
interpreting and moderating the videoconference the higher education project director, prior to the
for the college students, kept them volunteering implementation of the first grant. Teachers were
and participating in the program. more comfortable being observed knowing that
a person that they knew and trusted (the project
Technologically-Mediated director) was on-site and available to clarify for
Guided Observations students what they were observing.
The guided observations were structured for
Buffalo State College education faculty were different purposes, depending on the request of the
invited to schedule a session (during their regular college professor. For example, an Introduction
class time) in the distance learning room on campus to Education class asked to observe 15 minutes
and participate in a “guided observation” of an in each of the kindergarten through third-grade
unedited, live teaching episode. Initially there was rooms. The instructor wanted students to look at
concern that the project might be overwhelmed room arrangement, transition techniques, activity
with requests. If so, it would not be possible to level across grade levels, and behavior manage-
burden the four participating teachers and the ment techniques. A reading methods instructor re-
children at the charter school with too many quested an observation of a guided reading lesson.
interruptions in one week. However, as Boccia, A literacy methods professor wanted to observe
Fontaine, and Lucas (2002) found in their “Look- the kindergarten teacher model interactive writing
ing into Classrooms Project”, the college faculty or sharing the pen (something which had been
seemed reluctant to take time out of scheduled difficult for students to observe in their live field

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placements). With prior planning, requests were specific child’s behavior and the teacher’s use of
easily accommodated in the classroom teacher’s different behavior management strategies. Another
normal daily schedule. Teachers e-mailed the common question was how the teacher acquired
lesson plan prior to the scheduled observation. ideas for a particular lesson, and how long it took
Students were encouraged to follow the plan and to prepare and plan the entire lesson.
match what they observed with what had been
planned. Detours taken from the original lesson Students’ Reactions
plan were frequently a source of questions and
reflection in the debriefing talks following each From surveys collected during the initial phase
observation. of the guided observations, students reported a
Immediately following the 20- to 30-minute positive reaction to this virtual field experience
observation, the classroom teacher moved to the and an increased understanding of the realities of
school’s collaboratory and held an interactive teaching and urban schools. It was revealing to
session with the college students, including ques- read some of their misunderstandings and sober-
tions and answers. Initially, students seemed quiet ing to realize the work still needing to be done
during the question-and-answer period. In spite in teacher-education programs to uncover and
of this generation’s increased use of technology, discuss misperceptions and biases.
seeing themselves on TV and being asked to speak
into a microphone as the camera focused on them The obvious strength of this experience is being
was novel and unsettling for them. Almost all able to look over the shoulder of a skilled profes-
students who participated reported that they had sional as she demonstrates the concepts we have
never been in the distance learning room prior read and talked about. Nothing (short of actually
to the guided observation. The students seemed doing it) makes a concept clearer than seeing it
to need encouragement and prompts for asking actively and accurately portrayed in real-world
questions. It appeared that they felt uncomfortable settings.
voicing a question to the classroom teacher in
front of peers while the camera focused on them. This experience gave us an unedited picture of a
Students were encouraged to write down a question teacher and students in action. It was great to see
or thoughts that occurred during the observation, what we’ve learned about in every education class
with the intent of asking the teacher during the in an actual setting, not just words in some text.
debriefing. Additionally, the project leader and
the instructor would pose questions (during the I have gained more confidence. It is easy to read
observation) about what the teacher appeared to information in a textbook or watch videos, but
be doing and saying, and suggested that students to actually see everything implemented live by
should ask the teacher to clarify these points dur- a teacher who is unable to go back and redo or
ing the debriefing. Questions commonly asked by erase mistakes...This was so inspiring and gave
the students centered around specific aspects of me a realistic view that everything is not always
a lesson plan, the reaction of the children to the going to be perfect and that it does not have to
lesson, and what the teacher planned to do in a be either.
follow-up lesson. Students asked about teaching
strategies, the children’s behavior, curriculum I expected a bunch of wild, out of control children.
requirements, discipline, family involvement, and What I saw was a group of bright, well-behaved
differences between charter and public schools. children with just as much potential as other
Students frequently queried the teacher about a children.

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I was much more afraid of urban schools before a class-embedded virtual field experience. One
this experience. There are a lot more similarities course section of the Introduction to Literacy class
to suburban schools than I previously thought. served as the pilot for the project.
After assessing feedback from preservice
teachers, instructors, and the classroom teachers,
REFLECTIVE MEDIATION-IN-ACTION it seemed that the true value of observation for
preservice teachers lay in the opportunity to hear
Mediated reflection using a virtual field experience classroom teachers reflect on their teaching im-
evolved and changed over several semesters. After mediately after a lesson, to have their instructor
three semesters of scheduling guided observations mediate discussion, and to integrate the virtual
and receiving positive student feedback, the proj- observation into college classroom conversa-
ect added additional open observation times and tions and activities. This led to reconceptualizing
invited all students enrolled in any section (usu- and implementing phase two of the virtual field
ally six or seven) of Introduction to Literacy, an experiences.
early course in the teacher-education program, to
take advantage of the opportunity to watch good Phase II: Using Technology to
teachers teach literacy. Meditate Reflection in a Course-
A graduate student was hired to monitor the Linked Virtual Field Experience
open sessions, but the teachers at the school were
unable to leave their classrooms for the question- Reflection is a complex, abstract concept. Though
and-answer period due to the frequency of the most educators state that it is an important trait
open observation times (three mornings a week for teachers to possess, it has become a difficult
for one-and-a-half hours). term to concretely define and even more diffi-
The open observation model proved problem- cult to determine how to prepare teachers to be
atic for many reasons. Few students were able to reflective practitioners, especially in unfamiliar
come to the distance learning room in the mornings cultural contexts. The preservice teachers quoted
because of other course commitments. Instructors in the Instructor’s Vignette show how traditional
had other teaching responsibilities and could not field experience conditions perpetuate limited
be there to observe alongside the students. The opportunity for reflection. Frequently, instruc-
classroom teachers at the school felt burdened by tors send class participants to different schools
having to “go live” so many hours in one week. for short periods of time with no opportunity to
Reflecting on the data collected, we found integrate what they observe in schools to course
that the students reported experiences of using content or class conversations. In essence, students
video-conferencing to conduct the guided ob- are left to observe and participate in individual
servations as valuable. The guided observations, field placements with limited opportunities for
though valuable and positive, were still discon- any meaningful discussion or reflection with an
nected and needed to be included in the content instructor or mentor.
of individual courses if faculty were to become To complicate matters further, reflection is not
convinced to use class time to fulfill the field ex- generally associated with teachers. Teaching is seen
perience requirement. Following one semester of as immediate action, whereas reflection is perceived
combining some scheduled guided observations as a more academic action (Hatton & Smith, 1995).
including student/teacher debriefing sessions, Additionally, it has been suggested that preservice
and adding open observation times which proved teachers tend to revert to traditional notions of
ineffective, we decided to develop a model using teaching and learning during student teaching.

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These assumptions may be further reinforced in a from their own assumptions and biases to notice
traditional teaching environment. If these beliefs problems in their practice. They can then reframe
are firmly held, teacher candidates are resistant to problems in light of multiple perspectives and take
reflection and change (Yost, Sentner, & Forlenza- action that is informed by reframing. As shown in
Bailey, 2000). Furthermore, it is often difficult for the students’ comments, preservice teachers were
teacher candidates to even know what to reflect forced to confront their biases and assumptions
about (Dieker & Monda-Amaya, 1997). It is im- of urban schools and children by having the op-
portant, then, for teacher educators to facilitate this portunity to observe, reflect on what they were
reflection before the teacher candidate reaches the seeing, and then speak directly with the classroom
point of student teaching. In the course-embedded teachers following each observation.
virtual field experience, preservice teachers were Reflectivity appears to develop in stages.
engaged in mediated reflection on teaching from Researchers have found that teachers who are
three different viewpoints. Preservice teachers reflective move from a singular focus on technical
were watching and reflecting on the classroom issues surrounding the delivery of lessons when
teacher’s teaching. Simultaneously, the college they first enter the teaching field, to critical re-
instructor was watching, reflecting, and talking flection, where master teachers regularly examine
with them about the classroom teacher’s teaching, the technical, practical, social, and moral issues
and finally they were hearing the classroom teacher inherent in their design of the learning environment
reflect on their own teaching during the question- in their classroom from multiple perspectives.
and-answer period. Contrasted to the traditional Master teachers are also able to make changes to
field experience, where the preservice teacher is their teaching that improve student learning based
alone in a classroom watching and observing and on a variety of sometimes competing factors.
returns to campus without time for debriefing with These teachers take responsibility for their own
a classroom teacher, the virtual field experience can learning and that of their students (Giovannelli,
simultaneously provide four two-way communica- 2003; Hatton & Smith, 1995; Truesdell, 2004;
tion opportunities: students and classroom teacher, Yost, Sentner, & Forlenza-Bailey, 2000).
instructor and students, instructor and classroom Videoconferencing, as described in this project,
teacher, and student to student. provides a unique forum for preservice teachers
The teacher educator must “induce disequi- to be in a field experience environment where
librium and cognitive conflict” in the learner to reflection dominated the conversations with the
prepare him/her for critical reflection (Yost et al., college instructor and the classroom teachers. For
2000, p. 42). As the instructor’s reflections in the example, they might (and did) question teachers
vignette suggests, the instructor can mediate reflec- about the details of their lesson plans by asking
tion through a common virtual field experience. how long something took to plan or prepare (sin-
The instructor can facilitate reflection by posing gular focus), yet have the opportunity to hear a
questions before, during, and after the observation response from the teacher who would speak with
(Appendix B). Preservice teachers can observe them about how that lesson looked in the first year
the classroom teacher’s thought processes while that she taught it and the changes that had been
she/he responds to questions posed following made based on her own reflection on practice.
each observation. Our attempt in both phases of this project was
Reflective teachers and teacher candidates to move preservice teachers from reporting what
develop a habit of continually learning from ex- they observed, which is evidenced in early iterations
perience. According to Whipp (2003), reflective of the traditional field experience, to more critical
teacher candidates have the ability to stand back reflection based on a common mediated experience.

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Box 1. Instructor’s vignette

Instructor’s Reflection
The first semester, I taught the Introduction to Literacy class using a traditional field experience model. Throughout the fifteen-week
semester, students went to various schools to observe in the classroom for a total of ten hours. The students kept observation logs and wrote
a culminating paper describing their experience. This field experience was problematic in a number of ways. Because many of the preservice
teachers were non-traditional students and local schools are at capacity with teacher education students (there are nine institutions preparing
teachers within a fifty mile radius), placing students for observations was always difficult.
A second difficulty with traditional observations was students were watching one 45 minute to one hour lesson with no context of what
happened prior to or what would happen in the future. There was no way to control for good, bad or indifferent teaching, and I was unsure
whether the students would even recognize the quality of the teaching they observed. The students were very quick to judge the teachers and
the children’s behaviors without reflecting on what they were seeing. They just reacted. Compounding that, students all observed different
classes at different times, so it was impossible to have class conversations regarding the observations. Often what they observed in their
separate schools was disconnected to the conversations, readings and activities taking place in class.
These issues led to a discussion with the project director about other possible formats for observation. The following semester we decided
to have students utilize an open observation plan at the distance-learning laboratory. The teachers agreed to take turns being observed for
three mornings a week for one and a half hours at a time. After the observations occurred, the preservice teachers were excited to talk about
what they observed. Again though, only two to three students of a class of twenty-four observed the same lesson, and I, as the instructor, was
unable to observe any of the lessons. A major complaint of the preservice teachers was that the open observation times were not convenient
for them since the school taught literacy in the morning and most college students had a full schedule of classes in the morning. There were
issues with the technology not working on several occasions further frustrating the preservice teachers.
Once again, with the help of the project liaison, we re-conceptualized the field experience. This time, we decided to utilize class time to
facilitate and mediate the field experience observations. Because this is a critical course, prior to the field-based literacy methods classes held
in professional development schools, agreeing to give up class time were very difficult. One stipulation was that the observations had to be in-
tegrated with the content of our college course. The project liaison and I met with the teachers from the school. The teachers were each given
a copy of the syllabus with topics, assignments, and dates (Appendix A). We discussed which topics would be best for observation and which
teacher’s style was best suited to that topic. We determined that, after the lesson, the teacher would go into the collaboratory and reflect on
her teaching and answer the preservice teachers’ questions.We agreed on six observations and determined the dates to correspond with course
content. After each observation, I posted one question on a collaborative Web-based discussion group site (Appendix B). All students were
required to respond. They were encouraged to respond to others’ postings.
My misgivings about relinquishing precious class time for the observations were eliminated about ten minutes into the first observation.
The students (and I) were mesmerized by the classroom teaching. The discussions on Blackboard and in class were far richer than the old
“field experience paper” that was required during previous semesters. Because we all had a common observation experience connected to our
classroom readings and discussions, we could dialogue based on our personal interpretations. This allowed us to debate, break down stereo-
types, and change some of our notions of teaching. After the final observation, I posed the following questions:
On a scale of 1 (poor) to 10 (great), how would you rate the usefulness and the relevance of our observations in the distance-learning lab?
How did these observations enhance your learning? What did you get in the observations that would not have been possible by observing in
person? Do you feel you missed out on anything by not observing in person? What might it have been?
Every student rated the experience an 8, 9 or 10. Comments from students included:
…one of the great things about observing in the lab was that you were able to communicate with the teachers and have them do plans on
what we were learning about in class…
We didn’t have to get into a car and drive somewhere and only spend 30 minutes in the classroom. Then the students are not going to
behave normally because someone is new and they will act up for the time that I am there.
We did not interrupt their learning process and got to see how the kids really do act during a typical day.
…we could talk about the events from the observation as a class and we had the opportunity to observe the things that we were learning
about.
I did like that we did this as a class, so that all of us were on the same page and could discuss some of the effective as well as ineffective
practices that some of the teachers were taking. If we would have all went to different schools, and seen different exercises being imple-
mented in the classroom, our discussions would not have gone very far as none of our classmates would have known what we were talking
about. Also, we cannot be guaranteed that what we would have observed would have reinforced the concepts that we were learning about in
the classroom.
In my opinion, one of the best things that came out of these observations is the knowledge that we gained as a result of talking with the co-
operating teachers. When doing observations in classrooms, it is rare that we are able to talk with the teacher after we have seen her in action.
Talking with the teachers after observing them allowed us to grasp a true understanding of what they did and why, and allowed us to ask them
questions if we were unclear about any of the exercises that they did with their students.
It seems clear the mediated field experiences were more meaningful to the preservice teachers and enhanced the classroom readings, dis-
cussions and activities. Final evidence of the success of the virtual field experience came from the department evaluation which all students
are required to fill out at the end of the semester. In response to the question “What aspects of the course were most beneficial to you?” eleven
students out of twenty, unprompted, mentioned the distance learning lab observations. Clearly I’m encouraged to continue to use this model.
The evolution of planning for and thinking about this integrated field experience has enabled me to reflect on my own teaching. I find myself
more intentional about including what we see in the observations into class activities and conversations. On one occasion we observed a
vocabulary lesson. Following this, the students were required to present, with a group, a vocabulary mini-lesson. The students incorporated
several strategies they observed the teacher from the charter school model during her vocabulary lesson into their mini-lessons. Rather than
feeling students missed out on instructional time, I think the students have been enriched and their professional development supported by the
video- conferencing experience.

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Figure 1. Opportunities for mediated reflection in traditional and virtual field experiences

NEW TECHNOLOGIES BRING BOTH grants via Buffalo’s local telephone company,
CHALLENGES AND PROMISE Verizon (formerly Nynex). Each classroom in
the network contained the same equipment: eight
Distance learning via interactive television (pro- 32-inch SONY television monitors; one teacher
grammable two-way audio and video signals for station that included a touch panel to control the
communication using television monitors as a equipment; a computer with Internet access; an
display) began at Buffalo State College in 1995 Elmo document camera to display items; a tele-
when the campus was granted funds to purchase phone/fax machine; and two VCRs, one to play
equipment to create two distance learning class- videotapes and the other to record class sessions
rooms and join the Western New York Fiber to tape. Each classroom had a multifaceted sound
Network. At its peak, the network included over system, student area and teacher station micro-
100 classrooms in K-12 schools throughout the phones, and separate student view and teacher
western eight counties in New York State. Buffalo cameras. Students and teachers in each classroom
State College built two of the original distance were able to see and hear each other at television
learning classrooms for two consortia within the broadcast quality audio and video.
network, Buffalo CityNet and Project Connect. Despite the successes, there have been chal-
Over the past 11 years, the network was lenges which discouraged the use of the present
quietly phased out by nearly all of the original model for more preservice field experiences in
schools. The initial contracts with Verizon for teacher education. Access to high-quality schools
access to the network were for ten years; for with distance-learning facilities is unique and not
many school districts in Western New York, this commonly found. The consortia fees enabling the
contract period has ended. Using E-Rate funds, college to connect to King Center Charter School
the original local BOCES centers have entered and belong to both Project Connect network the
contract discussions with local cable companies CityNet were $40,000 annually. Scheduled ses-
to create a Gigabit Ether Network (Gig-E), which sions are sometimes abruptly cancelled (due to
will continue to provide high-speed connections unforeseen occurrences at the charter school), or
not only into specially-equipped classrooms but, the technology at one of the sites fails.
via videoconferencing technologies, having the Many factors contributed to the decline in use
potential to make any classroom, any laboratory, or of the original distance learning classrooms. Main-
any media center into a distance learning facility. tenance and repair of the equipment was costly and
The distance learning classrooms at Buffalo required trained technicians. All of the classrooms
State College were built with a diffusion fund and were built with grant or diffusion funds and, at the

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conclusion of the grant, there were districts that less-expensive solutions for quality of the virtual
could not continue with the expensive consortia field experience is important.
fees (approximately $16,000 yearly). While the use of interactive videoconferencing
Given all of the changes to the original Fiber continues at educational institutions worldwide,
Network, the college and the charter school have there are other emerging technologies that will
continued their involvement due in part to the impact teaching and learning. As the cost of
successful relationship of this project involving videoconferencing equipment and broadband
the education department and the charter school. connections continue to decline, and the quality
The college will leave CityNet consortium this of the audio and video increases, more schools
year, having recently purchased a videoconfer- may have the opportunity to become involved in
encing unit that will allow expanding virtual virtual field experiences and other technology-
field observations and offering college courses to supported preservice-education activities.
other locations in Western New York and around
the world.
The new videoconferencing unit, a Tandberg FUTURE TRENDS
6000 codec, costing $19,000, will be integrated
into the old Fiber Network classroom. The This model suggests potential for addressing key
classroom will be redesigned with upgrades to issues in teacher preparation. Since the literature
accommodate the change from fiber to Internet states that students tend to default to the model
protocol (IP) video conferencing. The eight SONY that they experience in student teaching, it seems
television monitors will be removed and replaced important for teacher-education programs to
with two movie-sized projection screens. Two search for ways to increase the quality, diversity,
projectors will be mounted to the ceiling of the and number of early field experiences which
classroom, one to display the teacher view and one preservice teachers encounter. Observing and
to display the student’s view of the other distance reflecting on many different teaching behaviors
sites. A new teacher station will be incorporated, in a mediated environment prior to student teach-
one that is consistent with other teacher stations in ing, preservice teachers have the opportunity to
smart classrooms on campus, in order to facilitate internalize multiple responses and, rather than
faculty use. New furniture will be added along defaulting to what they experienced as children
with wireless microphones, new cameras, and, in school or to their one student-teaching model,
with an eye to the future, an expandable option are prepared to respond more appropriately to
that will allow the college to add on video capture individual children.
software and other emerging technologies. Feedback from the guided observations con-
Transferring from the current system will be ducted in phase one of the project suggested the
expensive for both partners, but, in the long run, power of a single virtual observation in helping
will potentially save thousands of dollars each students alter their perceptions and attitudes about
year. The old system relied on a local phone urban classrooms and teaching. With repeated
company with fees and a network manager with mediated observations, students saw numerous
additional fees. The new system will allow for an respectful student/teacher interactions, more
organization to manage the site internally. While examples of positive behavior management and
even more cost-effective solutions (such as using culturally-responsive teaching, and many targeted
the Internet with cameras positioned at both loca- literacy strategies. Students could begin to rethink
tions) are a possibility, closely monitoring these their notion of teaching and learning and move
further along the continuum of internalizing reflec-

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tive teaching rather than relying on a singular reac- ment. Initial findings from the project described
tive response applied uniformly for all children. in this chapter suggest some benefits for all stake-
This leads us to speculate that repeated selective holders (see Figure 3). Unique to this project is
observations in different classroom settings (rural, the opportunity for preservice teachers, college
exceptional education, culturally-responsive, and instructors, and classroom teachers to engage in
linguistically-diverse classrooms) would enable observations and conversations simultaneously
preservice teachers to have a repertoire of re- reflecting on the process of teaching and learning.
sponses, strategies, and behaviors to bring to the
first years of teaching in any setting.
Additional work by Garrett and Dudt (1998) CONCLUSION
suggests that videoconferencing can be effectively
used to supervise student teachers. In a project While the use of interactive videoconferencing con-
using three wired sites and 24 student teachers, tinues at educational institutions worldwide, there
preliminary findings suggest that videoconferenc- are other emerging technologies that will impact
ing for student teaching supervision works across teaching and learning.As the cost of videoconferenc-
settings and disciplines with minimal preparation. ing equipment and broadband connections continue
Students, cooperating teachers, and supervisors to decline, and the quality of the audio and video
can effectively collaborate in the supervisory improves, more schools may have the opportunity
process. Similar to the participants of the charter to become involved in virtual field experiences and
school project described in this chapter, Garrett other technology-supported preservice-education ac-
and Dudt (1998) found that the human aspects of tivities. While we cannot prepare preservice teachers
the planning, scheduling, and conferencing were for every situation that they will encounter, we can do
more important to the quality of using distant a better job of diversifying their teacher-preparation
supervision than the technical aspects (problems experiences by using opportunities like technology-
and quality) of using videoconferencing equip- mediated virtual field experiences.

Table 1. Benefits for stakeholders

Preservice teachers can…

• Observe one teacher and classroom at the same time
• Eliminate travel time and transportation issues
• Concentrate without being distracted by being inside the classroom environment
• Gain more opportunities for mediated reflection with an instructor
• Ask questions about what is happening immediately and in later class sessions
Talk simultaneously with college instructors and classroom teachers about teaching and learning
College faculty can….
• Request and plan specific lessons related to course readings and assignments
• Supervise all students in their virtual field placement simultaneously
• Have the opportunity for “in-the-moment” reflection on teaching practice and refer back to scenarios that the whole class observed
• Ask questions of the classroom teacher in the presence of the preservice teachers to raise teachable moments, thus intentionally connect-
ing theory to practice
Talk simultaneously with classroom teachers and preservice teachers about teaching and learning
Classroom teachers can…
• Eliminate the distraction of too many adults in the classroom
• Model good practices and think more intentionally about their teaching and student learning
• Influence the curriculum of teacher-education preparation
• Participate in research influencing teaching and learning
• Learn more about current theory and practice in teacher-education programs
• Share “practical experiences” gained from classroom teaching
• Talk simultaneously with college instructors and preservice teachers about teaching and learning

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The Real World Buffalo

REFERENCES Groulx, J. (2001). Changing preservice teacher

perceptions of minority schools. Urban Educa-
Adcock, P., & Austin, W. (2002, March). Alter- tion, 36, 60–92. doi:10.1177/0042085901361005
native classroom observation through two-way
audio/video conferencing systems. Paper presented Hatton, N., & Smith, D. (1995). Reflection in
at the Society for Information Technology and teacher education towards definition and imple-
Teacher Education Conference. mentation. Teaching and Teacher Education,
11(1), 33–49. doi:10.1016/0742-051X(94)00012-
Boccia, J., Fontain, P., & Lucas, F. Michael. U
(2002, March). Looking into classrooms: A
technology mediated observation program for Hoot, J., Massey, C., Barnett, M., Henry, J., &
preservice teachers. Paper presented at Society Ernest, J. (2001). A former church as a center of
for Information Technology and Teacher Educa- excellence for children. Childhood Education,
tion Conference. 77(6), 386–392.

Cochran-Smith, M. (1995). Uncertain allies: Irving, K. (2001). Innovations in observing chil-

Understanding the boundaries of race and teach- dren: Use of new technologies. In Yelland, N.
ing. Harvard Educational Review, 56, 541–570. (Ed.) Promoting meaningful learning: Innovations
in educating early childhood professionals (pp.
Darling-Hammond, L. (1992). Accountability 77-83). Washington, DC: National Association
for professional practice. In M. Levine (Ed.), for the Education of Young Children.
Professional practice schools: Linking teacher
education and school reform (pp. 81-104). New Levin, R. (1990, November). An unfulfilled alli-
York: Teachers College Press. ance. The lab school in teacher education: Two
case students, 1910-1980. Paper presented at
Darling-Hammond, L. (1994). Professional the Annual Meeting of the History of Education
development schools: Schools for developing a Society, Atlanta, GA.
profession. New York: Teachers College Press.
Levine, M. (1992). Professional practice schools:
Dieker, L. A., & Monda-Amaya, L. E. (1997). Linking teacher education and school reform.
Using problem solving and effective teaching New York: Teachers College Press.
frameworks to promote reflective thinking in
preservice special educators. Teacher Education MacNaughton, R., & Johns, F. (1993). The profes-
and Special Education, 20(1), 22–36. sional development school: An emerging concept.
Contemporary Education, 64(4), 215–218.
Fountain, C., & Evans, D. (1994). Beyond shared
rhetoric: A collaborative change model for inte- National Council for Accreditation of Teacher
grating preservice and in-service urban education Education (NCATE). (2002). Professional stan-
delivery systems. Journal of Teacher Education, dards for the accreditation of schools, depart-
45, 218–227. doi:10.1177/0022487194045003008 ments, and colleges of education (p. 4). Retrieved
March 19, 2006, from http://ncate.org /documents/
Garrett, J., & Dudt, K. (1998). Using video con- unit_stnds_2002.pdf
ferencing to supervise student teachers. In Pro-
ceedings of the SITE 98: Society for Information Strudler, N., & Wetzel, K. (1999). Lessons from
Technology & Teacher Education International exemplary colleges of education: Factors affecting
Conference, Washington, DC: Vol. 9 (pp. 142- technology integration in preservice programs.
150). Educational Technology Research and Develop-
ment, 47, 63–81. doi:10.1007/BF02299598

901
 The Real World Buffalo

Teitel, L. (1999). Looking toward the future by ENDNOTES

understanding the past: The historical context
of professional development schools. Peabody
*
The name “The Real World” is copyrighted
Journal of Education, 74(3/4), 6–15. doi:10.1207/ by MTV.
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1
Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers to Use
Technology (2001-2004). Title: Technology
Truesdell, K. S. (1998). Broadening professinal = Access: Teaching Future Urban Teachers
development through school-university collabo- Project, U.S. Department of Education,
ration. Thesis (Ed.)—State University of New P342A010061
York at Buffalo. 2
Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers to Use Tech-
Whipp, J. L. (2003). Scaffolding critical reflection nology (2004-2007). Title: Reflective Me-
in online discussions. Journal of Teacher Education, diation Through the Use of Technology, U.S.
54(4), 321–333. doi:10.1177/0022487103255010 Department of Education, P342A030088

Yost, D. S., Sentner, S. M., & Forlenza-Bailey,

A. (2000). An examination of the construct
of critical reflection: Implications for teacher
education programming in the 21st century.
Journal of Teacher Education, 51(1), 39–49.
doi:10.1177/002248710005100105

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The Real World Buffalo

APPENDIX A

Sample Schedule of Mediated

Observations in Literacy Instruction

September 13: Community building—Kindergarten

September 22: Emergent reading/writing—1st Grade
September 29: Phonics Lesson—1st Grade
October 27: Vocabulary—2nd Grade
November 10: Poetry—2nd Grade
November 17: Reader’s workshop—3rd Grade
December 1: Assessment—Reading support instructor

APPENDIX B

Discussion Board Questions Posted Following Classroom Observations

Observation 1: How did Ms. Lockhart model reading, writing, listening, and speaking? How did it
enhance the children’s learning?
Observation 2: What dispositions did Miss Ortiz display that are important for teachers of young chil-
dren? Why are these important? How do these dispositions enhance learning?
Observation 3: So far in our observations, we observed lessons in kindergarten and first grade. This
week, we observed a 3rd grade classroom. What did you notice about the comparison in pacing
and length of activity, conversations between teacher and child, and behavior management strate-
gies? Thinking about the text reading, activities/discussions in class, and the observation, were
the teacher’s vocabulary strategies effective? Explain. What was one strength? What would you
have done differently?
Observation 4: What were your thoughts and feelings about the content of today’s lesson (poetry in 2nd
grade), what the children brought to the lesson (and how they responded), how the teacher handled
the interactions, and anything else you reflect on what you observed.
Observation 5: Ms. Schwartz discussed early on that she was going to do assessment rather than testing
with the students. How does this correlate to our discussion in class on assessment versus evalua-
tion? How can this type of assessment be useful to you as a teacher?

This work was previously published in Videoconferencing Technology in K-12 Instruction: Best Practices and Trends, edited
by Dianna L. Newman, John Falco, Stan Silverman and Patricia Barbanell, pp. 173-190, copyright 2008 by Information Sci-
ence Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

903
904

Chapter 4.8
Research on the Effects
of Media and Pedagogy
in Distance Education
Lou Yiping
Louisiana State University, USA

INTRODUCTION BACKGROUND

Do media influence learning? This is a historical Arguments for and against Media
debate in the field of educational technology, which Effects in Distance Education
started when Clark (1983, 1994) argued that media
are “mere vehicles” and it is the content and peda- The media effects debate has continued in the
gogical methods that are the “active ingredients” context of distance education (DE), especially
influencing student learning. Others (e.g., Kozma, regarding the need for comparative studies. Clark
1994; Cobb, 1997) disagreed and argued that (2000) believes that comparing media-supported
special media attributes can make certain types of DE versus classroom instruction is similar to the
learning more effective or cognitively efficient. In old studies on computer-based instruction and
this chapter, I will first review the key arguments that the research on the effects of DE has the
for and against media effects in distance education same problem of media and method confound.
(DE). I will then review several meta-analyses Therefore, he calls for conducting multi-level
that attempted to analyze the effects of media and evaluation studies on student perceptions of moti-
pedagogy based on quantitative syntheses of the vation using both quantitative and qualitative data
empirical research in DE. Finally, I will discuss such as questionnaires and cost-effective issues
directions for future research. of DE programs instead of experimental studies.
Smith and Dillon (1999) argue for the continued
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch408 need of comparative studies. They feel that the

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

way to solve the media and method confounding his collection, Russell concluded that the results
problem is to describe not only the physical char- support Clark’s theory of no media effects on
acteristics of delivery media but also how media student learning. Although the study was widely
attributes are used to support student learning in cited, the selective vote-counting approach has
the studies. Such features may include bandwidth been most criticized for its lack of rigor and
of a delivery system, whether the communication incomplete picture of DE effects (Bernard et al.,
is one-way or two-way, synchronous or asyn- 2004; Layton, 1999).
chronous, and interface design. A media attribute
associated with bandwidth is realism, which Meta-Analysis
may be used to support the learning of concrete
versus abstract symbols. Media attributes associ- Meta-analysis was first developed by Glass and
ated with one-way/two-way communication are his colleagues (Glass, McGaw, & Smith, 1981).
interactivity and feedback, which can facilitate It employs effect size as a standardized mean
active engagement and adaptation to learners. difference between an experimental and a con-
A media attribute associated with interface is trol condition so that findings across studies can
branching, which may support learner control be statistically combined to estimate an overall
and self-directed navigation. They believe that average effect size. It also allows researchers to
by describing these media attributes and how explore variability in the findings to identify po-
they are used to support student learning in DE tential moderating factors based on study features.
should help researchers un-entangle the media Hedges and Olkins (1985) further developed
and method confound, thereby, providing theory- the meta-analysis techniques. The weighting by the
based research evidence to direct effective design inverse of a sampling variance procedure further
of distance education. reduces bias from studies of different sample sizes.
The homogeneity analysis tests if the aggregated
Early Synthesis Effort findings are consistent or heterogeneous.

Regardless of Clark’s argument and repeated

call against media and DE comparative research MAIN FOCUS OF THE CHAPTER
(1983, 1994, 2001), a considerable number of DE
comparative studies have been and continue to be A total of 12 meta-analyses have been conducted
conducted, esp., after each wave of an emerging and published from 2000 to 2007, attempting to
information communication technology. As is the synthesize the empirical DE research findings us-
case in most educational research, some studies ing a variety of different meta-analytic procedures
found positive effects favoring DE, some found (see Table 1). Some focused on one type of DE
no significant or negative effects. and others were more inclusive.
Russell (1999) compiled and annotated 335
studies published from 1928 to 1998 that reported Video Conferencing or Telecourses
no significant difference between mediated DE
and classroom instruction. The collection does not Two meta-analyses focused on video-conferencing
include any studies that report significant findings, or tele-courses only. Machtmes and Asher (2000)
either positive or negative. Russell’ rationale for synthesized 19 studies published in 1943-1997
compiling no significant difference studies only comparing the effects of live and pre-produced
was that these studies considerably outnumbered telecourses with classroom instruction at the adult
those that reported significant findings. Based on and high education levels. They found an overall

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 Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

Table 1. Meta-analyses on the effects of DE

Author N of Education Level Outcomes Effect Size

studies
Videoconferencing or Tele Courses
Machtmes & Asher (2000) 19 Adult and high education achievement -0.0093 heterogeneous
Cavanaugh (2001) 19 K-12 achievement 0.15 heterogeneous
Online courses
Ungerleider & Burns (2003) 8 Secondary and university achievement 0.000
4 satisfaction -0.509*
Homogeneity not analyzed
Cavanaugh et al. (2004) 14 K-12 achievement -0.028 homogeneous
Williams (2006) 25 Undergrad. and graduate achievement 0.15*
applied health science Homogeneity not analyzed
Jahng et al (2007) 20 Undergrad. and graduate achievement 0.023 heterogeneous
0.0259 homogeneous after
removal of 4 studies
Synchronous and Asynchronous DE
Allen et al., (2002) 25 Not described Satisfaction -.0311 heterogeneous; -.0901
homogeneous after removal of
3 outliers
Shachar & Newmann (2003) 86 High education achievement 0.37* heterogeneous
66% favor DE
Allen et al (2004) 54 Not described achievement .048 heterogeneous
Zhao et al. (2004) 51 K-20, military, adult Mixed .10 Heterogeneous
2/3 favor DE
Bernard et al. (2004) 232 K-20, adults achievement 0.013 heterogeneous
attitude -0.081* heterogeneous
retention - 0.057* heterogeneous
Lou et al. (2006) 103 Undergrad. achievement 0.016 heterogeneous

mean effect size of -0.0093 and that the findings The findings across studies were significantly
were significantly heterogeneous. Through uni- heterogeneous. Although Cavanaugh coded and
variate study features analyses, they found that analyzed a number of study features including use
studies that were published in the last decade had of delivery system, duration, frequency, and mode
significantly more positive effect sizes favoring of DE, grade level, year of publication, outcome
DE (ES = +0.23, p< .05) than earlier studies. They measure, test sequence, sample size, grade level,
also found that studies where two-way interaction subject areas, and study sources, no significant
between students and instructor were available moderators were identified.
via either video or audio during live instruction
produced significantly more positive effect sizes Online Courses
than one-way pre-produced telecourses.
Cavanaugh (2001) synthesized 19 studies Four meta-analyses were conducted synthesizing
published in 1980-1998 on the effects of tele- studies on the effects of online learning compared
communication courses at k-12 levels on student with classroom instruction. Ungerleider and Burns
achievement. The overall mean effect size was (2003) synthesized a total of 12 studies published in
+0.15 favoring DE but not statistically significant. 2000-2003 on the effects of online and networked

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Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

learning (not exactly distance learning) on student • An independent classroom: Asynchronous

achievement and satisfaction at the secondary learning in which students complete course
schools and universities. The overall mean effect content at home on their own time.
size was 0.000 (N=8) on achievement and-0.509 • An open classroom: Synchronous and
(N=4) on student satisfaction. The latter is sig- asynchronous learning in which students
nificantly negative favoring classroom learning. complete course content independently
Neither homogeneity analyses nor study features gathering collectively throughout the
analyses were performed on either dataset. course to discuss content.
Cavanaugh, Gillan, Kromrey, Hess, and Blo-
meyer (2004) synthesized 14 studies published He found that the effect sizes were significantly
in 1999-2004 that compared the effects of online more positive in distributed synchronous class-
courses at k-12 virtual schools with classroom rooms (ES =+0.24, p<.05) and open classrooms
instruction. The overall weighted mean effect (ES = +0.25, p<.05) than in asynchronous inde-
size was -0.028, which is not significantly differ- pendent classrooms (ES = –.06). Williams also
ent from zero. The findings across studies were analyzed several instructional design features
significantly heterogeneous. Similar to Cavana- based on Olcott’s (1999) distance education ID
ugh (2001), they coded and analyzed a number components (p.129-130):
of study features including grade level, content
area, duration and frequency of the distance learn- • Interaction included the technical deliv-
ing experience, instructional role of the distance ery methods for communication between
education, pacing of the instruction, role of the instructor and student as well as student
instructor, timing of the interactions, and types and student such as e-mail, audio/video
of interactions, as well as various study quality conferencing, fax, telephone, and instant
and invalidity factors, but failed to identify any messaging.
moderating features that account for the significant • Introspection included instructional activi-
variability in the findings. ties such as use of examples, simulations,
Williams (2006) synthesized 25 studies pub- laboratory exercises, demonstrations,
lished in 1990-2003 that compared online courses group discussions, small-group projects,
with classroom instruction in applied health sci- student presentations, guided imagery, out-
ence at the undergraduate and graduate levels. lines, journals, and reflective writings.
The overall mean effect size was +0.15, which is • Innovation included instructional activities
significantly positive. Although the homogeneity with two or more learning styles targeted,
analysis was not conducted, Williams found that coded according to the type of learning be-
effect sizes were significantly more positive for ing examined such as visual learning (i.e.,
students who were working professionals (ES = textbooks, in-class videos/slides/over-
+0.74) than traditional students (ES not signifi- heads), auditory learning (i.e., lecture),
cantly different from zero). The researcher also and/or tactile learning (i.e., computer-as-
classified DE into three categories (p.129): sisted instructional programs).
• Integration included instructional activi-
• A distributed classroom: Synchronous ties such as case studies, role playing, skill-
learning in which students receive instruc- building techniques, and handouts.
tion at a set time in a satellite classroom • Information included instructional ac-
off campus. tivities such as quizzes, comprehension
checks, and other assessment measures to

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determine whether the student was gaining that it would need 3,062 additional unreported
the knowledge and/or skills necessary for studies with average non-significant findings to
advancement. refute the conclusion. Shacher did not code or
analyze any study features.
He found that effect sizes were significantly Allen, Bourhis, Burrel, and Mabry (2002)
more positive when instructional design com- synthesized 25 studies published in 1988-1997
ponents were present: innovation (ES = +0.18, on student satisfaction in traditional classrooms
p<.05), introspection (ES = +0.26, p<.05), infor- over distance education. The overall mean effect
mation (ES = +0.39, p<.05), and interaction (ES size was 0.031 and significantly heterogeneous.
= +0.29, p<.05) than when they were absent and Homogeneity was reached after removal of 3 out-
that there was a positive relationship between the liers. Two study features, type of media used for
number of ID components present and achieve- conveying information (video, audio, and written)
ment. and presence of interaction (full two-way video,
Jahng, Krug, and Zhang (2007) synthesized limited audio or email feedback, and none during
20 studies published in 1995-2004 on the effects instruction), were coded and analyzed. Student
of online courses over classroom instruction on satisfaction appears to differ for different types
student achievement at the graduate and under- of delivery media. When video was used in DE,
graduate levels. The overall mean effect size was students had similar satisfaction level as students
+0.023, which is not significantly different from in traditional classrooms; when only written com-
zero. The effect sizes across studies were signifi- munication (fax or emails) was used in the DE
cantly heterogeneous. After removal of 4 studies, condition, students reported significantly lower
the mean effect size was +0.0259 and homogene- satisfaction level than traditional classroom stu-
ity was achieved. One significant methodology dents (r= 0.247, N=4).
study feature was identified: the studies where Allen, Mabry, Mattrey, Bourhis, Titsworth, and
students received a pre-test and a posttest had Burrel (2004) synthesized 54 studies published in
significantly more positive mean effect size than 1962-2001comparing the performance of students
studies where students received a posttest only. in DE versus traditional classes. Similar to their
It is not clear, though, whether the pre-test scores earlier meta-analysis on student satisfaction, each
were subtracted from posttest scores in the effect study was coded for type of media used for con-
size calculations. veying information and presence of interactions.
No significant differences were found for either
Synchronous and Asynchronous DE of the two coded study features.
Zhao, Lei, Yan, Tan & Zhao (2004) synthesized
The other six meta-analyses are more comprehen- 51 studies published in 1982-2002 comparing
sive, including studies on the effects of all types the effects of distance courses versus classroom
of DE. Shacher (2003) synthesized 86 studies instruction on a variety of outcomes. The overall
published in 1990-2002 that compared the effects mean effect size was +0.10. The findings were
of DE and classroom instruction at all levels of significantly heterogeneous with 2/3 favoring DE.
high education. The mean effect size was +0.37, Nineteen study features were coded and a few
which is statistically significant favoring DE were identified as significant moderators includ-
students. Similar to most other meta-analyses, ing publication year, researcher as instructor bias,
the integrated effect sizes were significantly het- instructor involvement, synchronicity of student-
erogeneous with two thirds positive favoring DE. instructor interaction, and media involvement.
Based on a fail-safe analysis, Shacher concluded However, because the study features analyses

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Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

used the whole dataset with different types of level. They further examined how media were
outcomes, the results may be confusing and not used to support different types of DE pedagogy:
easily interpretable. instructor-directed, independent, or collaborative.
A common problem with analyzing individ- The specific codings are (p. 151-152):
ual study features separately is that some study
features may correlate with each other. This is • Instructor-Directed DE: Synchronous
especially misleading when study quality is not videoconferencing, one-way satellite TV
controlled, impacting on the validity of the find- broadcast with two-way synchronous au-
ings on significant moderating factors. Two recent dio, or audiographics were used to deliver
comprehensive meta-analyses (Bernard, Abrami, teacher-directed instruction and there was
Lou, Borokhovski, Wade, Wozney, Wallet, Fiset, no report of discussion among students or
& Huang, 2004; Lou, Bernard, & Abrami, 2006) group activities.
employed multiple regression analyses to control • Independent DE: Only asynchronous one-
for the quality of research methodology and cor- way TV, video tapes, and/or Web-based
relation among study features. resources were used and there was no re-
Bernard, Abrami, Lou, Borokhovski, Wade, port of discussion among students or group
Wozney, Wallet, Fiset, and Huang (2004) quanti- activities.
tatively synthesized a total of 232 DE comparative • Collaborative DE: Discussion board,
studies published in 1985-2002. In addition to email, listserv, audio-conferencing, tele-
estimating the average effect size of DE effects phone, or chat was used for collaborative
on student achievement (+0.013, p>.05), attitudes discussion among students.
(-0.081, p<.05) and drop-out rates (-0.057, p<.05),
they first analyzed the difference between synchro- The results showed significantly more posi-
nous DE (e.g., online courses) and asynchronous DE tive effect sizes for Collaborative DE than either
(e.g., video-based telecourses) and then analyzed Instructor-Directed DE or Independent DE (see
the relative importance of media, pedagogy, and Table 2). While students in Collaborative DE
research methodology quality through multiple achieved significantly higher than those in tradi-
regression analyses of 51 coded study features for tional classrooms (ES = +0.11, p<.05), no signifi-
each of the three outcomes. The results indicate cant difference was found in student achievements
that on average, effect sizes were more positive between remote and host sites in synchronous
for asynchronous DE than synchronous DE. Meth- instructor-directed DE (ES = -0.04). Similarly,
odological Quality explained a significant amount no significant difference was found in student
of variance in both synchronous and asynchronous achievement between students in Independent
DE outcomes (49% and 12%, respectively, for DE and in traditional classrooms (ES = -0.04).
achievement). Pedagogy explained a significant Homogeneity analyses indicate that the effect
10%-13% of variance after controlling for meth- sizes for instructor-directed DE were consistent
odology quality. Media were only significant when across the 49 independent findings integrated.
entered at step 1. These results show that pedagogy Since the effect sizes for Independent DE and
appears to explain a larger amount of variance in Collaborative DE were both significantly hetero-
the findings and that media and research quality geneous, further analyses were conducted to
study features are highly correlated. examine how media and pedagogy were used to
Lou, Bernard, and Abrami (2006) synthe- support three types of student interactions: student-
sized 103 DE comparative studies on student content, student-instructor, and student-student
achievement conducted at the undergraduate (Moore, 1989) and their relative impact on student

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 Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

Table 2. Weighted mean effect sizes for three types of DE pedagogy in undergraduate studies. (Source:
Lou, Y., Bernard, R. M. & Abrami, P. C., 2006)

DE Pedagogy k G+ 95% CI QW
Instructor-directed 49 –0.038 –0.108/+0.032 53.48
Independent 41 –0.038 -0.086/+0.011 223.143*
Discussion among students 30 +0.109 +0.030/+0.188 165.278*
* p<.05

achievement using multiple regression analyses. criticized by a number of researchers and is often
The study features included in the analyses for cited as a problem for media and method confound
each of the three interactions and the results of (e.g., Clark, 1983, 1994, 2000). One way to ensure
the regression analyses are summarized in Table best evidence syntheses is to select only best quality
3. The non-significant features in each type of studies such as randomized experiments as advo-
interaction appear to be significantly correlated cated by Slavin (1987). This is often problematic
with those that are significant. These results in- due to the limited number of randomized studies in
dicate that the best practices of DE that produce education (Slavin, 2008), especially in DE. Coding
higher student learning than traditional classrooms and analyzing methodology study features as is done
are instructional design and learning activities in several of the DE meta-analyses can help identify
that enhance: 1) student-content interaction potential influence from research methodology
through multimedia and interactive CBI, and 2) quality. However, simply identifying significant
student-instructor and student-student interactions methodology factors by analyzing each study
through opportunities and learning activities that feature separately without controlling for them is
encourage such interactions. not enough. Bernard, Abrami, Lou, Borokhovski,
Wade, Wozney, Wallet, Fiset, and Huang (2004)
and Lou, Bernard, and Abrami’s (2006) multiple
FUTURE TRENDS regression approach provides a feasible way in
controlling for methodology quality and thereby
The quality of DE primary studies, as in educational identifying the unique variance due to media and
technology research in general, has been repeatedly pedagogy features.

Table 3. Results of multiple regression analyses of the interaction study features after controlling for
research methodology quality. (After source Lou, Y., Bernard, R. M. & Abrami, P. C., 2006)

Student-content interaction • Systematic instructional design (ID)

• Use of one-way broadcast TV or videotape*
• Use of computer-based instruction (CBI)*
• Use of Web-based course materials
Student-instructor interaction • Opportunity for face-to-face meetings with instructor*
• Provision for synchronous technology-mediated communication with instructor
• Use of asynchronous CMC with students
• Activities that encourage student-instructor interactions*
Student-student interaction • Opportunity for face-to-face contact with other students*
• Provision for synchronous technology-mediated communication with other students
• Use of asynchronous CMC with other students
• Activities that encourage student-student interactions*
* p<.05

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Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

As technology-mediated DE is becoming increas- Study features analyses in several meta-

ingly popular for meeting a variety of education analyses indicate that both media and pedagogi-
needs, it is time to go beyond simply comparing cal strategies are important in facilitating student
DE with classroom instruction. Future DE primary learning in DE. Media and pedagogy that support
research should focus on directly examining the interaction with the instructor and other students
media and pedagogy factors in DE. More research are as important as media and pedagogy used to
is needed to investigate how different media can establish individual student interactions with con-
be effectively used to support a variety of sound tent only. These results support Keegan’s (1996)
instructional strategies for more effective student- differentiation between “distance teaching” and
content, student-student, and student-instructor “distance learning”. The traditional reference of
interaction and more effective learning. For ex- media as “delivery media” may not be sufficient.
ample, up to now, two-way communication such as In effective DE, media should not only be used
video conferencing has been used mainly to support for delivering instructional materials and teacher
instructor-directed lecture presentation. An interest- directed instruction and feedback but also for
ing line of future research would be to investigate facilitating student-student collaboration.
how synchronous video, such as desktop or portable
video conferencing, chat, and Instant Messenger may
be used to support student-student interactions (e.g., REFERENCES
group projects, peer tutoring) and student-instructor
interactions (e.g., project advising and providing Allen, M., Bourhis, J., Burrel, N., & Mabry, E.
interactive feedback). (2002). Comparing student satisfaction with dis-
Future primary studies should also provide tance education to traditional classrooms in higher
more complete descriptions of instructional condi- education: A meta-analysis. American Journal
tions including media attribute uses, instructional of Distance Education, 16, 83–97. doi:10.1207/
strategies, and methodological procedures, not S15389286AJDE1602_3
only of the experimental conditions but also of the Allen, M., Mabry, E., Mattery, M., Bourhis, J.,
control conditions, so as to build a better under- Titsworth, S., & Burrell, N. (2004). Evaluating the
standing of the media and pedagogy effects in DE. effectiveness of distance learning: A comparison
using meta-analysis. The Journal of Communica-
tion, 54, 402–420. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2004.
CONCLUSION tb02636.x

The DE meta-analyses reviewed in this paper have Bernard, R. M., Abrami, P. C., Lou, Y., Borokhovs-
provided a considerable amount of cumulative ki, E., Wade, A., & Wozney, L. (2004). How
evidence on the effects of DE versus classroom Does Distance Education Compare to Classroom
instruction as well as a variety of media and Instruction? A Meta-Analysis of the Empirical
pedagogy factors that significantly moderated Literature. Review of Educational Research, 74(3),
the effectiveness of DE. While the overall effect 379–439. doi:10.3102/00346543074003379
size of DE versus traditional classroom instruction
Cavanaugh, C., Gillan, K. J., Kromrey, J., Hess,
ranged from a moderate positive effect favoring
M., & Blomeyer, R. (2004). The Effects of Dis-
DE to no significant difference or negative effects,
tance Education on K–12 Student Outcomes: A
significant heterogeneity in the findings indicate
Meta-Analysis. Learning Point Association.
that the overall means are not representative of
all the findings integrated.

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Cavanaugh, C. S. (2001). The effectiveness of in- Machtmes, K., & Asher, J. W. (2000). A meta-
teractive distance education technologies in K-12 analysis of the effectiveness of telecourses in
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of Educational Telecommunications, 7(1), 73–88. Education, 14(1), 27–46.
Clark, R. E. (1983). Reconsidering research on Moore, M. (1989). Three types of interaction.
learning from media. Review of Educational American Journal of Distance Education, 3(2),
Research, 53(4), 445–459. 1–6.
Clark, R. E. (1994). Media will never influence Shachar, M., & Neumann, Y. (2003). Differences
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BF02299088 [Available online at http://www.agecon.ksu.edu/
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Clark, R. E. (2000). Evaluating distance educa-
tional Review of Research in Open and Distance
tion: Strategies and cautions. Quarterly Review
Learning, 4(2), 1–20.
of Distance Education, 1(1), 3–16.
Slavin, R. (1987). Best-evidence synthesis: Why
Cobb, T. (1997). Cognitive efficiency: Toward
less is more. Educational Researcher, 16(4),
a revised theory of media. Educational Technol-
15–16.
ogy Research and Development, 45(4), 21–35.
doi:10.1007/BF02299681 Slavin, R. (2008). Perspectives on evidence-
based research in education: What works?
Jahng, N., Krug, D., & Zhang, Z. (2007). Student
Issues in synthesizing educational program
achievement in online distance education com-
evaluations. Educational Researcher, 37(1), 5–14.
pared to face-to-face education. European Journal
doi:10.3102/0013189X08314117
of Open . Distance and E-Learning, 2007, I.
Smith, P. L., & Dillon, C. L. (1999). Compar-
Keegan, D. (1996). Foundations of distance edu-
ing distance learning and classroom learning:
cation. (3rd ed). London: Routledge.
Conceptual considerations. American Journal of
Kozma, R. B. (1994). Will media influence Distance Education, 13(2), 107–124.
learning? Reframing the debate. Educational
Ungerleider, C., & Burns, T. (2003). A system-
Technology Research and Development, 42(2),
atic review of the effectiveness and efficiency of
7–19. doi:10.1007/BF02299087
Networked ICT in Education. A State of the Field
Layton, J. R. (1999). No Significant Difference Report to The Council of Ministers of Educa-
Phenomenon: Book review. Educational Technol- tion, Canada and Industry Canada. Vancouver.
ogy & Society, 2(3), 142–143. Available online at http://www.cmec.ca/stats/
SystematicReview2003.en.pdf
Lou, Y., Bernard, R. M., & Abramin, P. C. (2006).
Media and pedagogy in undergraduate distance Williams, S. L. (2006). The effectiveness of
education: A theory-based meta-analysis of the distance education in applied health science pro-
empirical literature. Educational Technology grams: A meta-analysis of outcomes. American
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doi:10.1007/s11423-006-8252-x doi:10.1207/s15389286ajde2003_2

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Research on the Effects of Media and Pedagogy in Distance Education

Zhao, Y., Lei, J., Yan, B., & Tan, S. (2004).What Media: Delivery media such as television,
makes the difference? A practical analysis of Internet, and video used in teaching and learning.
research on the effectiveness of distance educa- Meta-Analysis: A literature review method
tion. Available online at http://ott.educ.msu.edu/ that quantitatively synthesizes the effects of an
literature/report.pdf experimental treatment.
Method: Instructional and pedagogical strate-
gies used in instruction.
Synchronous Communication: Real time
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
communication between the instructor and stu-
Asynchronous Communication: Delayed dents or among students using two-way commu-
time communication between the instructor and nication media such as telephone, video or audio
students or among students using discussion board, conferencing, and chat, etc.
emails, and etc. Systematic Instructional Design: Conven-
Computer-Based Instruction: Instruction tional instructional design practices and principles
such as tutorials, drill-and-practice, and simula- used in developing the course and course materials.
tions that are provided through a computer.
Effect Size: A measure of standardized mean
difference between the experimental and control
conditions.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 1766-1773, copyright 2009
by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

913
914

Chapter 4.9
Application of E-Learning
in Teaching:
Learning and Research in East
African Universities

Michael Walimbwa
Makerere University, Uganda

ABSTRACT versity of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The increase

in enrollment in these universities brings in many
The challenges of an increasingly borderless challenges in service provision, negatively affect-
world, as seen in the advancements in information ing instruction, learning, assessment and research
technology, have brought reform in universities services. A crisis-solving approach is presented as
and re-conceptualized what constitutes learning, stimulating a creative context for the meaningful
teaching, and research. E-learning is often imple- introduction of e-learning. It is also discussed
mented as a response to increasing educational whether the environment created so far through
demand and an increasingly networked commu- computer-mediated learning motivates institutions
nity. E-learning is considered as an interactive to integrate e-learning further. The sample in-
means to provide an alternative environment that volved instructors and learners from three universi-
stimulates practical learning and equips learners ties in three different countries of Eastern Africa.
with the skills to manage technological change Findings conclude that an e-learning environment
and innovations. This chapter evaluates the initial must be introduced by creating relevant awareness
phase of e-learning, the importance of a rightful to change attitude and empower users with an au-
attitude, context, and instructional design in digital thentic approach without too much technological
learning environments in Makerere University, complexity. Review of curriculum, assessment
Uganda, University of Nairobi, Kenya and Uni- and training around e-learning environments are
also imperative as these interrelated factors form
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch409
part of the e-learning process.

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Application of E-Learning in Teaching

ORGANIZATION BACKGROUND were manageable then, and quality training was

guaranteed. Makerere University, which had less
Some of the problems in higher education of than 5,000 students in 1990, had increased this
countries of Eastern Africa are the huge numbers enrolment to 30, 000 students by 2005. There
of learners and fewer instructors that eventually af- were equivalent increments in student enrolment
fect the quality of teaching, learning and research. at universities of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam to
There have been attempts to tackle some of these 20,000 and 16,000 respectively. With the large
major problems by the introduction of e-learning number of students, traditional modes of teaching
through integration of information and commu- became quite limiting, compelling the universities
nication technology (ICT) into teaching, learning into innovations to ensure quality service. From
and research situations. E-learning, begun with analogue file management system of large box
the use of radios and television sets in instruction files with immense papers, there was a dig through
followed by the instructor led systems (audio) the digital world of computing and networking as
where cassettes were recorded for learners to use innovations. In these universities, using ICT is so
independently with minimum help of the teachers. popular now that it has a Swahili language name,
In all these phases, there was support of printed TEHEMA: “technologia, ehabari mawasiliano”
media to enable independent and self-paced
learning on the side of the learner. In East African
universities, e-learning is a recent technological SETTING THE STAGE
initiative, which started with few computers and
basic networks. Makerere University, Universities Computers, multimedia (mm), interactive data-
of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam were connected to banks and communication platforms in e-learning
an internet service provider (ISP) that enabled stirs expectation of the potential of ICT in educa-
them to periodically download e-mails. These tion. Institutions of learning embarked on connec-
Universities, with little knowledge of the potential tions to the internet, formulation of ICT policy
of e-mail in instruction and limited networks left master plans and acquisition of learning manage-
internet service to the wits of a few individuals, ment systems (LMS) sometimes called learning
who later abandoned it (Tusubira, 2002). platforms. Meanwhile, there was demarcation of
The three universities share a common context e-learning centers and intensive set up of other
of location in Eastern Africa and have a common appropriate facilities for e-learning. It was felt that
challenge of increasing education demands amidst ICT in education have the potential to increase
limited resources. During colonial days, these not only the effectiveness of the educational
three were constituent colleges of the University process but also its overall efficiency whether in
of London, specialized in some programs. For terms of classroom activities or administration
instance, students who wanted to do law in East (Omwenga, 2003). Jonassen (2001) asserts that
Africa would go to the University of Dar es Sa- e-learning conforms to constructivism- a teaching
laam as it was not offered in either of the two. In and learning paradigm that allows one to learn
1963, the three universities became constituent what they want, at their own pace and to construct
colleges of the University of East Africa: Makerere knowledge in a social environment. Jonassen
University College in Uganda, University of Dar describes a constructivist-learning situation as:
es salaam in Tanzania and Nairobi University Col-
lege in Kenya. Since then, these Universities have Active: where students are able to meaningfully
grown in terms of student intake, academic units process their own information into valuable
and academic programs. Naturally, the numbers personal and social knowledge.

915
 Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Cumulative: where new learning bases and builds Constructivism is a teaching and learning
on prior learning; why personal experiences paradigm in which people are assumed to act
are a good basis for instruction. interactively and socially to create knowledge.
Integrative: where learners elaborate on new Methodologies of instruction are being recast to
knowledge and inter relate it with their cur- leverage new learning media and honor multiple
rent knowledge, just to suit the knowledge e-learning styles to fit learning situations. Raven-
into prior knowledge. scroft (2001), in a study, remarks that most TEL
Reflective: where learners consciously reflect on initiatives have been technology-led rather than
what they know and need to learn. This is a theory-led. Leading thinkers from both within and
basis for transfer of learning and situational outside academia are exploring radically differ-
or practical learning. ent approaches to teaching and learning based on
Goal directed and intentional: where learners theory; e-learning, among them.
subscribe to goals of learning; enabling In Africa, information and communication
focus on ideas that fascinate learners most. technology use in educational environment is far
from being fully realized as in many incidences,
Deriving from constructivism, Omwenga there are a number of encumbrances. In a research
(2003) presents five modes of using ICT in tech- done by Karen (2008), in several African primary
nology enhanced learning environment (TEL) as: schools, there was an interesting finding about
information and communication use. Most of the
Support mode: This is aimed at increased accuracy schools surveyed reported no functioning com-
and enhancing presentation of work. Tools puters, and no internet. Interestingly, the report
for use in this mode include word process- indicates that contacts between African and United
ing, PowerPoint, computer aided design and Kingdom schools were by e-mails mostly. This
desktop publishing among others. study though done in primary schools has an im-
Exploration and control: Learners are able to plication on higher education as it is the products
explore, examine, experiment with and build of primary schools that end up in Universities.
situations. Simulations, expert systems and But it is interesting to say on this basis that the
statistical packages are mostly used for this will to use ICT is there though with limitations.
purpose in TEL. Curran (2004) makes interesting conclusions
Tutorial mode: Information is presented at an that indicates that universities adopted a strategy
appropriate level and pace giving learners of e-learning due to their inherent characteristic of
an opportunity for feedback on progress. adaptability in use and flexibility in application.
Resource mode: Technology is used to access Though Curran’s study was done in European
information and other resources whether environment, it informs this study that the major
online through internet or offline through reason why a strategy for e-learning is taken is
CDs and other software. because of flexibility, if things don’t work, there
Link mode: Communication between individual is a lot of freedom to do something else. There is
learners and instructors, examples of e-mails, no use clinging on a strategy that is failing in a
net meetings and video conferencing. given context just because it worked in another
context. In certain situations, the integration of ICT
Notably however, these modes are not exclu- in teaching and learning has failed because of the
sive of each other, they tend to be blended for implementers attempting the “Everest syndrome”.
effectiveness.

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Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Table 1. E-Learning tools used in teaching and learning

TEL “tool” Uses and advantaged Principle for good teaching

COMMUNICATION
Homepage Good way of introducing instructors to students, last minute changes Student-instructor contact
can be made, other resources.
Bulletin board or One-to-many communication moderated discussions, anonymous Student-instructor contact, coopera-
discussion tool (asyn- interaction, debate, peer assessment, group work, searches, introvert tion among students.
chronous) students get involved, more writing by students, attachments can be
posted
Chat rooms (synchro- One-to-many communication, brainstorm, virtual office hours, im- Cooperative learning, gives prompt
nous) mediate feed back feed back
Calendar Posting of target dates, reminders, last minute changes, full calendar Emphasizes time on task, communi-
available with dates of activities cates high expectations.
E-mail One-to-one and one-to-many communication, private communication, Student-Lecturer contact, coopera-
reminders of specific dates, personal motivation, groupwork, search- tion among students
able medium, documents can be sent as attachments
TOOLS FOR AVAILABILITY AND ENRICHMENT OF CONTENT
Content module: Gives the feeling of flow, easier navigation, can add video, audio, Encourage active meaning
linked pages graphics
Self assessments Students asses their own knowledge of the subject, instructors can Encourages active learning, gives
include detailed feedback, tests can be repeated until students are sure prompt feedback
that they mastered it, drilling is good for memory.
Hyperlinks and refer- Gives links to other pages which can be interactive Encourages active learning, respects
ences and credit to referred to material diverse ways of learning
Syllabus (course con- Gives a description of the module content, lecturer information, out- Emphasizes time on task, student-
tent folders) comes, textbooks and expectations lecturer contact
STUDENT ACTIVITY AND STUDY TOOLS
Search facility Students can find material electronically Encourages active learning, respects
diverse talents.
Grade tool Students get their marks rapidly and can determine if they have to put Gives prompt feedback (depends on
in more effort for a module what and how much is made avail-
able), high expectations
Help files Explains to students what is necessary to be successful Encourages active learning, gives
prompt feedback
ASSESSMENT TOOLS
Quizzes: Timed, Ran- Formative / summative assessment, immediate feedback. Students Encourages active learning,
domized and multiple must have mastered the work to complete it in the set time. Students Expectations, emphasizes time on
get different sets of questions, generated randomly from the database task, gives prompt feedback, Diverse
learning.
Assignment tools Students can submit assignments electronically, grade assignments and Emphasizes time on task, gives
the grades and feedback are immediate prompt feedback
Group projects Gives students the opportunity to help each other as they become Cooperative learning
aware of each other’s strengths and weakness, prepares students for
future jobs, in which group work is becoming vital.
Adapted from Van Der Merwe (2004) Evaluating the integration of ICT into teaching and learning activities at a South African higher
education institution, p. 124-126.

In a study in an African context, Van Der technology enhanced learning environment sum-
Merwe (2004) describes the salient issues in a marized on Table 1.

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 Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Multimedia refers to text, sound, graphics, e-learning materials available weakens or destroy
animations, imaging, and spatial modeling into the capacity of learning. Merrill is critical of e-
computer systems. Multimedia involves the inte- learning material because they are designed badly.
gration of more than one medium into a form of Though Merrill makes this comment, it should be
communication. E-learning and communication noted that the beginning phase of e-learning in
theory combines for effectiveness. With the sur- is characterized by this, so no university should
facing of computers into education, multimedia despair that their materials are in this start at the
has been strengthened and is popular. Multimedia beginning. This is a very big leap forward.
holds a special place in technology enhanced
learning because as Jonassen (2001) argues, it
attracts and holds attention. A multimedia com- CASE DESCRIPTION
puter is able to capture sound and video. High-
resolution monitors, sound cards and increase in The initial days of the use of ICT in instruction
random access memory (RAM) and processing were filled with excitement and prophecies about
speed of personal computers, can be exploited to the great potential and improvement in education
transform teaching and learning environments. (Alessi and Trollip 2001). The same was felt at
Multimedia may be very useful where learners the three universities under this study. This pro-
use multitasking, but not every learner can be able jection has not been realized, many years down
to do this. the road and one wonders why. Challenges as
Jonassen (2001) further states that past research understanding, change of attitude and training are
has proved that multiple-channel and complimen- still prevalent (Omwenga, Waema and Wagacha,
tary channels improve e-learning situations while 2004). The persistence of these challenges and
information from different channels which are ignorance about ICT in education hinders any
inconsistent worsens a learning situation. This real utilization of e-learning as a resource that
compares with the position of Mayer (2001), facilitates educational environments (Fonseca,
Clarke and Mayer (2003) as cited in Merrill 2001). These issues made this research inevitable.
(2005) who contends that when a presentation The three universities have heavily invested in
contains three elements: graphics audio and visual, e-learning infrastructure in the initial phases; this
there is a decrease in learning. Nevertheless, the case study looks into the benefits being realized,
integration of multimedia as a tool in e-learning if not then why?
is very vital to enhance instruction and learning
situations as long as it is carefully used, given the The Study
fact that it goes far beyond what could be possible
in a normal face-to-face lecture room situation. The present study in an attempt to evaluate e-
However, Merrill (2005) is critical of designed learning for teaching, learning and research in
e-learning materials, saying most so called e-learn- three universities was conducted with the fol-
ing materials are merely information transferred lowing objectives:
to the Internet without appropriate demonstration,
practice, feedback, and learner guidance. This is 1. To identify the features of e-learning in the
what I call using ICT to give learners electronic universities;
notes, instead of enabling them to learn at ease. 2. To describe the utilization of features of
He hastens to add that the letter ‘e’ in e-learning e-learning; and
has to be replaced with enervative, endless or 3. To outline the attitude towards the use of
empty learning meaning that many of the designed e-learning in teaching and learning.

918
Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Evaluation approach as a research design was two for each of the universities of Dar es Salaam
used because the aim of this research was to study and Nairobi respectively. This technique helped
the practice of e-learning in its natural setting in in getting data faster by way of brainstorming.
order to interpret it in terms of the meaning people Structured interviews and focus group discus-
accord to it. The required data mainly concerned sions involved intensive probing questions using
actions and feelings about the practice, usage and a structured guide to reinforce group discussions
attitude to a digital learning environment (DLE). and get information from instructors. Participant
The data required was for evaluating practice that observation and checklists helped the researcher
made a qualitative design suitable. Data relating to get and record rightful data from the practical
e-learning was collected from Makerere, Nairobi ground. The researcher made observation tours
and Dar es Salaam universities. The universities of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam universities and
are chosen purposively, to enable a baseline for e-learning centers during data collection. Observa-
Makerere University’s e-learning project and tion checked inter-rater agreement and inter-rater
make the study a comparative one. Addition- reliability because of poor observation sometimes.
ally, all the three universities were engaged in Secondary data was used as universities had
piloting e-learning at different levels, introduc- extensive documents, some of them posted on
tion, implementation and evaluation. The target the university websites and e-learning platforms.
population was faculty students and instructors Many other publications from textbooks, journals,
(under-graduate and post-graduate). magazines and compact disc read only memory
Purposive sampling was considered because (CD-ROM) were studied and analysis of the same
e-learning is a pilot project thus few students and done (Jansen and Vithal, 2005).
instructors are deeply involved and the character- The findings of the study are summarized below
istics of e-learning practice and indicators needed under broad headings of Features of e-learning,
to be studied intensively. The respondents needed Utilization of e-learning, and Attitudes towards
to be reached by discussion groups, observation, use of e-learning.
and interviews that required a small sample size
as the purposive research required only those Features of E-Learning
respondents with relevant data.
The collection of data was done using in- Computing history of learners and instructors in
struments: observation checklists, structured all the three selected institutions is average. Most
interviews and focus group discussion guides. of the respondents had used computers for more
Observation enabled the researcher to get first than two years. The instructors had used computers
hand information through personal experience. in daily work while the students used them while
Focused group discussions enabled the researcher being taught, most of them during high school. This
to participate in live discussions while noting at- has made the introduction of technology enhanced
titudes and opinions of the respondents. Interviews a little easy as the struggle to train in basic com-
enabled in-depth examination the practice of e- puter may be sidelined. Computer literacy is high,
learning in Makerere, Dar es Salaam and Nairobi with the highest literacy noted at the University of
universities. The discussions were held because it Nairobi. There were therefore not many courses
was vital to facilitate informants’ interaction and organized as induction into e-learning for students.
therefore generate a wider response, while directly For instructors, there are several induction and
observing group reactions and feelings. Focused refresher courses in e-learning. Sometimes, it is
group discussions consisted of 20 students each, easy for both students and instructors to find their
5 focus group discussions from Makerere, and own way into e-learning. Most of the users said

919
 Application of E-Learning in Teaching

that they learnt how to use the electronic platforms KewlTM and Blackboard TM at the beginning but
by themselves, but sometimes only after a very has now opted for Moodle which is open source.
limited induction. In fact some of the students Most of the features as described in the Table 1
access internet from mostly other places outside given earlier are existent on the platforms. The
the university internet cafes. features make the learning environment highly
There is use of various computer applications engaging and interactive both in synchronous and
in the design of e-content with macromedia TM asynchronous ways.
and Microsoft office TM often being used in all Internet connection exists with the intranets
the institutions. Macromedia is software that is though the access points and facilities are still
used to design e-content in hypertext markup inadequate. Nonetheless, these universities have
language (HTML). This enables instructors to tried their best to increase access points. In Mak-
create hyperlinks to content outside the designed erere University for example, there is wireless in
content to enable further self discovery and learn- several places and in many lecturer rooms and
ing. Microsoft officeTM is used very frequently offices, there are access points. Network plans
though respondents were not conscious that they like the one given in the Figure 1 have been a very
were using the software in almost all the daily salient feature in the introduction of e-learning.
routines. For instance, you would find an instruc- None of the universities could have gone any step
tor with several presentations in power point, or without such plans.
students with a number of typed course works, In all the universities, there has been a complete
but when you ask them of the software they use digitization of libraries. Students can research
in their digital learning environments, they would online as the universities have been able to get
say, they have none. journals, books and other literature, which they
E-learning platforms exist in all the universi- have subscribed to and can be accessed by students.
ties, Moodle for Makerere, Blackboard TM and The University of Nairobi had been able to do
WebCTTM for Dar es Salaam and Wedusoft TM this with support of AVIOR, a Belgian support
for Nairobi with the internet as electronic learn- organization. By the time of this write up, the
ing platforms in the institutions. Makerere, had University of Nairobi had over 20,000, Dar es

Figure 1. Network plans at Makerere University

920
Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Salaam 25,000 and Makerere had 19,000 journals at the universities of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam
they could access. Research literature is more up were better compared to those of Makerere.
to date and global compared to the earlier times. This variation may be because of the deliberate
e-content design workshops at these universi-
Utilization of E-Learning ties. Naturally, Makerere has a lesson to learn
from this as it had no deliberate e-content design
Findings on the utilization of e-learning in the workshops. Though the institutions evidently had
three universities relate to technology concerns, some e-learning equipment that could produce
technology components, management and orga- quality multimedia e-content, multimedia content
nization. To design e-content materials instructors was not common, because they require more time
utilize the features of e-learning existent in the and technicality to make. The quality of technol-
universities in e-learning. The design skills are ogy to produce and deliver quality multimedia is
provided in the several e-learning workshops. limited. Currently broadband that has increased
At the University of Nairobi, all courses on the the internet bandwidth all over East Africa has
electronic learning platform are a property of the come and universities are attempting to increase
university. The University of Nairobi, among the on their bandwidth. Before, to download only a
three universities had the best (as rated by the small image would take too long or sometimes,
researcher) management of the technology they it would time out because of the bandwidth. This
had, where the University of Dar es salaam had had been a major bottleneck for the universities
the best organization of the technology. At the to effectively implement e-learning.
University of Dar es salaam, there was a very well Effective administration and support enhances
organized e-learning unit under the University the use of technology enhanced learning. There
computing center, but Makerere was only trying was some evidence of effective administration and
to put in place such a unit. support. At Makerere, the support team did not
Instructors need enough time to concentrate ably handle the e-learning user demands. As stated
on the design of e-content though this time is before, Makerere was at the beginning phase of
hard to be availed to them by the institutions. The piloting e-learning. However, many things have
conventional teaching methodologies are equally drastically changed for the better and now there
demanding for the time that would have been used is an established e-learning unit only awaiting
to design e-content. Even if there was enough senate to discuss and pass a policy for its total
time, the change is so fast in technology. The trap implementation. There are student internet kiosk
has always been to change with the technological attendants for the effective management and de-
change and pay little attention to the real pedagogic livery of e-learning. Though, more is needed for
issues and needs required in using technology in the efficiency of this system.
education. The management of time to engage in E-learning takes place through effective com-
e-learning and to teach is clashing. E-learning at munication where an instructor is at one end and
this level is used as a supplement to traditional the student at another; able to interact in a virtual
methods of instruction best described as blended way just like they were more or less face-to-face.
learning approaches. Makerere University learn- Instructors need time wherever they are to com-
ing platforms had more e-content courses than municate to their students in both, asynchronous
the other institutions though the quality of these and synchronous ways. Instructors did not report
courses was still low with little or no interactivity effective communication and its use in e-learning
in most of them being electronic lecture notes and because on many occasion, they did not create
Microsoft PowerPointTM slide shows. The courses enough time to communicate with their students.

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 Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Students on the other hand were more enthusiastic to face-to-face instruction. E-learning is viewed
in communication as they would chat with each as demanding considerable amount of time for
other, send emails, and join discussion forums, one to make an effective contribution or use of it.
activities that they instructors had created for The presence of multimedia and interactive
them. This comes about because in Makerere content in e-learning enables users to formulate
for instance, though wiring has done up to of- a different perception about e-learning. Most of
fices, very little attempts have been made to put those who are not very conversant with computer
computers in them. In most occasions, staffs who use feel that e-learning is very complicated and
are interested in e-learning have had to buy their needs very high intelligence for success. This may
own computers. This has been detrimental to the be the case but what is basic is, one should leave
pace of e-learning. On all the main university programming for computer scientists and look at
intranets of Nairobi, Dar es Salaam and Makerere the potential of multimedia in instruction. All that
nonetheless, there are a number of issues related is needed are only the basics, which bring in the
to announcements, jobs and other important an- fact that there is need for teamwork in e-learning
nouncements. Related to this communication, of between computer scientist, administrators, teach-
later, some of the faculties at Makerere University ers etc. The kind of support and administration
have established state of art video conferencing in an e-learning environment also gives users a
facilities that will facilitate real time technology platform for different attitudes.
enhanced learning. There are different motivational factors for en-
gagement in e-learning both intrinsic and extrinsic
Attitude towards Use of E-Learning in all the institutions. But the operational initiation
of e-learning has an impact on its success. The
It was rather difficult to get a general attitude universities are using a top-down approach and
towards the operation of e-learning in all the in this way, those who engage in e-learning might
three institutions, as it required more time than feel that it is imposed on them. On the contrary,
the research had. Nevertheless, some instructors if a bottom-up approach is used, it will bring in
see technology enhanced learning replacing face- more ownership of the technology enhanced learn-
to-face sessions and some students use e-learning ing initiative. These approaches serve as either
to dodge face-to-face sessions. At the University intrinsic or extrinsic motivators.
of Nairobi, an instructor asked, if e-learning will Users in all the three universities saw many
not take away all students from the lecture room benefits in e-learning including the ability to
as they would have all they need in terms of notes, access advanced content, availability of content
assignments and coursework. This comes because all the time, independent study and more effec-
of the factor that most instructors do upload all tive communication. All these have changed and
the notes they would have given in class. It would shaped the way institutions deliver and package
not be appropriate for one to upload the notes their services now. For example, the University
that the students will have in class, as this will of Nairobi had a completely digitized library
not make any big difference between technology during the time of this research. The Universities
enhanced learning and electronic notes. It requires of Makerere and Dar es Salaam have since then
time to put notes design materials for uploading also embarked on digitizing their libraries (this
in a right format. E-learning would appropriately publication has been done when the digitization is
be a blended instructional method. This is the also complete), where catalogues, journal books
reason why some instructors have avoided getting and most services are becoming digital. All these
involved in electronic instruction as they are used bring in the perception that e-learning solves all

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Application of E-Learning in Teaching

the problems which of course is not true. General the infrastructure available. There is in-
comments indicated that in e-learning, users go ternet connection, learning platforms, and
for learning aspects including interactivity in e- e-content so far designed and developed.
content and the potential to improve teaching not There is also a potential skill in users in
technological issues. the operation of e-learning. However, in all
Challenges of participation in e-learning exist the universities, e-learning demand is out-
in all the universities that included limited acces- growing supply if measures are not taken
sibility due to limited access points, high degree of to curtail this.
computer illiteracy among both staff and students, • There is utilization of e-learning infrastruc-
incoherent policies for e-learning, and the need ture in instruction, learning and research in
for mindset change among them. These are very the universities of Dar es Salaam, Makerere
limiting factors in the e-learning pilot given the and Nairobi. Utilization of e-learning has
fact that they relate to psychological orientation. been the design of e-content, provision
Issues of computers being expensive can be solved and search for content in a given course
by getting a few finances but issues of mindset unit with little emphasis on the pedagogic
are too personal. It is hoped that all institutions issues. The potential of e-learning in in-
will try to engage in some sensitization to create struction learning and research is therefore
awareness in ICT use. yet to be fully tapped. Technological and
managerial concerns related to e-learn still
prevails in these universities.
CONCLUSION • Nevertheless, there is generally a very
positive attitude towards technology en-
Technology enhanced learning in the universities hanced learning in all the three institutions.
of Dar es Salaam, Makerere and Nairobi is here to Students, instructors and other administra-
stay. It is an evolving and gradual process. It has tors concur that e-learning presents a choice
just started and has not yet reached the climax and for them to operate in an environment they
users have a lot of expectations from e-learning. like best. Knowledge about many aspects
The universities are aware of this fact that the of e-learning is still limited for some mis-
e-learning will not replace face-to-face teaching conceived reasons. This hinders the real
and learning but will be a complementary and utilization of e-learning in teaching, learn-
blended aspect of learning in which learners have a ing and research.
diversity of media in learning. Users need patience
with e-learning because it has just started and is In the Universities of Makerere, Nairobi and
not going to perform miracles. It is a journey. We Dar es Salaam, based on the earlier discussions,
can equate the introduction of e-learning in these the following specific conclusions can be obtained
institutions to a newly born baby, it is breast fed, relating to the practice of e-learning:
and it sits, crawls, walks and one time it will run.
The following are generic conclusions that may • E-learning is clearly taking shape in insti-
be generalized to all institution at the beginning tutions where there exists computer infra-
of an e-learning journey structure, intranet, internet, learning plat-
forms, e-learning policies and e-content
• There are scanty but clear indications of course materials.
e-learning in the universities of Nairobi, • E-learning in its first phase is being used
Dar es Salaam and Makerere as seen from for distribution of content though there is

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 Application of E-Learning in Teaching

an apparent move towards more interactive popular among all participants in the se-
materials lected institutions.
• Students need effective communication • Develop a curriculum in e-content devel-
and guidance from instructors concern- opment similar to that used by the case
ing aspects of content in an e-learning with the University of Nairobi.
environment • Regular training and workshops should
• E-learning use has not realized its full be encouraged to popularize e-learning
potential amongst users in Nairobi, Makerere and
• There is general satisfaction among us- Dar es Salaam Universities. In these work-
ers with regard to the use of e-learning in shops however, aspects of learning and ef-
teaching and learning. This is supported by fective communication and not technology
the fact that there is more strong agreement should emphasized.
with perceived advantages and disagree- • Specialized training in design of instruc-
ment with disadvantages of e-learning. tional materials. Many of the instructors
• The potential benefits of e-learning in are not teachers by training thus needing
teaching and learning manifest but do not pedagogic training to make more appropri-
reflect in most instructors due to lack of ate instructional material in all the three
course redesign. universities. The capacity to exploit e-
• Motivators into participation in e-learning learning depends on users’ skills.
are intrinsic: teaching and learning issues • Increased bandwidth in all the three uni-
(such as increased benefit to students). versities as the networks are still slow.
• There is effective team management and • Improve the kind of support given in e-
administration of e-learning infrastructure. learning centers, particularly in Makerere
University though it may be applicable in
all the three institutions. Learners com-
RECOMMENDATIONS plained about the technical support people
and uncooperative end user personnel.
On the basis of the findings of this project, in order This necessitated that people apt in use of
to improve on the practice and enable change of ICT but with some background pedagogic
attitudes towards the practice of e-learning, the training can do a better job than computer
following recommendations may be considered; technicians in e-learning.

• Get more computers connected to the in-

ternet and liberalize accessibility in the in- REFERENCES
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• Greater sensitization about the practice
of e-learning is called for to make it more

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Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Fonseca, C. (2001). Fallacies and objectives ADDITIONAL READING

regarding the uses of new technologies in educa-
tion. Prospects, 31(3), 399–413. Alessi, S., & Trollip, S. (2001). Multimedia for
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Jonassen, D. H. (2001). Computers in the Class- Boston: Allyn and Bacon.
room Minds for critical thinking. Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Merrill. Arsham, H. (2002). Impact of the internet on
learning and teaching. USDLA Journal, 16(3),
Merrill, M. D. (2002). First principles of in- 9-20. Retrieved from http://www.usdla.org/html/
struction. Educational Technology Research journal/MAR02_Issue/article01.html
and Development, 50(3), 43–59. doi:10.1007/
BF02505024 Delvin, M. (2002). Introduction. In The Internet
and the University: 2001 Forum. Forum for the
Mutula, S. (2002). E-learning initiatives Future of Higher Education, Aspen Symposium.
at the University of Botswana: challeng-
es and opportunities. Journal of Campus- Karen, E. (2008). North South School Partner-
wide Information Systems, 19(3), 99–109. ships: Learning from schools in the UK, Africa
doi:10.1108/10650740210431916 and Asia. London: Institute of Education.

Omwenga, E. I. (2003). Modeling and analyzing Laurillard, D. (2002). Rethinking teaching for
a computer mediated learning Infrastructure. the knowledge society. In The Internet and the
Unpublished Doctoral Thesis, University of University: 2001 Forum. Forum for the Future
Nairobi, Nairobi, Kenya. of Higher Education, Aspen Symposium.

Omwenga, E. I., Waema, T. M., & Wagacha, P. Luhanga, M. L., et al. (2003). Strategic Planning
W. (2004). A model for introducing and imple- and Higher Education Management in Africa:
menting E-learning for delivery of educational The University of Dar Es Salaam Experience. Dar
content within the African context. [AJST]. es Salaam: Dar es Salaam University Press Ltd.
African Journal of Science and Technology, Makerere University. (2009). Retrieved from
5(1), 34–46. http://www.mak.ac.ug
Van Der Merwe, A. (2004). Evaluating the McPherson, M. (Ed.). (2005). Developing inno-
integration of ICT into teaching and learning vation in e-learning: lessons to be learned. British
activities at a South African higher education Journal of Educational Technology, 36(4), 585–
institution. Unpublished Doctoral Thesis, Uni- 586. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2005.00548.x
versity of Stellenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa.
Omwenga, E. I. (2003). Modeling and analyzing
Walimbwa, M. (2007). E-learning practices in a computer mediated learning Infrastructure.
teaching, learning and research at the universi- Unpublished PhD Thesis, University of Nairobi,
ties of Makerere, Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. Nairobi, Kenya.
Unpublished M.Ed Dissertation, Makerere Uni-
versity, Kampala. Omwenga, E. I., Waema, T. M., & Wagacha, P.
W. (2004). A model for introducing and imple-
menting E-learning for delivery of educational
content within the African context. [AJST].
African Journal of Science and Technology,
5(1), 34–46.

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Picciano, A. (2002). Beyond student perceptions: Van Der Merwe, A. D. (2004). Evaluating the
issues of interaction, presence and performance integration of ICT into teaching and learning
in an online course. Journal of Asynchronous activities at a South African higher education
Learning Networks (JALN) 6(1). Retrieved from institution. Unpublished PhD Thesis, University
http://www.aln.org/publications/jaln/vn1/ of Stellenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa.
Ravenscroft, A. (2001). Designing e-learning Wayne, M. (2005). Can You Lead from Be-
interaction in the 21st century: revisiting and hind? Critical Reflections on the Rhetoric of
rethinking the role of theory. European Journal E-learning, Open Distance Learning, and ICTs
of Education, 36(2), 133–156. doi:10.1111/1467- for Development in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).
3435.00056 In A. Carr-Chellman (Ed.), Global Perspectives
on E-learning. Rhetoric and Reality (pp. 222-
Republic of Uganda. (2002). National infor-
240). Thousand Oaks,CA: Sage Publications.
mation and communication technology policy.
Kampala Uganda. Wischhhusen, M., et al. (2003). Applied Informa-
tion and Communication Technology. Oxford,
Rogers, M. O. (1995). Diffusion of innovations
London: Heinemann Educational Publishers.
(4th Ed.). New York: Free Press
World Bank. (2000). Higher Education in devel-
Surry, D. W., & Farquhar, J. D. (1997). Diffu-
oping countries, Peril and promise. Washington
sion Theory and Education Technology. Journal
DC: World Bank publication.
of Instructional Science and Technology, 2(1),
24–36. World Bank. (2002) Constructing knowledge
societies: New challenges for tertiary institu-
Taskforce on Higher Education and Society.
tions. Washington DC: World Bank publication.
(2000). Higher education in developing coun-
tries, peril and promise. Washington DC: World
Bank publication.
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Tusubira. (2002). Supporting universities’ ICT
developments: the Makerere university experi- Attitude: The feeling towards e-learning. This
ence. A paper presented at CODESRIA general feeling comes either before or after engaging in
Assembly 8 – 12 Dec 2002. e-learning
UNESCO. (2002). Information, Communica- Blended Learning: Learning which is deliv-
tion Technology in Education. A curriculum for ered using a mixture of both traditional methods
schools and programme for teacher development. like lecturers and technology enhanced instruction
Paris: UNESCO. E-Learning/ Technology Enhanced Learn-
ing: The delivery of learning, training or education
University of Dar es Salaam. (n.d.). Retrieved program by electronic means. It involves the use
from http://www.udsm.ac.tz of a computer or other electronic device in a way
University of Nairobi. (n.d.). Retrieved from to provide learning material
http://www.uonbi.ac.ke E-Content: Materials that have been trans-
formed from those that are delivered in the normal
lecture room, to those that are highly interactive
and allows self paced learning.

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Application of E-Learning in Teaching

Digital Environment: A situation where there Multimedia: The act of a lesson integrating
are electronic devices being used in instruction, audio-visual and video interactions to make learn-
leaning and research ers more engaged in a study.
TEHEMA: Is a Kiswahili acronym (techno- Intranet: Is a local area network, where a uni-
logia ehabari mawasiliano) for Information and versity can use the available computers to access
Communication Technology. information from within the campus.

This work was previously published in Cases on Interactive Technology Environments and Transnational Collaboration:
Concerns and Perspectives, edited Siran Mukerji, pp. 360-372, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an imprint
of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.10
Asynchronous Online
Foreign Language Courses
Leticia L. McGrath
Georgia Southern University, USA

Mark Johnson
University System of Georgia, USA

INTRODUCTION the courses. In addition, a set of guidelines for the

development of eCore® courses was established
In 1999, the Board of Regents of the University to ensure the courses were of the highest quality
System of Georgia (USG), in collaboration with possible. The eCore® course array was developed
a number of its member institutions, began de- over a period of seven years. While many of the
veloping a fully online set of courses that allows courses were well suited to the asynchronous on-
a student to complete a core curriculum that is line approach, there were content areas that were
transferable across the USG. The result of this ef- more controversial, such as physics, chemistry
fort is the USG’s eCore® Program, developed by and foreign languages, due to the highly specific
the Advanced Learning Technologies (ALT) unit requirements in each of these disciplines.
of the USG. The eCore® Courses were created The last courses to be developed for the USG’s
using a collaborative course development process eCore® Program were two that comprised the
that engaged teams of USG faculty, technical Intermediate Spanish sequence. This course
support and an instructional designer from ALT. development process began with an intensive
The collaborative course development process examination of the viability of an online language
was utilized in order to take full advantage of course by a team of content experts from a team of
the expertise of the team members and to incor- USG Foreign Language faculty. Foreign Language
porate multiple perspectives of the content into (FL) courses, by nature, must incorporate expo-
sure to the target language and extensive practice
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch410
communicating in that language. Technology is

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Asynchronous Online Foreign Language Courses

increasingly becoming an integral part of the FL Many researchers agree that text-based com-
classroom as students use computer-mediated puter conference technologies create a setting in
communication (CMC) to practice the language which students experience a decrease in anxiety
with their peers, instructor, and native speakers of when compared to face-to-face conversation
the language via chat rooms and message boards. (Beauvois, 1994, 1996, 1999; Kivela, 1996; Lee,
The following discusses the development and 2004; Meunier, 1998; Skinner & Austin, 1999;
implementation of the Intermediate Spanish levels Warschauer, 1996). In addition, research shows
I and II courses for the USG eCore® Program. that students indicate they feel a significantly
lower fear of negative evaluation via the com-
puter (Beauvois, 1996; Chun, 1994; Kelm, 1992;
BACKGROUND: COMPUTER- Kivela, 1996).
ASSISTED LANGUAGE Recent advances in computer conferencing
LEARNING (CALL) technologies expand communication from simple
text-based tools, such as email, chat rooms, or bul-
The study of Computer-Assisted Language Learn- letin boards, to voice-based technologies, further
ing (CALL), an emerging topic for educators and enhancing the language learning environment by
researchers, has provided language instructors and allowing students to communicate with their own
learners a great realm of possibilities in Second voices on their own time. Little research exists con-
Language Acquisition (SLA). Warschauer (1997), cerning the use of voice tools for CMC in foreign
in his study “Computer-Mediated Collaborative language classes; however a recent doctoral dis-
Learning: Theory and Practice,” provides a suc- sertation, “The Effects of Asynchronous Computer
cinct review of relevant research in the second Voice Conferencing on Learners’ Anxiety When
half of the twentieth century, confirming the Speaking a Foreign Language” by Poza (2005)
relationship between the significant increase in provides an in depth study of the many advantages
investigation in the 1990s with the advent of the of online oral interaction. Poza’s research utilizes
internet and the rise of the accessibility of comput- an asynchronous voice web board developed by
ers. Warschauer firmly asserts that online com- Wimba, a software company dedicated to the
munication “encourages collaborative learning in online education market. As defined by one of
the classroom” (p. 472). Some of the more salient the co-founders and former CEO of the company,
studies (Kern, 1995; Warschauer, 1997;Kinginger, K. W. Ross (2003): “Asynchronous voice is the
1998, Abrams, 2003; Poza, 2005) emphasize the interactive communication process of people
advantages of incorporating CMC into face-to- leaving voice messages for other people and the
face language courses. Kern contends that: other people responding to their voice messages”
(p. 60). The results of Poza’s investigation reveal
new medium-specific conventions . . . compensate that “a number of students experienced reduced
for the absence of prosodic and paralinguistic anxiety attributable to both the elimination of the
features found in face-to-face oral communication. time pressure of the classroom, as well as the op-
For example, facial expressions such as smiles [:-) portunity to edit their contributions before posting
1, frowns [):-(1, or winks [ ;-) ] become icons, them to the voice board” (108).
and tone of voice is represented by capitaliza-
tion, underlining, exclamation marks, and other
symbols. (p. 459)

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DEVELOPING AND IMPLEMENTING challenge. Beginning in April, 2004 a team of four

ECORE® INTERMEDIATE Spanish language faculty, an instructional designer
SPANISH I AND II and a programmer began to develop the courses.
As the FLT report emphasized, skill development
In the spring of 2003 The Foreign Language Team and assessment were crucial components of any
(FLT) was formed to investigate the efficacy of successful language course.
an online eCore® Spanish course. This team was The first challenge was to determine how the
made up of USG Spanish, French, German and oral aspect of language education could be ac-
English faculty. The FLT report, (Barron, et al., complished in an online environment. The FLT
2003) was a comprehensive evaluation of the recommended several possible technologies in-
“state of the art” of online language education cluding Wimba, a suite of “voice tools” specifically
and offered a set of specific recommendations designed for online language education, a voice
for developing asynchronous online language enabled web conferencing program called Ellumi-
education courses for the USG eCore® project. nate, as well as telephone and tape recorded audio
The report began with the following: sessions. After careful consideration, Wimba was
adopted because of its ease of use, asynchronous
This report examines issues surrounding the imple- application, and compatibility with Blackboard
mentation of 2000 level online foreign language Vista, the course management system used within
courses and makes specific recommendations the USG. Wimba allows students to record their
to the University System of Georgia regarding oral exercises and post them to a “voice board”
implementing such courses as part of its eCore® where they can be retrieved by the instructor for
program. In our examination, we consider out- review and comment. In addition, the applica-
comes and standards, pedagogical approaches, tion includes voice email, a voice recorder that
instructional materials, technology, teaching allows faculty to record audio and a synchronous
activities, and transferability issues. component called voice direct.
Next, the team developed the actual course
The central challenge in designing an online content including the lessons, labs and assess-
foreign language course is to use technology ef- ments. While there are many Intermediate Level
fectively to assist in developing the students’skills Spanish textbooks, Enfoques by Vistas Higher
in reading, writing, speaking, and understanding. Learning had several advantages that led the
A related challenge is to create an online course development team to adopt it for the courses.
that will effectively assess the students’ perfor- One of the primary advantages of Enfoques is
mance and growth. (p. 2) the online lab, Web SAM (Student Activities
Manual) provided by Quia Books. The labs, which
In addition, the FLT recognized the importance include the workbook, laboratory manual, and
of students having a foundation in the target video manual, are based on the textbook and this
language prior to taking online courses This saved the team countless hours of development
resulted in the implementation of the eCore® time. In addition, the textbook package includes
Spanish courses at the intermediate level with a CD-ROMs with video, audio and tutorials that
prerequisite of elementary Spanish in a traditional are also linked to the textbook. These ready-made
classroom setting. resources allowed the development team to focus
While this report provided an important frame- on writing the course content.
work for the eCore® Spanish courses, the actual In addition to the written course content the
development of the courses would be a greater development team had native speakers of the

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Asynchronous Online Foreign Language Courses

language record readings that allow the students its ancillaries, students have maximum exposure
to experience in-depth recitations of literature in to the language, providing them with ample op-
the target language. Finally, the team used the portunities to improve their ability to speak, read,
USG’s Interactive Media Object Development write, and understand Spanish.
Tool (IMOD) to develop flash cards that presented Individual student language acquisition was the
key vocabulary in each unit. These cards show top priority in the design of these courses. One of
the Spanish and English spelling of word along the key features of the online eCore® courses is the
with audio of the word being spoken in Spanish. dictation done by native Spanish speakers of much
The pilot eCore® Spanish course began in of the course content imbedded within the course
the spring of 2006 at the intermediate level with itself. Students experience much of what students
eleven students. Because the textbook, Enfoques, in a face-to-face class experience in that aspect, as
is integrated into the online course, students are they read along while the instructor explains the
able to use its many resources to guide them as material to them from the textbook. As a follow
they work through each lesson. Enfoques includes up, the students are asked questions concerning
a unique and engaging situational comedy video the context and vocabulary of the lesson, and they
episode in every lesson featuring native speakers must answer by recording their own voices to the
from several different Spanish-speaking countries. Wimba voice bulletin board Also accompanying
As students watch the video, they see the structures each new grammatical structure is an additional
they are learning put to use in the everyday lives explanation (in addition to the textbook) in Spanish
and adventures of the owner and his employees for students to use as a guide. At the end of each
of the lifestyle magazine Facetas. In addition, in chapter, students have the opportunity to listen
every odd-numbered lesson, students watch an while they read pieces of literature. Face-to-face
interesting short film by a contemporary Hispanic students, for the most part, are unable to enjoy this
filmmaker. Because the textbook emphasizes luxury due to time limitations in the classrooms,
authentic language and practical vocabulary for but one can imagine how effective it would be to
communicating in real-life situations, students have a native speaker recorded for each piece of
are provided with abundant opportunities to both literature that is introduced in class.
experience the language in context and practice One of the greatest advantages of an online
speaking it in communicative activities, all of this FL course is the increase in communication in
despite the fact that the students may never meet the target language among all students. In face-
face-to-face. In addition, in each lesson there are to-face classrooms, FL instructors often find it
literary readings, cultural viewpoints, fine art, and challenging to convince each student in a class-
quotations by famous Hispanics that recognize and room to participate openly in oral activities. Poza
celebrate the diversity of the Spanish-speaking (2005) affirms “that there is a strong relationship
world and Spanish speakers. between anxiety and risk-taking in oral participa-
When students sign in to their eCore® Span- tion in a foreign language,” and that “if foreign
ish course, they enter into a Spanish-speaking language educators can provide an environment
world, an environment where they can listen to where students can concentrate on language
the language in authentic situations via the vid- and meaning, rather than on fear of failure and
eos, the interactive CDROM, the mp3 files, the negative evaluation, their level of anxiety will be
comprehensive laboratory activities, the record- lowered, and they will be able to speak more often
ings within the course in each lesson, the Wimba and openly in the target language. (p. 18-19). The
voice boards, and the iMods. Using the materials affective filter, an expression used to describe the
within the WebCT course and the textbook with negative emotional environment created by high

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anxiety and low self-esteem in acquiring a second Spanish courses are more time consuming for
language, is indeed reduced in CMC. Students in both the instructor and the student than the
a face-to-face classroom who fear negative evalu- equivalent face-to-face courses. The activities
ation, either from the instructor or their peers, are within the textbook that are designed for use
less apprehensive when communicating online, within the classroom are now assignments that
given the absence of both certain social cues and students must complete on their own. Students
the intimidating presence of others nearby. In type their answers to the corresponding textbook
addition, “people with disabilities and those who activities listed within each lesson in WebCT,
would otherwise be reticent to participate in the record their voices in specific exercises, and
communication act feel more inclined to take complete the workbook activities, video manual,
part in the interaction” (Poza, 2005). The online and laboratory manual on the Quia Books web
Intermediate Spanish eCore® courses provide a site. The first semester that Intermediate Spanish
comfortable learning environment in which stu- I was offered in eCore®, spring 2006, the course
dents communicate with ease. In addition to the included lessons 1 through 6, and students turned
added benefits of lowering student anxiety, CMC in each textbook activity separately, inundating
allows for students to produce more language with the instructor’s assignment dropbox with dozens
a richer vocabulary than they do in face-to-face of submissions each chapter. Over the summer of
conversations (Beauvois, 1997). 2006, the course was restructured to incorporate
The scope and sequence of the eCore® In- only lessons 1 through 5 and revised so that stu-
termediate Spanish I and II courses is shown in dents would compile their textbook activities on
Table 1. (taken from Enfoques): one document per chapter and submit those at the
Due to the quantity of topics and structures end of each lesson.
covered in each chapter, the eCore® Intermediate

Table 1.

eCore® eCore®
INTERMEDIATE SPANISH I INTERMEDIATE SPANISH II
     Lesson 1 - Las Relaciones Personales      Lesson 6 - La Naturaleza
          describe in the present          describe and narrate in the future
          narrate in the present          express what you or others would do
          express personal relationships          express events that depend on other events
     Lesson 2 - Las Diversiones      Lesson 7 - La Economía y el Trabajo
        express actions in progress          reference general ideas
        avoid redundancy          express ownership or possession
        describe your daily routine and activities          create longer, more informative sentences
        express personal likes and dislikes          relate ideas more smoothly to other ideas
     Lesson 3 - La Vida Diaria      Lesson 8 - La Religión y la Política
        narrate in the past          describe actions in the passive voice
        express completed past actions          express surprise or unexpected occurrences
        express habitual or ongoing past events or conditions          express contradiction to previously stated information
        describe how, when, and where actions take place      Lesson 9 - La Cultura Popular y los Medios de Comuni-
     Lesson 4 - Los Viajes cación
        express past events and conditions          narrate events that depend on past events
        make comparisons          describe the position of people or objects
        express your attitude toward actions and conditions          express choice and negation
     Lesson 5 - La Salud y el Bienestar      Lesson 10 - La Literatura y el Arte
        express will, emotion, doubt, or denial          express what will have happened
        express uncertainty and indefiniteness          express what would have happened
        convey purpose, condition, and intent          make contrary-to-fact statements about the past
        give orders, advice, and suggestions          describe changes in a mental, emotional, or physical state

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Asynchronous Online Foreign Language Courses

The second offering of this course, fall 2006, a wide appeal to non-traditional students. Nearly
was more efficient and better organized. In both 45% of the students enrolled in eCore® courses are
the spring and fall semesters of 2007, two courses over the age of 25, 72% are female, and there has
of Intermediate Spanish I and one course of Inter- been a steady increase in the number of minority
mediate Spanish II were offered. Both courses are students to almost 30% since the inception of the
currently undergoing another revision due to a new program. In the Intermediate Spanish courses now
edition of the textbook, Enfoques. These changes offered in eCore®, students are quite pleased with
will provide the student with more contemporary the many resources available to them, and several
cultural activities with the integration of a new and have expressed interest in continuing the language
exciting video series titled Flash Cultura, which as a minor, perhaps even a major field of study.
depicts on-location scenes of real-world events
and real Spanish speakers. In addition, Enfoques
includes a new Supersite online which features REFERENCES
an expansive set of tools and resources for both
students and instructors. Abrams, Z. (2003). The Effect of Synchronous
and Asynchronous CMC on Oral Performance in
German. Modern Language Journal, 87, 157–167.
FUTURE TRENDS doi:10.1111/1540-4781.00184
Baron, E. Bledsoe, R, Cotille-Foley, N. Daigle,
As mentioned above, there are few studies on the L. Nuhfer-Halten, B, McCoy, S. Tesser, C (2003).
use of voice tools in online language courses. There Proposed Implementation of eCore Online For-
is a great opportunity for research in this area, es- eign Language Courses: Evaluation and Recom-
pecially concerning student evaluation both prior mendations
to and following taking the fully online course.
As video conferencing is gaining in popularity, it Beauvois, M. H. (1994). E-talk: Attitudes and
would provide another avenue of research for the motivation in computer-assisted classroom discus-
possibility of incorporating into these online Span- sion. [from the Kluwer Online database.]. Comput-
ish courses. In addition, podcasting has become ers and the Humanities, 28, 177–190. Retrieved
an excellent way to reach students via their most January 25, 2004. doi:10.1007/BF01830738
chosen media, providing them the opportunities
Beauvois, M. H. (1996). Personality types and
to view video and/or listen to audio files via their
megabytes: Student attitudes toward computer-
iPods as they approach learning a foreign language
mediated communication (CMC) in the language
in a fully online classroom.
classroom. CALICO Journal, 13, 26–45.
Beauvois, M. H. (1997). Write to speak: The
CONCLUSION effects of electronic communication on the oral
achievement of fourth semester French students.
As of the spring of 2006 over 13,000 students had In J. Muyskens (Ed.), New ways of learning and
taken eCore® courses in 489 sections of the 25 teaching: Issues in language program direction
courses offered. One advantage of these courses (pp. 93-1 16). Boston: Heinle.
is that their credits are accepted system-wide by
the 35 USG institutions. This flexibility, combined
with the fact that the courses are offered in an
“asynchronous” or anytime-anywhere format, has

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 Asynchronous Online Foreign Language Courses

Beauvois, M. H. (1999). Computer-mediated Ross, K. W. (2003). Asynchronous Voice: A

communication: Reducing anxiety and building personal account. IEEE MultiMedia, 10, 70–74.
community. In D. J. Young (Ed.), Affect in For- doi:10.1109/MMUL.2003.1195163
eign Language and Second Language Learning:
Skinner, B., & Austin, R. (1999). Computer con-
A Practical Guide to Creating a Low Anxiety
ferencing—does it motivate EFL students? ELT
Classroom Atmosphere (pp. 144165). Boston:
Journal, 53, 270–278. doi:10.1093/elt/53.4.270
McGraw Hill.
Warschauer, M. (1996b). Motivational aspecs of
Chun, D. M. (1994). Using computer networking
using computers for writing and communication.
to facilitate the acquisition of interactive compt-
In M. Warschauer (Ed.), Telecollaboration in
etence. System, 22, 17–31. doi:10.1016/0346-
foreign language learning: Proceedings of the
251X(94)90037-X
Hawai’i symposium. (Technical report #12) (pp.
Kern, R. G. (1995). Restructuring classroom in- 29-46). Honolulu, Hawai’i: University of Hawai’i,
teraction with networked computers: Effects on Second Language Teaching & Curriculum Center.
quantity and characteristics of language produc-
tion. Modern Language Journal, 79, 457–476.
doi:10.2307/329999
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Kinginger, C. (1998). Videoconferencing as Ac-
cess to Spoken French. Modern Language Journal, Affective Filter Hypothesis: The hypothesis
72, 502–513. doi:10.2307/330221 credited to Stephen Krashen, an expert in linguis-
tics, that declares that a student’s anxiety, low self
Kivela, R. J. (1996). Writing on networked esteem, or lack of motivation can serve to cause
computers: Effects on ESL writer attitudes and a mental block preventing the successful acquisi-
apprehension. Asian Journal of English Language tion of a second language. If the “affective filter”
Teaching, 6, 85–92. is lowered by creating a learning environment in
Lee, L. (2004). Learners’ perspectives on net- which students are more motivated and suffer from
worked collaborative interaction with native less anxiety and low self esteem, the possibility
speakers of Spanish in the U.S. Language Learning of success in achieving SLA is greatly improved.
& Technology, 8, 83–100. Asynchronous Course: A course that does
not typically meet for regularly scheduled class
Meunier, L. E. (1998). Personality and motivation- meeting times and is available any time, any place
al factors in computer-mediated foreign language and at any pace. This allows students to partici-
communication (CMFLC). In J.A. Muyskens pate from any location. These courses generally
(Ed.), New ways of learning and teaching: Focus make use of the Internet, CD-ROM, independent
on technology and foreign language education study, or a combination thereof. Students access
(pp. 145-197). Boston: Heinle & Heinle. the course material from a course web site or a
Posa, María Isabel Charle (2005) The Effects of course management system.
Asynchronous Computer Voice Conferencing Computer Assisted Language Learning
on Learners’ Anxiety When Speaking a Foreign (CALL): A wide encompassing term that rep-
Language.” resents a methodology of language teaching and
learning that involves the utilization of computer
technology in assessment, reinforcement, interac-
tion, communication, and presentation.

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Asynchronous Online Foreign Language Courses

CALICO: The Computer Assisted Language compared to the first language, “L1”. Second lan-
Instruction Consortium, a professional organiza- guage acquisition may be abbreviated “SLA”, or
tion whose members emphasize the combination L2A, for “L2 acquisition”.Synchronous Course:
of technology with language teaching and learning. A course that meets for regularly scheduled class
Computer-Mediated Communication meeting times.
(CMC): Any communication between two or USG’s eCore® Program: eCore®—short for
more individuals using a computer as the means electronic core curriculum—allows University
to exchange data. System of Georgia students the opportunity to
Quintessential Instructional Archive complete their first two years (the “core” cur-
(QUIA) : A web site (found at http://www.quia. riculum) of their collegiate careers in an online
com/books) that partners with textbook publishers environment. While originally designed for the
to produce online workbooks and textbooks where non-traditional student, many currently enrolled
students are engaged with interactive exercises, students find eCore® presents an opportunity for
many of which provide immediate feedback. increasing flexibility and convenience in their
Second Language Acquisition (SLA): The course load management. eCore® consists of
process by which people learn languages in online freshman- and sophomore-level courses
addition to their native language(s). The term designed, developed, taught, and supported by
second language is used to describe any language faculty and staff from the University System of
whose acquisition starts after early childhood Georgia. eCore® offers courses in English, math-
(including what may be the third or subsequent ematics, science, history, and the social sciences.
language learned). The language to be learned is Courses comply with ADA standards to meet the
often referred to as the “target language” or “L2”, needs of students with disabilities or special needs.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 115-121, copyright 2009 by
Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

935
936

Chapter 4.11
The Application of Sound
and Auditory Responses
in E-Learning
Terry T. Kidd
University of Texas School of Public Health, USA

INTRODUCTION the designer must strive to incorporate the use of

sound for instructional transactions. By sharing
Prior to computer technology, several studies have knowledge on this issue, designer can create a
concluded that multiple senses engage the learner more realistic vision of how sound technology
to the extent that a person remembers 20% of can be used in e-learning to enhance instruction
what they see, 40% of that they see and hear, and for quality teaching and participant learning.
70% of what they see, hear and do. In general, the
participant engages what is seen and what is heard.
With this implication, instructional designer or BACKGROUND
developers try to use design guidelines to identify
the main uses of sound in e-learning as multime- Prior to computer technology, many studies con-
dia agents to enhance and reinforce concepts and cluded that multiple senses engage the learner
training from e-learning solutions. Even with such to the extent that a person remembers 20% of
understanding, instructional designers often make what they see, 40% of that they see and hear,
little use of auditory information in developing and 70% of what they see, hear and do. “Human
effective multimedia agents for e-learning solu- beings are programmed to use multiple senses
tions and applications. Thus, in order to provide for assimilating information” (Ives, 1992). Even
the learner with a realistic context for learning, with such understanding, instructional designers
often make little use of auditory information in
developing e-learning. “This neglect of the audi-
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch411

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

tory sense appears to be less a matter of choice 1999). Silence can be used to set a mood or to
and more a matter of just not knowing how to provide a moment for reflection.
‘sonify’ instructional designers to enhance learn- Mayer and his associates (Moreno & Mayer,
ing” (Bishop & Cates, 2001). The major obstacle 2000a, 2000b; Mayer 2003) have conducted
in this development is that there is not a significant a number of experiments with older learners,
amount of quantitative study on the why, when, demonstrating the superiority of audio/visual
and where audio should or should not be used instructions. These studies have shown that, in
(Beccue & Vila, 2001). many situations, visual textual explanations may
In general, interface design guidelines identify be replaced by equivalent auditory explanations,
three main uses of sound in multimedia agents and thus enhance learning. These beneficial ef-
in e-learning: (a) to alert learners to errors; (b) to fects of using audio/visual presentations only
provide stand-alone examples; or (c) to narrate occur when two or more components of a visual
text on the screen (Bishop & Cates, 2001). Review presentation are incomprehensible in isolation
of research on sound in multimedia applied to ef- and must be mentally integrated before they can
fective e-learning solutions reveals a focus on the be understood.
third use cited above. Barron and Atkins’s (1994) Because some studies suggest that the use of
research found that there were few guidelines multiple channels, when cues are highly related,
to follow when deciding whether audio should is far superior to one channel, the more extensive
replace, enhance, or mirror the text-based ver- use of sound may lead to more effective computer-
sion of a lesson. The results of her study showed based learning materials. In order to have design
equal achievement effectiveness with or without guidelines in using sound in e-learning, instruc-
the addition of the audio channel. Perceptions tional designers must understand the cognitive
were positive among all three groups. Shih and components of sound’s use and the ways sound
Alessi’s (1996) study investigated the relative contribute to appropriate levels of redundancy
effects of voice vs. text on learning spatial and and information in instructional messages. Bishop
temporal information and learners’ preferences. and Cates suggested that research should first ex-
This study found no significant difference on plore the cognitive foundation. “Such theoretical
learning. The findings of Beccue and Vila’s (2001) foundation should address information-processing
research supported these previous findings. Recent theory because it supplies a model for understand-
technological advances now make it possible for ing how instructional messages are processed by
full integration of sound in multimedia agents learners; and communication theory because it
to be employed in e-learning solutions. Sounds supplies a model for structuring effective instruc-
may enhance learning in multimedia agents, but tional messages.”
without a strong theoretical cognitive foundation,
the particular sounds used may not only fail to
enhance learning, but they may actually detract MAIN DISCUSSION:
from it (Bishop, 2001). THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS
The three audio elements in multimedia pro- FOR THE USE OF SOUND IN
duction are speech (narration, dialogue, and direct INSTRUCTION SOFTWARE
address), sound effects (contextual or narrative
function), and music (establishing locale or time; Bishop and Cates proposed a theoretical founda-
all of these identify characters and events, act as tion for sound’s use in multimedia instruction
transition elements between contrasting scenes, to enhance learning. They studied the Atkinson-
and set the mood and pace of presentation (Kerr, Shiffrin information processing model, which

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 The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

Figure 1. The Atkinson-Shiffrin information processing theory model and illustrations

addresses the transformation from environment 2001). Bishop and Cates also investigated the
stimuli to human schemata and their limitation Shannon-Weaver Communication model and its
factors due to human cognitive constraints. They limitations. They also adopted Berio’s suggestion
adopted Phye’s categorization of this process to that learning models in terms of communication
three main operations: acquisition, processing, generally begin with and focus on how messages
and retrieval. Figure 1 summarizes the Atkinson- are received and processed by learners. The work
Shiffrin information processing model and its of a number of authors identifies the three levels
limitations. “Information-processing theory ad- or phases of learning selection, analysis, and
dressed human cognition. synthesis. Figure 2 summarizes the Shannon-
Communication theory, on the other hand, Weaver communication model, its limitations,
addressed human interaction” (Bishop & Cates, and the three phases of learning.

Figure 2. The Shannon Weaver communication model and illustrations

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The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

Built on these two theories, Bishop and Cates tion by helping learners overcome various infor-
proposed an instruction communication system mation processing and noise encountered at the
where acquisition, processing, and retrieval op- selection, the analysis, and at the synthesis phase
erations are all applied, in varying amounts, dur- of the instructional communication process.
ing each phase of learning. This orthogonal rela- In overcoming acquisition noise, Bishop and
tionship is depicted in Figure 3. “Instructional Cates suggested that sounds could gain learners
communication systems could fail because of attention, help learners focus attention on appropri-
errors induced by excessive noise” (Bishop & ate information, and keep distractions of compet-
Cates, 2001). Limitations within three informa- ing stimuli, engage learner’s interest over time.
tion-processing operations can contribute to Bishop and Cates believed that sounds could help
problems in instructional communications. Noise learners elaborate on visual stimuli by providing
encountered within each operation is also shown information about invisible structure, dynamic
in Figure 3. change, and abstract concepts. And because of the
The three diagonal cells highlighted represent nature of sound to be organized in time, where
the heaviest operation within each learning phase. images are organized in space, Bishop and Cates
During selection, learning calls on acquisition believed that sounds could provide a context
heavily while during analysis, processing is cen- within which individuals can think actively about
tral. During synthesis, learning calls on retrieval connections between new information, therefore
most heavily. The relative strength of potential overcome processing noise. Bishop and Cates
noise increases and the consequences become cited Gaver’s (1993) research that when we hear
more serious at each deeper phase of learning the sound of a car while walking down the street
when following the cells vertically down the in- at night, we compare what we are hearing to our
formation-processing operations. Bishop and memories for the objects that make that sound,
Cates suggested that adding sound to instruc- drawing lfrom and linking to existing constructs
tional messages may help optimize communica- and schemata to support our understanding of what

Figure 3. The Bishop and Cates instructional communication system--a framework of instructional
communication system

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 The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

is happening, and we step out of the car’s path. context redundancy, and construct redundancy
However, if we hear the same automobile sound respectively. Sound’s content redundancy (“What
in a cartoon, we would be able to depict this event I asked was, can you pick up some things on your
in terms of another existing knowledge of event, way home?”) could contribute to the instruc-
therefore draw different conclusion. “Sounds tional message addressing the learner’s attention
could tic into, build upon, and expand existing difficulties at each of the three learning phases.
constructs in order to help relate new informa- Sound;s context redundancy (“No, I am baking a
tion to a larger system of conceptual knowledge, pie, I need flour not flower.”) could contribute to
therefore overpower the retrieval noise” (Bishop the instructional message addressing the learner’s
& Cates, 2001). (Figure 4) trouble with information manipulation. Finally,
Most researchers acknowledge that it is im- sound’s construct redundancy (“I am baking a pie
portant to employ multiple sensory modalities for for tonight’s desert.”) could assist learners in
deeper processing and better retention. Bishop connecting new information to existing sche-
and Cates used the example provided by En- mata. Bishop and Cates concluded that sound’s
gelkamp and Zimmer that seeing a telephone and contribution to optimize learning in e-learning
hearing it ring should result in better memory could be in the form of secondary cues. System-
performance than only seeing it for hearing. In- atically adding auditory cues to instructional
structional designers could suppress information- messages based on the proposed framework might
processing noise by anticipating communication enhance learning by anticipating learner difficul-
difficulties and front-loading messages by using ties and suppressing them before they occur.
redundancy—sound as the secondary cue. Bishop
and Cates defined redundancy as the part of in-
formation that overlaps. They further explained
that in order to overcome the acquisition, process-
ing, and retrieval noise, instructional designers
could use sound to employ content redundancy,

Figure 4. Summarization of Bishop and Cates framework for sound usage in multimedia based instruc-
tion Instructional communication system

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The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

INSTRUCTIONAL COMMUNICATION Which sound should be used to overpower

FRAMEWORK channel noises?
2. Audio quality: Pacing, pitch and volume all
Bishop and Cates’s (2001) instructional com- play a role in setting the mood of instruction.
munication framework provided a theoretical The voice of a male or female and how its
foundation for answering the question of why we expressiveness affects learners are worth
should incorporate sound into multimedia agents exploring.
for effective e-learning solutions. Barron and 3. Cognitive load: How can sound be incor-
Atkins (1994) also suggested that when complex porated into e-learning without exceeding
graphics are involved, it might be more feasible learners’ channel capacity?
to deliver instruction through audio than through 4. Redundancy between audio and graphics:
text because there is insufficient room on the Research showed that the word-for word
screen for the text. Shih and Alessi (1996) stated narrates redundancy could not improve
that each medium has its own characteristics and learner achievement because no new infor-
interacts with other media to produce different mation is supplied. Will there be appropriate
effects when put together. Their report also stated redundancy between a complex graphic and
the advantage auditory system has over text: (a) audio?
voice is generally considered the more realistic 5. Interference factors: Multiple channel cues
and natural mode than displayed text; (b) voice might complete with each other, resulting in
has the advantage such as being more easily com- distraction in learning. A syntax and connec-
prehended by children or poor readers; (c) voice tion needs to be established between primary
does not distract visual attention from stimuli and secondary cues.
such as diagrams; (d) voice is more lifelike and 6. Learner control: Learners tend to achieve
therefore more engaging; and (e) voice is good better performance when they have control
for conveying temporal information. Bishop and of the learning experience.
Cates’s framework provided the answer to how, 7. Logistics: The speed, volume, and the re-
where, and when instructional designers could use peatability should take into consideration
sound in designing software to enhance learning. when designing e-learning using sounds.
Instructional designers should understand the 8. Demographic: Is there difference among
cognitive components of sound’s use and the ways gender, age group, and ethnic background
sounds could contribute to appropriate levels of in achievement and perception? How will
redundancy. By using sound as the secondary cue learners speaking English as the second
to complement the primary message and to provide language learn differently from a native
new information, instructional designers could speaker? How will this affect the design of
systematically add sound in the multimedia agent e-learning using sound?
to e-learning to lead to more effective computer- 9. Content area: Are there different consid-
based learning materials. This research leads to eration factors when designing e-learning
a wide range of research questions. using sound for different content subject
such as math and science?
1. Quantitative data collection: The next step 10. Second language: In designing e-learning
in supporting Bishop and Cates’s framework teaching foreign languages, will sound be
is to conduct experiments with collection of incorporated as the redundancy or should
quantitative data. Overcome channel noise. sound play a more essential role? What are
What is the appropriate redundancy level? the design guidelines for such software?

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 The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

11. Learning modality: What is the relation- Bishop, M., & Cates, W. (2000, October 25-28).
ship between learner’s preferred learning A model for the efficacious use of sound in multi-
modality in terms of sound and the delivery media instruction. In Proceedings of the Selected
mode? Research and Development Papers, Presented at
the National Convention of the Association for
Educational Communications and Technology
CONCLUSION (vol. 1-2). Denver, CO.
Bishop, M., & Cates, W. M. (2001). Theoreti-
While the debate over pedagogical strategies
cal foundations for sound’s use in multimedia
for sound to reinforce the learning process in e-
instruction to enhance learning. Educational
learning rages on, researchers and instructional
Technology Research and Development, 49(3),
developers continues to seek theories for effective
5–22. doi:10.1007/BF02504912
applications of sound in the teaching and learning
process via e-learning. It seems clear that sound Kerr, B. (1999). Effective use of audio media
and audio multimedia interventions are permanent in multimedia presentations. Middle Tennessee
fixture in the future landscape of e-learning. If State University.
appropriately employed, the multimedia within
Mayer, R. (2003). The promise of multimedia
the e-learning program not only becomes a stand
learning: Using the same instructional design
alone learning reinforcement agent, but it also
methods across different media. Learning and
helps to extend the learning capabilities of the
Instruction, 13, 125–139. doi:10.1016/S0959-
user, thus assisting the learning in their efforts to
4752(02)00016-6
gain the concepts and knowledge presented in the
e-learning program. As we continue to look to the Moreno, R., & Mayer, R. E. (2000a). Meaning-
future for new innovative strategies developed out ful design for meaningful learning: Applying
of research, we can begin to harness the power of cognitive theory to multimedia explanations. In
adding effective multimedia agents in the teaching [Charlottesville, VA: AACE Press.]. Proceedings
and learning process for e-learning, thus reaching of the ED-MEDIA, 2000, 747–752.
the goal of providing quality teaching and effective
Moreno, R., & Mayer, R. E. (2000b). A coher-
training solution via e-learning for organization
ence effect in multimedia learning: The case
performance improvement.
for minimizing irrelevant sounds in the design
of multimedia instructional messages. Jour-
nal of Educational Psychology, 97, 117–125.
REFERENCES
doi:10.1037/0022-0663.97.1.117
Barron, E. E., & Atkins, D. (1994). Audio in- Shih, Y., & Alessi, S. M. (1996). Effects of text
struction in multimedia education: Is textual versus voice on learning in multimedia course-
redundancy important? Journal of Educational ware. Journal of Educational Multimedia and
Multimedia and Hypermedia, 3(3/4), 295–306. Hypermedia, 5(2), 203–218.
Beccue, B., & Vila, 1. (2001). The effects of adding
audio instructions to a multimedia computer based
training environment. Journal of Educational
Multimedia and Hypermedia, 10(1), 47–67.

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The Application of Sound and Auditory Responses in E-Learning

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS their brains and sensory systems (hardware) and in
the rules and strategies (software) that they learn.
Cognitive Load Theory: A term (used in Instructional Design: Instructional design
psychology and other fields of study) that refers is the analysis of learning needs and systematic
to the level of effort associated with thinking development of instruction. Instructional design-
and reasoning (including perception, memory, ers often use Instructional technology as a method
language, etc.). According to this theory people for developing instruction. Instructional design
learn better when they can build on words and models typically specify a method, that if fol-
ideas they already understand. The more things lowed will facilitate the transfer of knowledge,
a person has to learn at a single time, the more skills, and attitude to the recipient or acquirer of
difficult it will be to retain the information in their the instruction.
long term memory. Instructional Software: The computer pro-
Communication: Communication is the pro- grams that allow students to learn new content,
cess of exchanging information and ideas. As an practice using content already learned, or be evalu-
active process, it involves encoding, transmitting, ated on how much they know. These programs al-
and decoding intended messages. low teachers and students to demonstrate concepts,
Information Processing Theory: The infor- do simulations, and record and analyze data.
mation processing theory approach to the study Multimedia: The presentation of informa-
of cognitive development evolved out of the tion by a combination of data, images, animation
American experimental tradition in psychology. sounds, and video. This data can be delivered
Information processing theorists proposed that like in a variety of ways, either on a computer disk,
the computer, the human mind is a system that through modified televisions, or using a computer
processes information through the application of connected to a telecommunications channel.
logical rules and strategies. Like the computer, the Sound: The vibrations that travel through air
mind has a limited capacity for the amount and that can be heard by humans. However, scientists
nature of the information it can process. Finally, and engineers use a wider definition of sound that
just as the computer can be made into a better includes low and high frequency vibrations in air
information processor by changes in its hard- that cannot be heard by humans, and vibrations
ware (e.g., circuit boards and microchips) and its that travel through all forms of matter, gases,
software (programming), so do children become liquids, and solids.
more sophisticated thinkers through changes in

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Multimedia Technology and Networking, Second Edition, edited by
Margherita Pagani, pp. 47-53, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

943
944

Chapter 4.12
The Influence of Visual
and Temporal Dynamics
on Split Attention:
Evidences from Eye Tracking

Florian Schmidt-Weigand
University of Kassel, Germany

ABSTRACT viewing behavior as an indicator of how split

attention is managed the harms of a split source
This chapter introduces eye tracking as a method format in multimedia learning can be overcome
to observe how the split of visual attention is man- by implementing a user interaction that allows
aged in multimedia learning. The chapter reviews the learner to adapt the material to perceptual and
eye tracking literature on multirepresentational individual characteristics.
material. A special emphasis is devoted to recent
studies conducted to explore viewing behavior in
learning from dynamic vs. static visualizations and INTRODUCTION
the matter of pacing of presentation. A presented
argument is that the learners’ viewing behavior “Before information can be stored (…), it must be
is affected by design characteristics of the learn- extracted and manipulated in working memory.”
ing material. Characteristics like the dynamics (Paas, Tuovinen, Tabbers, & Van Gerven, 2003,
of visualization or the pace of presentation only p. 64).
slightly influence the learners’ visual strategy, In multimedia learning environments, a learner
while user interaction (i.e., learner controlled pace often has to extract and integrate information from
of presentation) leads to a different visual strategy different sources of information like words and
compared to system-paced presentation. Taking pictures. Empirical evidences as well as theoretical
considerations led to various instructional design
principles to present those different sources of
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch412

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The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

information in a learner supporting fashion (e.g. BACKGROUND

Mayer, 2001, 2005; Sweller, van Merrienboer,
& Paas, 1998). The attentional, perceptual, and Currently, research on multimedia learning and
cognitive demands of multimedia instruction, instructional design is influenced by two theoreti-
however, are mostly inferred from learners’ per- cal frameworks, cognitive load theory (Sweller
formance on subsequent tasks or self-reported et al. 1998) and Mayer’s (2001) cognitive theory
difficulties with the materials at hand. In order of multimedia learning. The main aim of these
to advance theoretical approaches and to refine theoretical approaches is to base instructional
instructional design principles process-related but design on “how the human mind works” (Mayer,
subjective measures (e.g. cognitive load) and ob- 2001, p. 41). The most central concept of human
jective but product-related measures (e.g. learning cognitive architecture in both, the cognitive load
outcomes) need to be complemented with more theory and the cognitive theory of multimedia
objective and process-related measures (Brünken, learning, is working memory. The central role of
Plass, & Leutner, 2003; Paas et al., 2003). An often working memory for the matter of understanding
suggested, well suited, albeit – in multimedia learn- and learning stems from the assumption that,
ing – seldom-used process-related observation is simply stated, working memory is the gateway
the learner’s viewing behavior during acquisition. between the external world and the internal cog-
The absence of studies applying, for example, nitive entities. Meaningful learning requires the
eye tracking methodology in this area may at learner to select relevant information, to organize
least partly be explained by a lack of satisfying that information in a coherent structure, and to
theoretical understanding of how the presum- integrate this structure into existing knowledge.
ably complex cognitive processes involved in Working memory plays an essential role since
multimedia learning correspond to viewing be- it is here, where the selection, organization, and
havior. The chapter tries to take a step towards integration processes are assumed to take place.
an understanding of such viewing behavior in Among the various models and theories of
multimedia learning environments. Before we can working memory (for an overview, see Miyake
discuss and further investigate how a particular & Shah, 1999) consensus exists on two aspects
viewing behavior may correspond to a particular that are relevant to multimedia learning. First,
learning outcome it is necessary to explore, if and most theorists agree that working memory re-
how multimedia design actually affects viewing sources are limited, and second, in most models
behavior. Reviewing the eye tracking research on of working memory there are, apart from a central
combined presentation of text and pictures and regulation system, two or more separate subsys-
providing recent research results of eye tracking tems. The notion of separate subsystems comes
studies in multimedia learning the chapter aims into play whenever information is presented in
to answer the following questions: different codes (e.g. words, pictures, etc.) and/
or different modalities (eye, ear, etc.) as it is
1. How do learners split their visual attention the case in multimedia learning. In accordance
during learning from a multimedia instruc- with Baddeley’s (1986) working memory model
tion? And cognitive load theory and the cognitive theory of
2. Which attributes of a multimedia instruction multimedia learning assume different subsystems
moderate a learner’s viewing behavior? or processing channels for visual and auditory
information. Visual information is processed in
a visuo-spatial sketchpad; auditory information
is processed in an auditory loop. The limited

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processing capacities of the subsystems are easily The modality principle is supported by several
exhausted by multimedia learning material. Con- studies verifying that it is more beneficial for
sequently, the commonly assumed positive effect learning if text in simultaneous presentation with
of multi-representational material on learning – as visualizations is presented aurally rather than visu-
expressed by the multimedia principle (Fletcher ally (Brünken & Leutner, 2001; Mayer & Moreno,
& Tobias, 2005; Mayer, 2001) – is complemented 1998; Moreno & Mayer, 1999; Mousavi, Low,
by a set of design principles that deal with the is- & Sweller, 1995; Schmidt-Weigand, Kohnert,
sue, how to overcome problems connected with & Glowalla, 2008; Tabbers, 2002; Tindall-Ford,
the presentation of multiple information sources Chandler, & Sweller, 1997; for a review see Ginns,
(Mayer, 2001, 2005). 2005). For example, Moreno and Mayer (1999)
One of these principles is the so-called modal- used a sequence of 16 animated illustrations de-
ity principle: “Students learn better when words picting the process of lightning. The illustrations
in a multimedia message are presented as spoken dynamically visualized e.g. the motion of cool air
rather than printed text” (Mayer, 2001, p. 134). that becomes heated or positive charges moving up
The theoretical explanations for this superiority to the cloud producing a flash light. Illustrations
of spoken over written text presentation in multi- were accompanied by an expository text describing
media learning basically rest on the limitations of each of the major events. Text was spoken, written
visual processing. If verbal information is added inside the illustration frame or written below the
to some visualization (illustration, graph, etc.) in illustration frame. Participants performed better
written form, both information sources must be on subsequent retention and transfer tests when
processed by the visual processing channel. As text was spoken rather than written (modality ef-
we know from everyday experience, we usually fect). Within written text conditions, participants
cannot attend simultaneously to spatially distinct performed better when text was written inside
visual information sources. Physiologically, visual rather than below the illustration frame (spatial
acuity is restricted to an area of about 1° to 2° of contiguity effect).
visual angle which on a computer monitor in 80 As outlined above, these effects can be ex-
cm distance roughly corresponds to a circular plained by differing processing demands due
area with a diameter of 2.5 cm (approximately to a visual split attention. However, as Moreno
corresponding to the size of a quarter dollar and Mayer (1999) point out “the superiority of
coin). Thus, in order to extract all information concurrent animation and narration over concur-
learners are forced to split their visual attention rent animation with on-screen text might [also]
between the information sources. Consequently, be caused by students missing part of the visual
before integrating both sources, the source that information while they are reading the on-screen
was attended first must be held active in working text (or vice versa)” (Moreno & Mayer, 1999,
memory until the corresponding information in the p. 359). Thus, split attention entails a cognitive
second source is found and processed. The more and a perceptual component. In fact, due to the
information is held active or the more capacity is afore mentioned physiological boundaries several
needed to search for corresponding information the theories on visual attention allocation (for an
more cognitive resources are occupied, resulting in overview, see Allport, 1989) suggest that the eye
a higher cognitive load. Presenting spoken rather itself is a limiting factor for information process-
than written text is supposed to reduce this load ing. The resources of working memory may or
by eliminating the need to split visual attention may not be sufficient to process all information
between the two sources. gathered by the eye. But the eye itself is surely
limited in the amount of information that can be

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The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

fixated and gathered in a discrete time interval. acquired primarily during the fixations (cf. Just
Reconsidering the introductory quotation, infor- & Carpenter, 1980). Consequently, fixating a
mation may have to be extracted and manipulated discrete area (words, sentences, objects, etc.) is
in working memory before it can be stored (Paas commonly taken as a correlate of attentional and
et al., 2003), but it also must be extracted before cognitive processes allocated to the inspected area
it can be manipulated. Tversky, Morrison, and (eye-mind assumption). That is, at the beginning
Betrancourt (2002) refer to this notion as the Ap- of each new fixation visual attention is assumed
prehension Principle. The structure and content of to be allocated to the stimulus at the center of
the representation must be readily and accurately fixation. When the information within this area
perceived and comprehended. is sufficiently processed attention may be real-
In most studies the actual split of a learner’s located to a new stimulus in order to program
visual attention has mostly been inferred from the next saccade while the eye remains fixated.
subsequent learning outcomes or self-ratings of These covert shifts of attention are assumed to
cognitive load. In order to explore, how a learner occur shortly before the next saccade is executed
actually splits his or her visual attention between (Henderson, 1992; Reichle et al., 1998).
written text and visualizations it appears reason- For the matter of split attention in multimedia
able, if not necessary, to observe the process of learning two general aspects of a learner’s viewing
allocating visual attention and cognitive ressources behavior might be of particular interest, (a) the
to split information sources. One method that is distribution of fixations across the split informa-
commonly associated with visual attention and tion sources, and (b) the pattern of saccades from
cognitive processing is the measurement of eye one source to the other. Unfortunately, none of
movements. The relationship between visual at- the theories in the field of multimedia learnig
tention and eye movements has been extensively predicts particular patterns of eye movements yet.
investigated (cf. Rayner, 1998). In complex in- However, applying the method of eye tracking
formation processing such as reading, the link may help gaining further insight into how much
between the two is probably quite tight. For such visual attention is captured by each of multiple
complex tasks it is commonly assumed that there visual information sources, how the integration of
is a functional relationship between the allocation spatially separated stimuli is visually managed, and
of visual attention, cognitive processing and eye which attributes of a learning material moderate
movements. Before outlining these assumptions the split of visual attention.
it is necessary to shortly consider particularities
of eye movements.
Contrary to introspection we do not move our EYE MOVEMENTS IN SPLIT
eyes smoothly over some static visual display ATTENTION CONDITIONS
(e.g. a text or a graphic) but instead make sud-
den jumps from one location to another. There Although eye movement studies have generated
are periods of 100 to 500 ms, called fixations, in a good understanding of the processes involved
which the eyes come to rest, interspersed with in reading and in scene perception (for reviews,
rapid eye movements of 15-40 ms (depending on see Rayner, 1998; Underwood, 2005) only few
the size of the eye movement), called saccades experimental eye movement studies have ad-
(cf. Reichle, Pollatsek, Fisher, & Rayner, 1998). dressed combinations of words and pictures in
During saccadic movements little visual informa- the past. Notable exceptions are studies from
tion is acquired. Instead, the visual information Hegarty on the comprehension of mechanical
necessary for reading or scene perception is diagrams (Hegarty, 1992a, 1992b; Hegarty &

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Just, 1993), Carroll, Young, & Guertin (1992) on of their functions in the learning context. Levie and
the visual analysis of cartoons, d’Ydewalle and Lentz (1982) distinguish four general functions:
colleagues on attention allocation in subtitled (1) attention guiding, (2) affective, (3) cognitive,
television (d’Ydewalle, Praet, Verfaillie, & Van and (4) compensatory functions. However, the
Rensbergen, 1991; d’Ydewalle & Gielen, 1992), assumed benefits of illustrations do not seem
Rayner, Rotello, Stewart, Keir, & Duffy (2001) to be reflected in the learners viewing behavior.
on the integration of text and pictorial informa- Hannus and Hyönä (1999) found that learning
tion in print advertisements, and more recently from illustrated textbooks is heavily driven by the
Holsanova and colleagues on newspaper reading text. They presented text passages from 4th-year
(Holmqvist, Holsanova, & Holmberg, 2007; Hol- elementary school biology books to elementary
sanova, Rahm, & Holmqvist, 2006). Meanwhile, school children. The children spent 80% of their
a growing number of eye tracking studies have learning time on reading the texts. Furthermore,
been conducted with multimedia learning material 66% of the time spent inspecting illustrations was
(e.g. Ciernak, Scheiter, & Gerjets, 2007; Faraday devoted to read the figure captions! In accordance
& Sutcliffe, 1996; Folker, Ritter, & Sichelschmidt, with Rayner et al. (2001) there was also little
2005; Hannus & Hyönä, 1999; Schmidt-Weigand back-and-forth looking between a relevant text
et al., 2008). segment and a corresponding illustration. This
A common result among these eye movement viewing behavior may have been due to some
studies is that people favor text over pictures. text characteristics. As the authors note, in their
Rayner et al. (2001) investigated the pattern of text book passages, no reference was made in the
viewing behavior for people looking at print ad- text to any illustration.
vertisements. When looking at an advertisement Folker et al. (2005) used color-coding to make
viewers tended to read the large print first, then the references between text and illustrations more
smaller print and then they looked at the picture. explicit. Twenty students (mean age 24.3 years)
Although some viewers did an initial cursory read a textbook passage describing the function
scan of the picture, most of them did not alternate and the different phases of mitotic cell division.
fixations between the text and the picture part of In the color-coding condition, passages of the text
the ad. Also the viewing behavior in subtitled corresponding to structures or labels in the pictures
television is largely text directed (d’Ydewalle et were of the same color. Participants in this group
al., 1991; d’Ydewalle & Gielen, 1992). Clearly, were significantly faster in processing the mate-
when foreign movies are subtitled in the local rial than participants who had no explicit color
language, reading subtitles is more or less obliga- reference in the text (control condition). The faster
tory. However, d’Ydewalle and colleagues (1991) processing, however, was due to fewer fixations
found that reading subtitles is preferred even if on the picture region in the color condition while
the movie and the subtitles were both presented the time spent reading remained constant across
in the local language. Since this preference was conditions. Unfortunately, Folker et al. (2005)
observed no matter if the participants were familiar do not report the movement patterns between
(Dutch) or rather unfamiliar (Americans) with text and picture region. Thus, we do not know if
subtitled television the authors conclude that either color coding simply facilitated the processing of
(a) reading subtitles is more efficient in following the illustration or if it evoked a different visual
and understanding a movie or (b) processing of strategy.
the visual modality is more dominant. It might well be the case that the textbook
In learning material one may expect illustra- illustrations used by Hannus and Hyönä (1999)
tions to attract some more visual attention because and Folker et al. (2005) were not sufficiently

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helpful or necessary to understand the text. In diagram about three times per trial on average.
multimedia learning, however, a special emphasis The number of re-readings was again related to
is given to the integration of text and pictures the statements’ difficulty, being higher the more
in working memory. Hegarty (1992a, 1992b; inferences were required to verify the sentence.
Hegarty & Just, 1993) applied diagrams and Hegarty interpreted these results in terms of
verbal descriptions of pulley systems in order to working memory load. The higher the demands
examine such integration processes. In a study of inferring and storing the motion of the pulley
from Hegarty and Just (1993) participants viewed system, the earlier the sentence representation
text and diagrams describing pulley systems. Be- decayed and had to be reactivated by re-reading.
ing instructed to understand how the respective In the Hegarty (1992a) study participants had
pulley system worked, viewers tended to inspect to infer motion from a static diagram of a dynamic
the diagram at the ends of sentences and clauses. pulley system. Exploiting the possibilities of
Approximately 80% of the participants’ diagram computer-based instruction, processes that are
inspections occurred after reading the segment dynamic by nature can be depicted by dynamic
describing that particular aspect of the diagram. rather than static visualizations. In comparison
Thus, the participants’ viewing behavior as they to static visualizations, the cognitive demands to
read text accompanied by diagrams suggests that process and integrate written text accompanied by
viewers attempted to fully interpret a sentence or dynamic visualizations may be different. Motion
clause before inspecting its referent in the diagram. does not need to be inferred by the learner but is
Hegarty (1992b) concluded that the construction readily available. This direct access to dynamic
of a mental model from the material was largely information may cause a visual strategy different
text directed. from the one commonly observed with static vi-
In another study, Hegarty (1992a) further sualizations. First, the depicted information does
examined the construction process of the mental not need to be mentally animated. And second,
model by using a sentence-picture verification dynamic visual information is more transient
task. Participants were presented with a static than a static display. Therefore, learners may be
diagram of a pulley system and a sentence de- inclined to attend to dynamic visualizations earlier
scribing a dynamic attribute of a component of in the integration process, being not as much text
the pulley system. Participants were asked to directed as with static visualizations.
respond whether the sentence was true or false Taken together, the management of split at-
of the depicted system. Recording reaction time tention during learning appears to be driven by
and inspection time, she found that differences in written text. But how is the visual attention to
reaction time were largely due to differences in written text influenced by the presence of dynamic
diagram inspection time. Both, reaction time and compared to static visualizations and/or the pres-
inspection time were highly related to the state- ence and degree of time constraints? The following
ments’ difficulty (number of inferences required sections describe a series of four experiments in
to verify a dynamic attribute). Concerning the which learners’ eye fixations were tracked as they
strategies, participants typically read the sentence watched a multimedia instruction on the formation
before inspecting the diagram in 98.5% of trials, of lightning similar to the one used by Moreno
suggesting that the overall strategy was to construct and Mayer (1999). Besides eye movements, the
a representation of the text first and then verify experiments applied measures of cognitive load
this representation against the diagram. However, as well as learning outcomes. In order to explore
participants also reread the text during a trial, the influence of split attention on cognitive load
thus switching back and forth between text and and learning outcome measures the experiments

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also entailed presentation conditions in which ing behavior and collected subjective estimates of
text was spoken. The focus, however, will be set students who received one of the following four
on the learners’ viewing behavior under split at- presentation formats: a multimedia instruction
tention conditions. presenting (1) dynamic visualizations together
with written text, (2) dynamic visualizations
with spoken text, (3) static visualizations with
EFFECTS OF DYNAMIC VS. written text, and (4) static visualizations with
STATIC VISUALIZATIONS spoken text. The learning material consisted of a
ON SPLIT ATTENTION 16-step multimedia instruction on the formation
of lightning. The content of the material was
The purpose of the first two experiments was to based on an animation used by Moreno and Mayer
examine whether characteristics of visualizations (1999). Visualizations were designed to illustrate
moderate the effects of split attention on view- the dynamics of the major events (cf. Figure 1).
ing behavior. By comparing dynamic with static Both experiments confirmed that split attention
visualizations, the experiments ask whether and to during learning from the applied multimedia in-
what degree the transience of visualizations affects struction was largely text directed. The presence
visual attention allocation. How much attention of written text led learners to attend to the text
is devoted to dynamic compared to static visual- before splitting their visual attention by switching
izations? How is visual attention on written text back and forth between text and visualization.
affected by the presence or absence of dynamics in Overall, participants spent up to twice as much
visualizations? And, how do learners estimate the time reading than inspecting visualizations and
presence or absence of dynamics in visualizations switched on average 4 times per scene between
in relation to their split of attention? To answer written text and visualizations. Both, viewing time
these questions, the experiments observed view- on text and visualizations as well as the number

Figure 1. Selected frames of the multimedia instruction (scenes 1 – 4)

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The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

of transitions between both information sources single statements and overall difficulty with the
were slightly affected by the presence vs. absence material range from r = .25 to r = .51. The highest
of dynamics within the visualizations. Participants correlation is reached by statement (3) (repeat parts
spent some more time on dynamic compared to of the text). This correlation highlights the role of
static visualizations and, thus, less time reading text comprehension in cognitive load.
text. Furthermore, experiment 2 revealed that Furthermore, the initial and constant reliance
visual attention was captured by dynamic visual- on written text, as found in numerous eye track-
izations, indicated by a lower number of transitions ing studies, suggests that learners follow a visual
between text and visualizations compared to strategy, i.e. voluntarily attending to written text.
static visualizations. However, the amount of In contrast to this hypothesis, participants in the
initial reading after a scene change was not af- experiment reported a significantly higher agree-
fected by the presentation format of the visualiza- ment with statement (8) than with statement (7),
tions. i.e. they felt distracted from inspecting visualiza-
Experiment 2 obtained self-ratings in order tions by the presence of written text (and not vice
to assess cognitive load. These measures allow a versa), no matter if visualizations were dynamic
more detailed view on the attentional aspects of or static. Thus, initial reading appears to be rather
presentation format. Participants reported a higher automatic than intended.
difficulty with the learning material for written Since the presentation time was limited (i.e.
compared to spoken text presentation (“How easy once the animation was started it proceeded with
or difficult was it for you to learn something about a constant pace), the time spent reading was lost
lightning from the presentation you just saw?”), for inspecting the visualizations. Consequently,
confirming the afore mentioned effect of text mo- participants rated presentation time as less ap-
dality. In addition, participants were asked to give propriate in written compared to spoken text
subjective estimates of the following more detailed conditions (statement (9)), i.e. the split of visual
statements: (1) “I would have preferred to stop attention was subjectively time consuming. Thus,
the presentation myself at certain points“, (2) “I the effect of split attention can be described as a
would have preferred to look at some illustrations distraction effect evoked by written text in a time
again“, (3) “I would have preferred to rewind and limited presentation condition. Participants felt
repeat parts of the text”, (4) “I missed parts of the they needed more time to sufficiently attend to
textual information”, (5) “I missed parts of the all offered information sources.
illustrations”, (6) “It was difficult for me to relate Taken together, presenting written rather than
textual and pictorial information to each other”, (7) spoken text in a multimedia instruction leads to a
“The illustration distracted me from textual infor- rather automatic initial reading behavior that is,
mation”, (8) “The textual information distracted compared to spoken text presentation, perceived
me from the illustration”, and (9) “How did you as a time-consuming process. Consequently, one
perceive the presentation pace? The pace was …”. should expect that with longer presentation duration
Statements 1 to 8 had to be rated on a 6-point scale learners devote relatively more time to visualiza-
from completely false, false, rather false, rather true, tions than to written text. Once enough time is given
true to completely true. Statement 9, concerning to attend and integrate all information sources the
the pace of presentation had to be answered on a harms of split attention should disappear. Further-
7-point scale from very slow, slow, rather slow, more, the visual strategy may change as soon as
optimal, rather fast, fast, to very fast. The internal the learner can control the pace of presentation.
consistency of the statements was considerably The experiments presented in the following section
good (Cronbach’s α = .83). Correlations between were designed to test these hypotheses.

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 The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

EFFECTS OF TIME CONSTRAINTS with a reading sequence. However, the longer

ON SPLIT ATTENTION the presentation lasted relatively more time was
spent inspecting visualizations. As it was expected,
The main idea of these two experiments was that the absolute number of transitions between text
pacing is an additional source of cognitive load. If and visualizations increased with presentation
learners have more time to read expository text, duration. However, also the relative number of
the need to split visual attention between written transitions (i.e. transitions per second) increased
text and visualizations should be less harmful. with presentation duration. All these changes
Moreover, if learning is largely text directed, as emerged in the additional time for each scene.
indicated by prior studies, split attention should Comparing the viewing behavior only in the
have a larger effect on visual compared to verbal time intervals of the fastest pace of presentation
information. Finally, it is an open question how revealed no differences in the ratio of time spent
additional time is used in terms of visual attention reading to time spent inspecting visualization or
allocation. We may expect that after reading has in the number of transitions. Deviating viewing
been successfully completed relatively more time behavior obviously settled in the additional time
can be spent viewing visualizations. given by slower pacing.
The purpose of the first of these experiments In accordance with this viewing behavior,
was to examine the influence of system-controlled the difference between written and spoken text
pacing of instruction on effects of split attention presentation became more evident in a visual
and text modality. The learning material consisted memory task compared to a text retention task.
of the same multimedia instruction as in the first This difference was larger the faster the pace of
two studies. Dynamic visualizations on the forma- presentation was. In addition, subjective cognitive
tion of lightning were accompanied by expository load revealed that the harms of split attention (i.e.
text (visualization format was not varied). The text the modality effect) were apparent under serious
was either presented in spoken or written format. time constraints. Overall, cognitive load dropped
The variation of pacing was derived in the fol- down for longer presentation durations. A modality
lowing manner. In the fast condition, timing was effect could only be found under fast presentation.
set to a ratio of 120 words per minute resulting The observed patterns of viewing behavior and
in a presentation duration of 140 s. This pace ap- its contribution to cognitive load and learning out-
proximates a timing originally applied in Mayer come can be understood in terms of particularities
and Moreno (1998) by adjusting the pace of pre- of reading. People are known to differ in reading
sentation to a normal speaker’s rate. Medium and speed (cf. Just & Carpenter, 1987). Reading speed
slow paces were obtained by reducing the ratio reflects individual abilities (e.g. Jackson & Mc-
successively with a factor of 0.75. Thus, the ratio Clelland, 1975, 1979; Just & Carpenter, 1992)
was 90 words per minute for medium pace and but it is also adjusted to characteristics of the text
67.5 words per minute for slow pace resulting in (e.g. Graesser, Hoffman, & Clark, 1980) and task
durations of 187 s and 249 s respectively. These demands (e.g. Hartley, Stojack, Mushaney, Annon,
variations resulted in a 2 (spoken vs. written text) & Lee, 1994). Concerning the specific task of read-
x 3 (fast, medium, and slow pace) factorial design. ing to summarize expository text, Hyönä, Lorch,
Results are presented for the split attention condi- and Kaakinen (2002) identified different types of
tions, i.e. where text was written. eye movement patterns. Participants read (and
Overall, learners under split attention condi- subsequently summarized) two expository texts
tions showed a comparable viewing behavior (approximately 1,000 words each). 75% of their
at the beginning of each scene, i.e. they started participants followed a linear reading strategy, i.e.

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The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

most readers went through the texts from left to the application of deliberate viewing strategies.
right with only few backward saccades to earlier Thus, split attention effects might at least partly
passages, so-called regressions. Such regressions be caused by a mismatch of system-paced instruc-
usually do not exceed 10% of the saccades occur- tion with self-paced reading. These hypotheses
ring during reading (cf. Rayner, 1998). The linear gain support from a final study to be reported in
readers in the Hyönä et al. study could be further this chapter. In this study, learners were under
divided into “fast linear readers” (mean reading control of the pace of presentation. Each of the
rate: 231 words/minute) and “slow linear readers” 16 scenes lasted until participants hit the space
(133 words/minute). These results confirm (a) the bar to start the next scene. Text was again either
linear reading behavior consistently found across written or spoken.
various reading tasks and (b) the inter-individual First of all, learning under self-paced presenta-
differences of the pace of progressing through tion did not reveal any differences between written
the text. There was, however, a group of 20% and spoken text presentation in terms of learning
of readers who followed a distinctive strategy, outcomes and cognitive load. That is, the learners
the “topic structure processors”. With a reading were able to adjust the pace of presentation to be
rate of 139 words per minute this type of reader comparably successful in learning from the ani-
was rather slow. Compared to the linear readers mation and to experience a comparable cognitive
the topic structure processors devoted additional load. One may expect the higher cognitive load
visual attention to headings and topic-final sen- under split attention to be expressed in a longer
tences as expressed by significantly more and time on task for written compared to spoken text
longer reinspective fixations. Most notably, these presentation. Contrary to this hypothesis, the
readers turned out to have the highest working learner-paced presentation durations in written
memory span (Danemann & Carpenter, 1980) text presentation were almost identical to spoken
and to have written the best summaries. The worst text presentation in terms of means, variances, and
summaries were produced by the slow readers. ranges. Overall, the variation of system-paced
While the comparably slow reading rate of the presentation durations in the former experiment
topic structure processors appears due to deliber- (140, 187, and 249 s, respectively) roughly fitted
ate, probably effortful strategies for remembering in with the range of learner-paced presentation
and summarizing the expository texts, in the case durations (132 to 285 s). It is also notable that the
of the slow linear readers this same rate appears average presentation duration in this experiment
to be a rather unsuccessful attempt to compensate (183 s) was very close to the medium system-
for comprehension difficulties. paced presentation duration of 187 s in the former
Individual differences in reading speed may experiment. Due to these similarities on the time
interfere with the learning task in a system paced dimension, differences in the observed viewing
multimedia instruction for several reasons. First, behavior of both experiments can be devoted to
the faster the pace the more likely some – espe- the issue of learner control. Figure 2 depicts the
cially visualized – information is missed or not amounts of time each participant spent reading and
sufficiently processed due to the general tendency inspecting visualizations under system controlled
to attend to written text first. Second, a faster (left panel) and learner controlled (right panel)
pace of presentation especially challenges slow presentation. Figure 3 depicts the number of tran-
readers probably resulting in even poorer text sitions for each participant in both experiments.
comprehension. And third, adjusting ones reading As can be seen in the right panel of Figure 2
speed to a system-controlled pacing may hinder an time on task under learner-controlled presentation
adjustment to the complexity of the content and is almost exclusively driven by the time learners

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 The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

Figure 2. Time spent reading (triangles) and time spent inspecting visualizations (circles) for each
learner under written text conditions in system controlled (left panel) vs. learner controlled (right panel)
presentation

Figure 3. Number of transitions between text and visualizations for written text conditions in system
controlled (left panel) vs. learner controlled (right panel) presentation

spent viewing text. That is, while participants in ing the text, they showed a highly stable fixation
system-paced instruction used additional presen- pattern in a self-paced instruction. Learners ad-
tation time in favor of illustrations (Figure 2, left justed the pace of presentation to their individual
panel) participants in learner-paced instruction reading speed and engaged in an otherwise sys-
used additional presentation time exclusively for tematic viewing behavior.
reading. Furthermore, transitions in learner-paced These results can be interpreted in the following
instruction did not systematically vary with time manner. The longer the system-paced presenta-
on task (Figure 3, right panel) while in system- tion duration was the more participants can be
paced instruction additional presentation time assumed to have read the written text. They really
lead to an increase of transitions between text and had additional time to spend on inspecting visu-
visualizations (Figure 3, left panel). Taken to- alizations and “to look around”. In learner-paced
gether, participants in system-paced instruction instruction, the split of visual attention between
used additional presentation time in favor of vi- text and visualizations appears rather systematic
sualizations and switches between text and visu- and is comparable to the viewing behavior shown
alizations while participants in self-paced instruc- by the medium system-paced presentation group.
tion used additional presentation time mainly for The general strategy was to read (some portion
reading. Apart from the time learners spent read- or all of the) text, then switching to inspect the

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The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

visualization, re-reading some portion of text to understand visualized information. In one of

and going back to the illustration once more. The the presented studies, however, participants felt
inter-individual difference in the time spent read- distracted from inspecting visualizations by the
ing almost perfectly correlated with the chosen presence of written text – although they spent
presentation duration. Thus, an optimal fit of most of their time reading! Thus, the observed
presentation pace to task demands in concurrent viewing behavior rather indicate a preconcious
presentation of text and visualizations is appar- attentional capture of written text.
ently driven by individual reading speed. One may conclude that due to the attentional
capture of written text visualizations are not suf-
ficiently processed. But the comparably short
THEORETICAL IMPLICATIONS fixation times on visualizations may also indicate
a higher computational efficiency of pictures
The findings of the studies reported in this chapter compared to text. As Larkin and Simon (1987)
have some implications for theoretical accounts point out, “sentential representations [i.e. text]
of split attention effects in multimedia learning, are sequential while diagrammatic representations
namely cognitive load theory (Sweller et al., [i.e. visualizations] are indexed by location in a
1998) and the cognitive theory of multimedia plane. The information displayed by [visualiza-
learning (Mayer, 2001). Split attention effects are tions] is only implicit in sentential representations
usually explained in terms of limited cognitive and therefore has to be computed, sometimes at
resources. Two further resources were introduced great cost, to make it explicit for use” (p. 65).
in this chapter that may interact with the cogni- In other words, reading requires word-by-word
tive processes associated with split attention: (a) fixations, lexical access, and syntactic as well
visual perception and (b) learning time. As noted as semantic processing while the information
earlier, due to restrictions of visual acuity our eyes depicted by visualizations may be gathered at a
have to move in order to gather all information glance. In accordance with this interpretation, eye
given in a multimedia learning material. In fact, movement studies on scene perception have led
the term “split attention” may rather refer to the to the conclusion that “participants get the gist
common insight that we cannot look at a text of a scene very early in the process of looking.
and an illustration at the same time. Eye tracking [...] The gist of the scene is abstracted on the first
studies revealed that we manage this limitation couple of fixations, and the remainder of fixations
of our eyes in a fairly consistent way. Learners on the scene are used to fill in details” (Rayner,
almost immediately look at written text and usu- 1998, p. 398). However, whether the ‘gist of a
ally spend much more time reading than view- scene’ is sufficient for learning depends on the
ing visualizations. Some researchers concluded complexity of the visualization and the complexity
that text is perceived as the main medium for of referential connections between the text and
the acquisition of information. In this view, the the visualization.
observed eye movements indicate a strategic and A necessary precondition for split attention
reasonable decision made by the learners. In fact, effects to occur is that one source of visual in-
expository text is a highly structured information formation cannot be understood without the other
source and people are used to gain much informa- (Sweller, 1999), i.e. both sources have to be at-
tion from reading. Visualizations are usually not tended in order to “get the full picture” of what
self-explaining and are often accompanied by is to be learned. There is evidence that the inter-
written text. Reading the text first might often dependence between different learning elements
have been experienced as being helpful in order moderate effects of split attention, being harder

955
 The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

to handle for learning material of high compared multimedia instructions as “faster” when verbal
to low “element interactivity” (Tindall-Ford et al., explanations were written rather than spoken,
1997). Element interactivity refers to the extent a higher cognitive load only occurred for fast
to which the learning task requires the learner presentation paces, and no effect of text modality
to hold several related chunks of to-be-learned occurred at all when learners controlled the pace
information in working memory simultaneously. of presentation. Given the general tendency to
As Ginns (2005) notes, there is no objective attend to written text first, split attention under
measure of element interactivity. However, eye time constraints especially impairs processing time
movements may be interpreted as an indication for the pictorial information. The results of the
of this interplay between text and visualizations. presented eye tracking studies support this view
In the studies reviewed in this chapter eye move- in showing that especially visual memory proved
ments varied with the complexity of the material. sensitive to the modality of text presentation.
A picture in an advertisement is almost surely Furthermore, participants spent relatively more
less complex than, for example, the diagram of time viewing visualizations when the pacing of
a pulley system. As a result, participants in the instruction was slower.
Rayner et al. (2001) study did not look back from But the influence of time constraints is not
the picture of an ad to the text while those re- restricted to visualizations. Conversely, the com-
readings occurred between a pulley diagram and parison of viewing behavior under system-paced
the accompanied text (Hegarty, 1992b). Hegarty and self-paced instruction rather highlights the
(1992a) interpreted the number of switches be- prominent role of reading for split attention ef-
tween the text and the visualization in terms of fects once more. The pattern of viewing behavior
working memory load. More re-readings occurred in self-paced instruction is fundamentally dif-
when more inferences were required. Concerning ferent from the one observable in system-paced
the perceptual aspects of split attention there may instruction. Under self-paced instruction, learners
be less content-specific variables that moderate spent a comparable amount of time looking at
split attention as well. For example, dynamic visualizations while their time on task strongly
visualizations may be considered as less complex varied with the time spent reading. In the absence
than static visualizations since the depicted dy- of extraneous load in terms of time constraints,
namics are readily perceivable and do not need to the inter-individual differences in reading time
be inferred by the learner. Accordingly, in one of suggest that the main source of cognitive load
the presented studies more alternations occured in the instructional material was the text. In fact,
between text and static visualizations compared text comprehension is well recognized as a mat-
to text with dynamic visualizations. ter of managing working memory load (Graesser
The presented studies also highlighted the role & Britton, 1996; Just & Carpenter, 1992). The
of learning time for the management of split atten- difference between system-paced and self-paced
tion. In contrast to the physiological restrictions viewing behavior may indicate a change in cogni-
of visual perception, learning time is a resource tive strategies. Reading is an inherently self-paced
that is either set by the ‘instructor’ or allocated activity. Individual reading speed does not only
by the learner. If learning time is restricted by reflect text comprehension abilities but also the
a system-controlled pacing of instruction, it is contribution of deliberate, probably effortful,
an obvious source of extraneous cognitive load. strategies for remembering expository text (Hart-
Consequently, the pacing of instruction moderates ley et al., 1994; Hyönä et al., 2002). While under
effects associated with split attention (cf. Ginns, system-paced presentation reading speed has to
2005). In the presented studies learners perceived be adapted in some way to the pace of presenta-

956
The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

tion, self-paced presentation allows the learner to number of studies have shown that concurrent
engage in a more elaborated processing of verbal presentation is superior to sequential presentation
explanation. Consequently, written text must be of corresponding information sources (‘temporal
assumed more compatible with self-paced than contiguity principle’, Mayer, 2001; for a review,
with system-paced instructions. In this view, under see Ginns, 2006). In his meta-analysis, Ginns
self-paced presentation written text may also be (2006) also identified the complexity of learning
superior to spoken text. Actually, there already materials as a moderator of temporal contiguity
exists empirical evidence for such a “reversed” effects. Indeed, complexity in terms of referential
modality effect (Tabbers, 2002). connections between text and visualizations may
require alternations between both information
sources. Thus, it is recommendable to present
PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS corresponding information sources close together
in space and time as well as to make referential
The research presented in this chapter allows connections explicit.
suggesting how split attention effects may be Reducing split attention by spatial contiguity
overcome. In time-limited presentation, (a) the or color-coding while the presentation is still
perceptibility especially for the visualization is system-paced (as it is indeed the case in many of
decreased, and (b) written text comprehension is the studied materials) always bears the risk for
disturbed. Consequently, negative influences of the learner to miss some information. This risk
split attention on learning can be avoided if both is probably higher for visualizations than for text
information sources are sufficiently perceptible and if the material is rather complex. Furthermore,
and/or if the design of a multimedia instruction system-paced presentation may interfere with
ensures not to bother a regular reading behavior. individual differences in (self-paced) reading
To make sure that all information sources in a speed. An easy way to avoid these problems is
multimedia instruction are sufficiently perceptible learner-paced instruction. Instead of specifying a
the instructional designer must consider the split of system-controlled pace that may be appropriate
visual attention that occurs whenever two or more for an average learner, this minimal form of user
visual information sources are presented concur- interaction allows each learner to adjust the pace
rently. In fact, current design guidelines already of presentation to his or her individual needs.
recommend presenting written text near rather than Doing so, the learner can ensure to capture all
far from visualizations in order to minimize split at- information that is displayed. An individually
tention (spatial contiguity principle). Furthermore, chosen pace allows the learner to follow a regular
guiding visual attention to appropriate referents, reading behavior that is susceptible to cognitive
e.g. by color-coding, can have positive effect on strategies. In this view, learner-control is not only
visual processing (Folker et al., 2005) and cogni- recommendable to overcome difficulties with split
tive load (Kalyuga, Chandler, & Sweller, 1999). attention in multimedia learning but learner-paced
Due to the fact that learners consistently attend to instructions can even benefit from written text
written text first one might be seduced to present presentation.
text and visualizations sequentially rather than
concurrently. Indeed, sequential presentation elim-
inates visual split attention, which may facilitate CONCLUSION
text comprehension. But sequential presentation
also eliminates the temporal contiguity between Two main conclusions can be drawn from the eye
the text and the corresponding visualization. A tracking studies outlined above. First, viewing

957
 The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

behavior in combinations of text and visualiza- learner. Understanding the demands of a particular
tions follows a fairly stable pattern that can be learning material on the learner’s perception and
moderated by design attributes of the instruction. accounting for individual differences by imple-
In general, written text drags visual attention away menting user interaction appears promising to
from inspecting visualizations. Thus, visualiza- advance the design of multimedia instructions in
tions have to “compete” with the text, whenever a learner-supporting fashion.
it is written. The degree of competition is influ-
enced by visual dynamics as well as the presence
and degree of time constraints. Learners adapt to FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
these properties of a multimedia instruction by
distributing their visual attention between written Concerning the limitations of the presented eye
text and visualizations differently. Furthermore, tracking studies, the applied learning materials
they are able to adjust the pace of presentation to consisted of rather short presentations. A three-
a regular reading strategy that only varies in the minute multimedia instruction on the formation
time taken to read text. of lightning can be considered to be a prototypical
Second, under less attentional competition, case of an application of dynamic visualizations.
less time constraints, and learner control of pace, For the matter of generality, this research must
effects of split attention change, decrease, or even be extended to broader classes of multimedia
disappear. The competition between written text learning material. For example, the comparison
and visualizations was stronger when visualiza- of viewing behavior under system-paced and
tions were dynamic rather than static and when self-paced instruction led to the hypothesis that
presentation time was seriously constrained. reading strategies play an important role even
Especially when learners are relieved from time in split attention. Effects of a strategic behavior
constraints, the need to split visual attention loses may be rather small in an instruction of 3 minutes
much of its detrimental effects. These differential length. Thus, it appears worth examining if and
effects on cognitive load and learning outcome how visual strategies may change with the amount
are associated to particularities of the viewing of content, especially the amount of text.
behavior. In general, presenting written text forces Visual and temporal dynamics of a multimedia
the learner to read text. When learners can follow presentation are only two design characteristics
a regular reading strategy by controlling the pace that may be expected to affect a learner’s view-
of presentation they do not suffer from written ing behavior. The patterns of viewing behavior
(compared to spoken) text presentation. Thus, the in the presented studies highlighted the role of
need to read written text may or may not interfere expository text in split attention. However, one
with extracting information from visualizations can easily imagine more complex and/or abstract
depending on how seriously reading and viewing pictorial information, for example electric cir-
visualizations are disturbed by the design of a cuits or statistical graphs that may require more
multimedia instruction. processing resources for visualizations than for
A theoretical implication of these results is written text. Similarly, text difficulty depends
that current explanations of split attention need on the text structure and the subject matter.
to incorporate resources of visual perception and Furthermore, multimedia learning material can
learning time in addition to cognitive resources. differ with respect to the referential connections
As a practical consequence, the question for an between text and visualizations. It can be as-
instructional designer is if the displayed informa- sumed that all these characteristics of a learning
tion can be sufficiently extracted by an individual material affect the learner’s viewing behavior

958
The Influence of Visual and Temporal Dynamics on Split Attention

and, thus, the way split attention is managed. In Baddeley, A. (1986). Working memory. Oxford,
order to gain a better understanding of split at- UK: Clarendon Press.
tention effects one direction of further research
Folker, S., Ritter, H., & Sichelschmidt 2005. Pro-
is to explore the viewing behavior with learning
cessing and integrating multimodal material – the
material that systematically varies those aspects.
influence of color-coding. In: Bara, B. G., Bar-
Such research can help estimating the relative
salou, L., & Bucciarelli, M. (Eds.). Proceedings
contribution of verbal explanations in comparison
of the 27th Annual Conference of the Cognitive
to visualizations and the contribution of “element
Science Society2005(p. 690-695). Mahwah, NJ:
interactivity” (Tindall-Ford et al., 1997) between
Erlbaum.
textual and visual information.
Finally, eye tracking offers an extensive data- Brünken, R., & Leutner, D. (2001). Aufmerksam-
base. There are numerous ways in which those data keitsverteilung oder Aufmerksamkeitsfokussier-
can be analyzed that go way beyond the level of ung? Empirische Ergebnisse zur “Split-Attention-
analyses presented in this chapter. For example, in Hypothese” beim Lernen mit Multimedia. [Split
reading research viewing behavior is usually not attention or focusing of attention? Empirical
described in the overall time spent reading a text results on the split-attention hypothesis in mul-
but in terms of gaze durations or single fixations timedia learning.]. Unterrichtswissenschaft, 29,
on words and the saccadic movements between 357–366.
these gazes or fixations (Rayner, 1998). Such
Brünken, R., Plass, J. L., & Leutner, D. (2003).
analyses are accompanied by theoretical models
Direct measurement of cognitive load in multi-
accounting for eye movements on the same level
media learning. Educational Psychologist, 38,
of description (e.g. Reichle et al., 1998). These
53–61. doi:10.1207/S15326985EP3801_7
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Salvucci & Anderson, 2001). So far, there is no Visual analysis of cartoons: A view from the far
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learning and observations of viewing behavior, visual cognition: Scene perception and reading
i.e. current models on the integration of verbal (pp. 444-461). New York: Springer.
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Ciernak, G., Scheiter, K., & Gerjets, P. (2007,
course of visually attending to the information
August). Eye movements of differently knowledge-
sources. However, models develop with the level
able learners during learning with split-source
of observations they have to account for. Further
of integrated format. Paper presented at the bi-
eye tracking studies may stimulate to advance
annual meeting of the European Association of
current models in order to allow predictions of
Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI).
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Budapest, Hungary.
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d’Ydewalle, G., & Gielen, I. (1992). Attention
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Tversky, B., Morrison, J. B., & Betrancourt, M. overcome split-attention effects? Saarbrücken,
(2002). Animation: Can it facilitate? Interna- Germany: VDM.
tional Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 57,
247–262. doi:10.1006/ijhc.2002.1017 Underwood, G. (Ed.). (1998). Eye guidance
in reading and scene perception. Oxford, UK:
Underwood, G. (Ed.). (2005). Cognitive Processes Elsevier.
in Eye Guidance. Oxford, UK: Oxford University
Press. Van Gompel, R. (Ed.). (2007). Eye movements: A
window on mind and brain. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

This work was previously published in Cognitive Effects of Multimedia Learning, edited by Robert Zheng, pp. 89-107, copyright
2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 963

Chapter 4.13
Leveraging Libraries to Support
Academic Technology
Heather Jagman
DePaul University, USA

Melissa Koenig
DePaul University, USA

Courtney Greene
DePaul University, USA

ABSTRACT ever more closely and actively aligned with the

teaching mission of the university, universities
Through leveraging the relationship between li- and colleges can transform librarians’ roles
braries and technology, colleges and universities within the academy by leveraging their skills to
can make the best use of the skills that librar- enhance teaching and learning in today’s online
ians bring to the table. At DePaul University, environment.
three positions have been created, which report
to two campus units: The University Libraries
and Instructional Technology Development. The INTRODUCTION
consolidation of both library and instructional
technology perspectives to create this first group As more and more library services and resources
of blended positions at DePaul has been success- are delivered online, libraries and technology
ful, due in large part to the fact that the primary become increasingly intertwined. In their article
responsibilities of these positions are in areas of “Merging Library and Computing Services at
mutual interest: instruction, collection develop- Kenyon College: A Progress Report,” Oden Jr. et
ment, and technology support for faculty and al. (2001) describe the phenomenon as follows:
students, whether on a consulting basis or at the
reference desk. As libraries and librarians become …the era when computers largely performed re-
petitive and otherwise tedious tasks (such as data
processing) transformed to an era when computers
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch413

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

served equally to store, retrieve, and manipulate to service through focusing on the patrons rather
information. The transformation has meant an than the collections.”
increasing overlap between library services
and computing services, making an integrated
approach seem sensible. (Oden Jr. et al., 2001) BLENDING LIBRARY
AND INSTRUCTIONAL
More and more institutions are exploring this TECHNOLOGY POSITIONS
model of combined library and IT services in vari-
ous ways. Ferguson, Spencer, and Metz (2004) Library mission statements generally speak to
give brief descriptions of similar undertakings at providing support for the instructional and re-
Bucknell University, Pacific Lutheran University, search programs at a given university. DePaul
and Wheaton College, and note “the need for the University’s library mission is no exception to
library and IT organizations to work together to this rule, and states that “as an integral part of
support today’s scholars and students in a much the academic function of DePaul University, the
more seamless fashion.” libraries’ mission is to support the current and
Jerry D. Campbell, CIO and Dean of Uni- anticipated instructional and research programs of
versity Libraries at the University of Southern the University by providing collections, services,
California, Los Angeles, points to initiatives un- facilities, and personnel to satisfy the information
dertaken “within academic libraries in the digital and research needs of DePaul students, faculty,
age: providing quality learning spaces; creating and staff.” (Brown, 2002)
metadata; offering virtual reference services; To serve this mission, the libraries have fa-
teaching information literacy; choosing resources cilities on all six DePaul campuses, with paper,
and managing resource licenses; collecting and microform, video, and audio collections as well
digitizing archival materials; and maintaining as extensive electronic collections available
digital repositories.” (Campbell, 2006) These 24×7×365 to university affiliates from anywhere
are just a few examples of how libraries have in the world via the Internet. Each library facility
expanded services and resources using technology. also has public access computers, and all students,
To make the best use of the skills that librarians faculty, and staff have electronic access to refer-
bring to the table, colleges and universities must ence services, document delivery, and course
continue to explore further avenues to leverage reserves. As libraries increasingly deliver their
the relationship between libraries and technology. services online, our patrons begin to expect this
In some environments as at Kenyon College, type of access, and are beginning to demand the
described by Oden Jr. et al. (2001), the integration same type of access to their other course materials.
occurs not only at the departmental or administra- Because libraries have led in this area, librarians
tive level, but also within individual positions, become natural advocates for electronic access
requiring staff with expertise in both arenas. Barth to materials.
and Cottrell (2002) describe in some depth the According to its mission, the University’s
Librarian Technology Consultant model adopted department of Instructional Technology Devel-
at Kenyon College, in which positions serve as opment (ITD) “advocates for students and col-
liaisons to specific departments and schools. They laborates with faculty and university departments
state, “This type of cross-focus began to build in developing a learning environment enriched
bridges with constituents, notably faculty, to better through effective use of technology in the cur-
serve the user by bringing a more holistic approach riculum.” The compatible missions of ITD and
the libraries make these academic support units

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Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

natural collaborators. Guan and Morrissett (2006) skill set of librarianship with the information
emphasize the importance of “taking advantage technologist’s hardware/software skills, and the
of the long-established trust relationship between instructional or educational designer’s ability to
librarians and faculty.” As they point out, librar- apply technology appropriately in the teaching-
ians are already seen as trusted members of the learning process.” While the skills themselves
academic community. Faculty are accustomed to are important, of equal if not more importance is
asking for assistance in finding library resources the way in which the blended or hybrid librarian
for their classes and in acquiring materials for executes his or her work—to be able to commu-
their research, as well as inviting librarians to nicate genuine enthusiasm for the potential uses
provide library research instruction for their of technology in the teaching environment. It is
students. Expanding this role so that librarians the combination of enthusiasm with the library
show faculty how to integrate library resources background, subject knowledge, and technical and
entirely into their online course sites, or into teaching skills that truly transform and reframe
course sites complementing in-person instruc- the way faculty perceive the use of technology
tion, is a natural place to begin the consultation. in their classes.
Leveraging this relationship allows instructional Librarians who report to both the Libraries
technology departments a way to reach faculty in and Instructional Technology Development are
a non-threatening way. not only enthusiastic promoters of teaching with
Librarians also bring an understanding of the technology, but are also able to draw connections
organization of information, including experi- between the activities of both units from a unique
ence with indexing and database construction. perspective. At DePaul University these blended
These skills, along with librarianship’s emphasis librarians have aided in the development of, and
on user-centered services, are valuable skills participated in, a number of cooperative projects
and can be applied in many arenas, from online and cross-departmental trainings.
course organization to assisting with the creation
of database-driven Web sites.
At DePaul, the blending of librarian/instruc- COLLABORATIVE TRAINING:
tional technology consultant positions began in BLACKBOARD
2003 with the hiring of a suburban campus coor-
dinator who also served as instructional technol- The earliest training collaboration, “Linking to
ogy consultant for the suburban campuses. Two Resources in Blackboard,” began as a day-long
additional librarian-consultant positions were workshop to teach faculty how to use the Black-
developed in summer 2005 and resulted in the board course management system at the Univer-
changing of job duties for two existing assistant sity’s newest and smallest residential campus.
coordinators of library instruction positions. In addition to learning the functionality of the
As DePaul increases the numbers of these dual Blackboard course management system from
positions, it has become important to look at the an instructional technology consultant (ITC), a
personalities and skill sets of the individuals who librarian instructed faculty in linking to content
are either hired or reorganized into them. contained in library databases. In the course of
Though specific job titles vary widely, this delivering the workshop, it was discovered that
type of position is referred to within the library faculty could also benefit from a more basic over-
world as a “hybrid” or “blended” librarian, which view of library resources. In time, the combined
Steven J. Bell and John Shank (2004) define as “an library and instructional technology development
academic librarian who combines the traditional

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 Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

staff also recognized there was an audience for also taken through the process of creating stable,
a more intensive Blackboard training workshop. persistent links to articles of their choice in the
The Blackboard Institute (BI) evolved as library’s online database collection, and are taught
an endeavor to offer brief, intensive training in how to include those links in their course sites or
Blackboard. Existing instructional programs of- course Web sites. Faculty appreciate being able to
fered by instructional technology development recommend online full-text articles, and provide
were structured over a five-week period, and many links to them to at a moment’s notice.
faculty members balked at this extended time In addition to the blended librarians leading the
commitment. Coordinated by one of the blended session, librarians representing the subject areas of
librarians, the hands-on workshop is offered the participants are invited to the presentation and
over three consecutive days to faculty members encouraged to continue the discussion over lunch.
interested in building a Blackboard course site The positive outcome of this training endeavor
to complement classroom instruction. When the supports Bell’s finding that when “library staff
inaugural Blackboard Institute filled to capacity is involved in managing the course management
within a few days, a second institute was added, system (CMS) or providing training for new users
which also filled to capacity. Future institutes are …[t]hat is a favorable condition for librarians to
planned during academic breaks with two more influence faculty to create links to the library.”
to follow immediately prior to the fall term. An (Bell, 2002)
additional Advanced Blackboard Institute is also Faculty awareness of, and facility with, elec-
planned, designed to expand the skills of the initial tronic reserves and linking should lead to inclusion
institute participants. and promotion of resources already purchased by
During the Institute, participants develop and/ the libraries. These outgrowths can improve stu-
or upload a course syllabus, structure course in- dent work as well—when faculty know how easy
formation, identify and link to online resources, it is to include an article from the day’s newspaper,
and create learning activities to engage learn- they are more likely to add that link into their
ers. Hands-on activities are complemented by course site. In turn, students are more likely to read
showcases, discussions, and critiques among the and access items that are immediately available.
participants. As different instructional technol- Cohen agrees: “Integrating course-management
ogy consultants and librarians present, other staff software with the library’s digital offerings is
members are available, roaming to assist faculty essential for getting the maximum value from
members as needed. This helps to build the role the institutional investments of both money and
of librarian as technology expert. expertise.” (Cohen, 2002) Gibbons also argues
A presentation on linking to library resources that integrating library resources into course
takes place during the morning of the second management systems makes students regard them
day. The benefits of the online course reserve more favorably, and thus increases the likelihood
system are demonstrated first. Faculty need only those students would turn to the linked electronic
to submit citations for items to be put on reserve resources provided by the library. (Gibbons,
for their courses. The library determines whether 2005a) Furthermore, according to studies cited by
the item may be linked through an existing data- Gibbons, it is the convenience and efficiency of
base subscription, and if not, scans the relevant course management systems that appeal most to
articles or chapters. Items which cannot be placed students. (Gibbons, 2005b) Students rated being
on electronic reserves due to limitations of format able to access syllabi and course readings as the
or of copyright are placed on print reserve and a most attractive and useful features.
link is created to the catalog record. Faculty are

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Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

ADDITIONAL FACULTY ment system (LCMS). This tool can be used to

TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES build interactive lessons by creating and linking
together instructional elements such as animations,
Librarian members of the instructional technology and assessment elements such as quizzes, tests,
consultant staff also assist with the development and assignments. All of these objects can be shared
and delivery of instructional technology develop- with other users of the application and used or
ment workshops on using word processing applica- re-used in multiple contexts. The library’s instruc-
tions, developing presentations, and building Web tion program makes heavy use of IB, currently
sites, as well as on homegrown applications such delivering nine targeted, class-specific workshops
as QuickData, instructional technology develop- to four schools or units across the University. In
ment’s online survey development tool. Aside sum, over 7,000 students have taken at least one
from the obvious point-of-service opportunities to of the ten workshops that have been available
promote and recommend related library resources, over the life of the application. Additionally, the
librarians working with faculty in this capacity University’s Office of Institutional Compliance
increase the possibility that faculty will think of utilized the application to deliver training to all
the library when designing their assignments. employees.
Instructional technology development work- Instruction Builder 3.0 was released in August
shops provide an ideal forum for promoting the 2005, the third version release in the project’s five
library’s “Just for Faculty” section of the library’s year lifespan. This release of the product was the
Web site. (DePaul University Libraries, n.d.) This culmination of a multi-year joint development
page includes information about course reserves, process between the University Libraries and In-
the library’s instruction program, suggestions for structional Technology Development, undertaken
purchase, and interlibrary loan. It also includes by a cross-functional team of stakeholders, includ-
step-by-step directions for linking to library re- ing the library instruction coordinator, the head
sources and provides a tool that wraps code around of library Web services, Instructional Technology
each link to enable proxy access for off-campus Development’s lead developer, and three of the
university affiliates. Library/Instructional Technology Development
joint-report positions, one of whom served as
project manager. For the two previous releases,
TECHNOLOGY COLLABORATIONS: the same collaborative model has been used to
LEARNING CONTENT generate system requirements, test beta versions,
MANAGEMENT SYSTEM and compile lists of enhancements.
Feedback collected from the development
Several additional outgrowths of the library-ITD team, librarian graders, and student users of the
collaboration exist, resulting in technical solutions system has led to a number of changes to the ap-
primarily utilized or supported by the library. plication over its lifespan. In conjunction with the
Ranging across functional units in the libraries library-driven enhancements in the third release,
and instructional technology development, these the project manager worked with the Office of
applications are critical to the delivery of library Institutional Compliance within the University,
services and resources. The successful use by the for which a separate instance of the IB application
library of one jointly developed application has was established to integrate their requirements
led to its adoption by other university units. and feedback. Interface changes, restructuring
The first and most established of these is in- of user permissions, and enhanced functionality
struction builder (IB), a learning content manage-

967
 Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

are a few results of this iterative, collaborative bine them to form workshops or tutorials, and to
design process. “publish” or release them to students and instruc-
tors. Higher-level administrative tasks such as
activating and deactivating users, assigning user
INSTRUCTION BUILDER: CURRENT permissions, creating and populating groups, and
STRUCTURE AND FUNCTIONALITY editing released content, are restricted to only a
few select users.
The instruction builder (IB) system is flexible and
allows instructional objects created within it to be
linked together into one of two delivery methods: ELECTRONIC RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT
• Workshops, which are built using a com-
bination of instructional elements and The two units also work collaboratively on an
assessment elements, and which are application for managing electronic resources.
linked to specific DePaul courses via the The University initially contracted with a ven-
University’s student information system dor providing aggregated, single-entry access to
• Tutorials, which may be freely accessed library electronic subscriptions over five years
(i.e., they are not linked to any course) ago. This vendor also provides a link resolver,
and which are primarily composed of in- which uses the OpenURL protocol to provide
structional elements, with no required more seamless access to electronic full-text con-
assessments tent across all library databases and vendors. At
the time of inception, the library’s Web services
IB is role-based; display options and permis- department was maintaining its own database of
sions are assigned according to role. The three information on library subscriptions to online
major categories of roles are student, instructor journals and databases. Over time, the library Web
(faculty), and administrator. All three log in to a services department worked with the vendor to
common interface to access workshops and other customize the look and feel of search and results
data. Students complete workshops at their con- screens so that they blended seamlessly with the
venience, and are not required to complete them library’s Web site.
in one sitting. Once submitted, depending on their In July 2005, reorganization consolidated
content, workshops may be graded automatically several positions with technical or Web site man-
by the system or interactively by a faculty member, agement responsibilities from both the libraries
librarian, or instructional designer. and instructional technology development into a
Instructors may view workshop content and single department, responsible for all systems and
class roster data from their login screen. Ad- development projects for the larger teaching and
ditionally, they are provided with a direct URL learning resources unit. At this time, day-to-day
to each workshop, which they may add to their maintenance of technical and interface issues for
course within a course management system, or these services is managed by the new, merged sys-
send via e-mail. tems and applications development department,
Administrative access to the system is man- with assistance from collection development on a
aged at several tiers. Most users have access to case by case basis for subscription/vendor contacts.
view published content and to grade submitted
workshops. A smaller group of users have the
ability to build individual content items, to com-

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Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

FUTURE DIRECTIONS AND in the productive use of all manner of resources.

POSSIBLE APPLICATIONS (Institute of Museum and Library Services, 2006)

With each year bringing more integration of tech- Further, the organizational structure at this
nology across the whole of higher education, and institution supports such an arrangement, since
with the technology landscape constantly chang- both the libraries and instructional technology
ing, it is likely that more and more of the services development are part of the same overarching ad-
offered and resources provided by libraries and ministrative unit, teaching and learning resources.
instructional technology support units will be In addition, as previously mentioned, the
inextricably intertwined with the online world. success of these and similar positions is affected
Most important, though, must be the examina- by other, less quantifiable factors related to the
tion of why this effort will prosper. It is already personal characteristics of the individual filling the
immediately apparent that some of the areas most position; it is essential that the individual possess
profoundly impacted by technology include: appropriate technical skills and discipline back-
ground, as well as certain elements of personality
• Instruction, whether in-class or online, and (e.g., enthusiasm, self-direction, flexibility, curi-
whether conducted by faculty or by aca- osity/interest in technology), which are the most
demic support units such as the libraries or difficult to quantify when developing “hybrid” or
instructional technology development “blended” positions.
• Library collections, including online data- It is also important to remember that although
bases and indexes, electronic journals, and many of the trends and forces in the current envi-
books ronment indicate a shift toward an environment
• Technology support for faculty, staff, and where more and more “blended” positions exist,
students, as new technologies are adopted the audience for library services and resources
and integrated into the curriculum (recent remains rich and varied in its interests, needs, and
examples include streaming multimedia, approaches. “Traditional” library services such as
podcasting, and blogging) reference, cataloging, circulation, archives, and
preservation have become neither superfluous
The consolidation of both library and instruc- nor outmoded, as evidenced by their continued
tional technology perspectives and responsibilities utilization, and they retain their importance to
to create this first group of blended positions at the support of teaching and learning within the
DePaul has been successful, due in large part to academic enterprise. This carryover of skills and
the focus of these positions on the areas previ- values, albeit with new and different methods of
ously listed. The Institute of Museum and Library delivery, is recognized within the IMLS paper:
Services (IMLS) recent white paper publication, “…There is also a need to assure that the basics of
“The Future of Librarians in the Workforce Proj- library work do not change in the electronic age.”
ect—University Libraries” confirms this: (Institute of Museum and Library Services, 2006)
In fact, circulation of DePaul’s print collections
Faculty will still expect librarians to understand increased 23% for the 2005 fiscal year, despite
their intellectual needs and to anticipate those yearly increases in e-book and electronic journal
needs in the works they acquire and license (in- subscription access, illustrating the continuing
cluding GIS and other non-traditional resources). impact of one the library’s most basic resources:
More than ever faculty look and will look to li- books.
brarians to deliver instruction to the community

969
 Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

Campbell grapples with these issues of transi- Bell, S. J., & Shank, J. (2004). The blended librar-
tion in his article “Changing a Cultural Icon: The ian: A blueprint for redefining the teaching and
Academic Library as a Virtual Destination.” The learning role of academic librarians. College &
library is still seen as a cultural icon, but it has Research Libraries News, 372–375.
become increasingly apparent that the public face
Brown, D. (2002). Library Mission Statement
of the icon needs to be updated to better reflect
(pp. 1): DePaul University.
the ideals of a new society. If libraries fail to take
advantage of opportunities to change their image, Campbell, J. D. (2006). Changing a cultural icon:
their role in the academy may be threatened by The academic library as a virtual destination.
the impact of technology and its perceived ease of [Electronic version]. EDUCAUSE Review, 16–30.
use. Libraries will always be keepers of informa-
Cohen, D. (2002, May/June). Course-management
tion, but their previous service model, primarily
software: Where’s the library? [Electronic version]
passive, will need to shift in order to retain its
EDUCAUSE Review: 12-13. Retrieved March 29,
importance in a society that values desktop- and
2006, from http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/
doorstep-delivery services. He concludes, “Over
pdf/erm0239.pdf
the next decade, colleges and universities will have
to make critically important practical and policy DePaul University Instructional Technology De-
decisions about the future of libraries, about the velopment. (n.d.). About ITD. Retrieved March 28,
space devoted to libraries, and about the roles of 2006, from http://www.itd.depaul.edu/website/
librarians.” (Campbell, 2006).
DePaul University Library. (n.d.). Just for faculty.
It is clear that a crossroads has been reached.
Retrieved March 28, 2006, from http://www.lib.
We argue that these decisions can be made easier
depaul.edu/faculty.htm
as libraries and librarians become ever more
closely and more actively aligned with the teaching Ferguson, C., Spencer, G., & Metz, T. (2004,
mission of the university, and as universities and May/June.) Greater than the sum of its parts: The
colleges look at transforming the librarians’ roles integrated IT/library organization. [Electronic
within the academy by leveraging their skills to version] EDUCAUSE Review: 38-46. Retrieved
enhance teaching and learning in today’s online March 29, 2006, from http://www.educause.edu/
environment. ir/library/pdf/erm0432.pdf
Gibbons, S. (2005a). Course-management sys-
tems. Library Technology Reports, 41(3), 7–13.
REFERENCES
Gibbons, S. (2005b). Who should care and why?
Barth, C. D., & Cottrell, J. R. (2002). a constitu- Library Technology Reports, 41(3), 21–25.
ency-based support system for delivering infor-
mation services. College & Research Libraries, Guan, S., & Morrissett, L. (2006, March). Merg-
63(1), 47–52. ing library and instructional technology exper-
tise through joint positions. Presentation at the
Bell, S. J. (2002). New information marketplace EDUCAUSE Midwest Regional Conference,
competitors: Issues and strategies for academic Chicago, IL.
libraries. [Electronic Version]. Portal: Libraries
and the Academy, 2, 227-303. Retrieved March
29, 2006 from Project Muse.

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Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

Institute of Museum and Library Services. (2006). Learning Content Management System: A
IMLS task force on future of librarians in the work- system where instructional designers and other
force—university libraries. Retrieved March 29, instructional content developers can create, store,
2006, from http://mingus.exp.sis.pitt.edu:8888/ reuse, manage, and deliver digital learning content
workforce/IMLS_Opinion_Papers.pdf using a central learning object repository.
Link Resolver: A software application that
Oden, R. A., Jr., Temple, D. B., Cottrell, J. R.,
uses the OpenURL protocol to provide more seam-
Griggs, R. K., Turney, G. W., & Wojcik, F. M.
less access to electronic full-text content across
(2001). Merging library and computing services
all databases and vendors for a desired citation.
at Kenyon College: A progress report. [Electronic
OpenURL: An ANSI standard (Z39.88) used
version] EDUCAUSE Quarterly, 4, 18-25. Re-
to transport metadata and/or other identifiers about
trieved March 29, 2006, from via http://www.
a source object to a target object. In libraries,
educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/eqm0141.pdf
this standard is used by link resolvers to connect
patrons to resources and services.
Persistent Links: Links provided by a database
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS that allow direct and stable access to a particular
document or item.
Blended or Hybrid Librarian: A librarian Reference Services: Service provided by
with a skill set consisting of traditional library libraries whereby patrons are assisted in the loca-
skills, facility with hardware and educational tion and retrieval of information relevant to their
software, and the ability to communicate the information needs.
appropriate use of technology in a teaching and Student Information System: Often part of
learning environment. enterprise solutions that also manage human re-
Course Management System (CMS): An sources and financial services, student information
online learning environment, which bundles systems are responsible for maintaining the records
teaching and communications tools. These tools of course enrollment, grades, course history, and
can be used to supplement classroom learning or other data related to a student’s academic career.
can stand alone as an online learning experience.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Researchon Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 168-176, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

971
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Chapter 4.14
Student Decision Making in
Technology Application
Ali Ahmed
University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, USA

Abdulaziz Elfessi
University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, USA

ABSTRACT nology resources. Findings reveal that students’

perceptions and experiences were quite similar.
This study investigated factors that influence
students’ decision-making processes in selecting
a classroom or online course, student technology INTRODUCTION
skills and experience, and concerns students have
about Internet integration. Students completed a Educational reform is exerting pressure on
survey questionnaire and Web-based pretests and prospective and experienced teachers to model
posttests. A Likert scale instrument was com- authentic teaching and to demonstrate under-
pleted by students in both a control group and standing and knowledge of various instructional
an experimental group. Independent two-sample techniques and tools. Teachers are being trained
t-tests and an analysis of covariance (ANCOVA), or retrained to reduce the lecture-and-listen styles
using the initial score as the covariate, were of instruction that have traditionally been used
conducted. Level of significance (alpha) was set and to enhance their facilitation of appropriate
at .05 to achieve statistical significance for all student-centered instructional methods. Technol-
analyses. Both groups in this study were full-time, ogy is one of the new teaching and learning tools
on-campus students with access to the same tech- that teachers are expected to use. As more schools
invest in technology and students increasingly
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch414 obtain technological sophistication, teachers are

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Student Decision Making in Technology Application

expected to not only demonstrate technology Wang (2002) revealed that ease of technology use
competency but also be effective at integrating and access to technology are important consider-
technology into their teaching. ations when deciding whether to use technology.
The use of technology as an instructional tool Buzzell, Chamberlain, and Pintauro (2002) stated
and medium is usually determined by the peda- that both Web-based and classroom learning are
gogical style adapted by the instructor (Shovein, effective instructional environments.
Huston, Fox, & Damazo, 2005). However, during Advocates of online learning mention the flex-
a time when active student participation in the ibility that online learning provides. Although on-
learning process is receiving widespread attention, line learning offers flexibility, it is not yet regarded
educators must consider student learning prefer- by many educators as an appealing replacement
ences and technology abilities when planning a of classroom learning; therefore, the significance
course delivery format. Various factors determine of flexibility should not override other factors that
students’ preferences and perceptions about tech- affect learning such as student learning styles and
nology application in both classroom and online technology skills. Atan, Rahman, and Idrus (2004)
environments. In this study, the authors studied the recognized the benefits of Web-based instruction
factors that influence students’ decisions to learn such as increased opportunities for using differ-
in a classroom vs. an online setting. In addition, ent instructional strategies, use of multimedia,
the authors also examined students’ technology improved communication and interaction, and
skills and concerns about Internet integration easy access to course materials; however, they
within classrooms. also argued that the impact of a traditional course
delivery system supercedes that of online learning.
Due to the time and technology skills needed
INSTRUCTIONAL ENVIRONMENT to manage online classes and to teach and support
students, online learning is more demanding and
Participation in Web-enhanced classrooms or involved than is generally assumed (Shovein et
online distance learning is influenced by student al., 2005). Atan et al. (2004) observed that, “dis-
motivation, technology experience, learning tance education learners need constant reminders
styles, and learning expectations (Shovein et regarding learning strategies, time management
al., 2005). According to Shin and Chan (2004), skills, motivation, and discipline” (p. 105). Stu-
education level, online learning experience, and dents require online support for successful online
Internet skills affect student participation in online learning. Although concerns about the effects of
learning. technology on learning and course management
Many institutions of higher education are are raised when teaching online, the presence of
using Web-based instruction for classroom and technology in traditional classrooms also calls
distance education (Falvo & Solloway, 2004). for a reassessment of classroom management
Various online course management systems have practices. The physical space in classrooms and
evolved within the last decade and have been disruptions of student learning by the Internet
widely adapted by educational institutions. Course require new classroom management styles (Lim,
management systems such as BlackboardTM, Pek, & Chai, 2005).
WebCTTM, and Desire2LearnTM have been used Effective integration of the Internet requires
in classrooms to supplement learning and as an careful consideration of individual learner dif-
online distance education delivery medium. In a ferences and needs. If online learning is to be
comparison study of two online course manage- integrated into campus-based courses because of
ment systems, Storey, Phillips, Maczewski, and the potential of the Internet as an effective learn-

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 Student Decision Making in Technology Application

ing tool, a mixed-mode delivery format should stated that an online medium facilitates learning
be adapted to supplement face-to-face learning more thoroughly than face-to-face environment
(Sheard & Lynch, 2003). This view is consistent (Cottrell & Robinson, 2003). Cottrell and Rob-
with the findings of Rovai, Wighting, and Liu inson posited that two potential reasons for these
(2005) who reported that hybrid learning increases perceptions are the independence of and access
persistence and commitment to online learning. to materials that Web-based learning provides.
Cottrell et al. further noted that online learning
environments individualize learning because
TECHNOLOGY USE students can learn according to their learning pref-
AND PERCEPTION erences, style, and pace. Web-based instruction
increases collaboration and mentoring, enhances
Educational scholars and practitioners have students’ self-confidence, and provides students
long reported that students prefer learning in with alternative learning styles (Chang, 2003).
environments in which they are comfortable. As In a comparative study of online and on-campus
educational institutions and instructors began to students, Rovai et al. (2005) discovered that no
integrate the Internet as an instructional tool and difference in learning and performance exists as
delivery medium, students learned and developed long as students using the online environments
the technology skills that became important, if have a sense of community and collaboration
not required, for this new method of learning. similar to that found in classroom environments.
However, not all students were fascinated with In examining the role of student perceptions
the use of technology for teaching and learning. about the instructional delivery medium, Miller,
A study by Rule, Barrera, Jolene, Dockstader, and Rainer, and Corley (2003) found that perceived
Derr (2002) reported that students in a technology- ease of use and usefulness of a medium encour-
rich environment had higher technology skills aged students to enroll in a course utilizing such
than classroom students with limited access to a medium. Possessing the necessary skills to
computers. Although Rule et al. found no sig- successfully learn in such an environment cre-
nificant differences in students’ attitude toward ates a positive perception about the instructional
computers, their study revealed that students who medium. Miller et al. further demonstrated that
were highly motivated were more likely to use students who exhibit technology anxiety or lack
computers than their less motivated counterparts. technology skills are less motivated to learn in an
They further reported that access to computers online environment.
and technology support are important factors in
a student’s decision to utilize computers.
When Buchanan, Brown, Casanova, Wolfram, DESCRIPTION OF THE STUDY
and Xie (2000) contrasted two student groups in
online and classroom environments, they found Students enrolled in an introductory educational
that Web-based students considered technol- technology course took part in this study to in-
ogy skills, organization, and personalities more vestigate the various factors that influence student
important for learning compared to classroom decision making with regard to technology use.
students. Other studies point out that student The study explored whether differences in student
choices and decision-making are influenced by technology experience, skills, or concerns about
personal relationships and technology support. In Internet integration play a role in learning in a
a survey of student perceptions about Internet use classroom or an online environment.
for learning, an overwhelming number of students

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Student Decision Making in Technology Application

The experiences and perceptions of two groups SUBJECTS

of students who were either enrolled in class-
room or online sections of the same course were Participants consisted of two groups of pre-service
compared. Students in the two course sections teacher education students. Although all students
were full-time, on-campus students with access were full-time, on-campus students, one section
to similar resources such as computers, printers, of the course was taught online as a distance
university networks, and the Internet. The only education course. One group of 24 students was
difference was that the online group completed enrolled in the classroom section of the course,
the course as distance education students while while the other group of 23 students completed
the classroom students used the Internet as a the course online.
supplement to face-to-face learning. Many of the participants were undergraduate
students of junior and senior standing. The course
is one of the required courses in the education
DATA COLLECTION program and is designed to introduce students to
the field of educational technology.
To study student technology experience including
learning environment and concerns about technol-
ogy use, students completed a survey question- INSTRUMENT AND DATA ANALYSIS
naire and pretests and posttests. To compare and
investigate students’ perceptions about technology The first goal of this study was to compare the
integration, a Web-based pretest was administered level of “computer and Internet technology
to both groups (online and classroom) during the skills” of students in the two sections. A Likert
first day of the semester; a Web-based posttest scale instrument (1 = Expert, …, 5 = None) was
was administered again at the end of the semester. completed by the students in both classes. This
Both tests were executed and scored automati- was part one of a questionnaire on Web-based
cally using an online assessment tool. This study educational technology (Tetiwat, 2003) consisting
was conducted to answer the following research of eight items. Independent two-sample t-tests
questions: were conducted to determine the difference in the
mean scores between the two groups.
1. How do student technology experience and The second purpose of the study was to as-
skills determine student preference for online sess and compare the factors that influenced the
or classroom learning? students’ decisions to use Internet/Web technolo-
2. Are there any significant differences between gies. A Likert scale instrument (1 = Very strong
online and classroom students’ decision- influence, …, 5 = No influence) was completed
making processes in the use of the Internet by the students at the beginning and the end of
as an instructional medium? the semester. This was part two of a questionnaire
3. Are there any significant differences in stu- on Web-based educational technology consisting
dent concerns about the use of the Internet of 12 items. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA),
as an instructional tool? using the initial score as the covariate, was con-
ducted to determine the difference in the mean of
the scores for each class at the end of the semester.
The final purpose of this research was to
compare the students’ levels of concern regarding
the use of the Internet in teaching and learning. A

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 Student Decision Making in Technology Application

Likert scale instrument (1 = Extremely concerned, test for homogeneity of variance indicated that
…, 5 = Not concerned) was again completed by the assumption for equality of variance was not
the students at the beginning and at the end of the violated. Independent two-sample t-tests indi-
semester. This was part three of a questionnaire on cated no significant difference (P-value>.05) in
Web-based educational technology consisting of the mean scores of level of skills among the two
16 items. ANCOVA, using the initial score as the classes for seven of the eight items. The only
covariate, was conducted to determine the differ- significant difference (p<.05) among the two
ence in the mean scores for each class at the end classes was found for the item, “using the Internet
of the semester. The level of significance (alpha) for other communication forms (e.g., chat, discus-
was set at .05 to achieve statistical significance sion forum, listserves, bulletin-board),” (see Table
for all analyses. 2) where online students revealed more experience
in Internet use for communication compared to
the traditional (classroom) group. Most students
RESULTS in both groups ranked their word processing and
presentation software skills as advanced or inter-
To examine student decision-making procedures mediate. Students ranked their skills in develop-
in using technology as a learning tool, this study ing Web courses as the lowest of the eight skills.
researched the role of student technology skills, Student responses to several statements were
student perceptions about the influence of tech- analyzed to examine the factors that affect student
nology on learning, and student concerns about decision-making processes. The results from the
incorporating technology in learning. Forty-seven analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) indicated only
students completed the assessment at the beginning a significant difference (P-value<.05) among the
and at the end of the semester. The data on sex, two groups in item two (studying performance is
age, and degree program are presented in Table 1. improved) regarding the factors that have influ-
The study assessed students’ level of technol- enced or would influence their decision to use the
ogy skills. Normal probability plots reveal that Internet/Web (see Table 3).
the normality assumptions were valid. Leven’s According to the data (see Table 4), both the
online and classroom students were most influ-
enced in their decision-making by the need to
Table 1. Student demographics (age, sex, and
communicate with instructors and friends (item
degree)
4), their confidence in the value of the Internet
Variable n % (item 11) to improve studying performance (item
Age 2), and the ease of Internet Study (item 3). Con-
21-29 2 4.3
versely, the data reveals that the ability to use
30-39 0 0
technology on a trial basis (item 9) and the avail-
>40 1 2.1
ability of other courses on the Internet (item 12)
had the least influence on student decision-
Sex
making process.
Male 9 19.1
In investigating students’ levels of concern
Female 38 80.9
when deciding whether or not to use Internet/Web
Degree Seeking 45 (2 missing)
technology instruments, ANCOVA indicated a
Bachelor 42 89.3
marginal significance (p=.08) between the two
Master 1 2.1
groups for the item “ownership of the Web-based
Other 2 4.3

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Student Decision Making in Technology Application

Table 2. Means (SD) for level of skill instrument; ** (What level of computer and Internet technology
skills do you have?) *significant at .05 **1=Expert, 2=Advanced, 3=Intermediate, 4=Beginner, 5=None

Item Classroom Experimental P-Value

1. Word processing software. 2.29(0.69) 2.13(.081) 0.467
2. Spreadsheet software. 3.25(.079) 3.00(0.61) 0.232
3. Presentation software. 2.92(0.77) 2.87(0.76) 0.834
4. Programming. 3.75(0.61) 3.70(0.70) 0.785
5. Using Internet for communication forms. 3.17(0.87) 2.61(0.93) 0.040*
6. Using Internet to do research. 2.63(0.57) 2.36(0.89) 0.290
7. Developing Web pages. 3.54(0.59) 3.74(0.55) 0.241
8. Developing Web courses. 3.92(0.28) 3.79(0.67) 0.373

Table 3. ANCOVA results: “Influence factors”; *significant at .05 **1=Very strong influence, 2= Strong
influence, 3=Somewhat influence, 4= Weak influence, 5=No influence

Item F (1,43) P-Value

1. Task achievement is more rapid 0.84 0.365
2. Studying performance is improved 7.10 0.011*
3. Making studying easier 0.256 0.616
4. Communication with instructors and friends is enhanced 1.26 0.267
5. Use of Internet/Web technology is easy to learn 0.487 0.489
6. Acquisition of Internet/Web technology skill is easy to achieve. 0.715 0.402
7. Suitability for my courses. 0.25 0.620
8. Compatibility with my learning style. 0.052 0.82
9. Ability to use Internet/Web technology on a trial basis 0.922 0.343
10. Knowing where to go to try out Internet/Web technology 0.595 0.445
11. 11. Value of Internet/Web technology 0.865 0.358
12. 12. Availability of other courses on the Internet/Web 0.358 0.553

courses.” The results from ANCOVA are given DISCUSSION

in Table 5.
Table 6 shows that students were most concerned Unlike distance education or classroom learning,
about technical problems (item 11), effectiveness the use of technology such as the Internet as an
of Web-based courses compared to face-to-face instructional tool and medium requires students to
learning methods (item 4), keeping up with the have at least basic technology skills. Students are
speed of technology (item 10), and the possibility becoming increasingly familiar with technology
of the Internet replacing face-to-face classrooms application in classroom learning and distance
(item 16). Students seemed to have been less con- education settings and many have some form of
cerned about the ownership of courses, lack of technology experience, regardless of their learning
support from their own institution, and the limited environments and fields of study.
use of the Internet in their subject areas.

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Table 4. Means ± standard deviation for pre and posttest of influence factors

Traditional Experimental
Item Pre Post Pre Post
Mean n Mean n Mean n Mean n
1. 88±.741 24 2.50±.978 24 2.04±.878 23 1.86±.774 22
2. 1.75±.608 24 1.92±.584 24 1.39±.583 23 2.09±.811 22
3. 1.83±.761 24 2.33±.917 24 1.86±.793 21 1.91±.868 22
4. 1.75±.794 24 1.67±.565 24 1.57±.728 23 1.82±.664 22
5. 2.04±.806 24 2.21±.833 24 1.91±.793 23 2.14±.560 22
6. 2.25±.676 24 2.42±.776 24 2.00±.905 23 1.86±.640 22
7. 2.25±.737 24 2.29±.690 24 2.09±.733 23 1.95±.722 22
8. 2.04±.751 24 2.58±.776 24 2.00±.853 23 2.14±.889 22
9. 2.46±.884 24 2.88±.680 24 2.05±1.046 22 2.36±.658 22
10. 2.13±.680 24 2.42±.717 24 2.04±.928 23 1.95±.653 22
11. 2.21±.779 24 2.33±.637 24 1.91±.848 23 1.95±.486 22
12. 2.46±.884 24 2.71±.955 24 2.32±1.129 22 1.91±.750 22

In this study, the findings did not reveal wide- ogy in instruction. The mean score of classroom
spread discrepancies in student technology skills (3.18) and online (3.02) students’ overall skill
and perception about the incorporation of technol- levels reveals that students in both groups had some

Table 5. ANCOVA results: “Level of concern”; *significant at .05 **1=Extremely concerned, 2= Very
concerned, 3=Somewhat concerned, 4= A little concerned, 5=Not concerned

Item F(1,43) P-Value

1. Lack time to use Internet/Web technology for my classes 0.520 0.483
2. Limited knowledge of Internet/Web technology 0.009 0.925
3. Effectiveness of Internet/Web technology in supporting learning 1.145 0.705
4. Effectiveness of Web-based courses compared to face-to-face learning methods 0.021 0.884
5. Availability of suitable Internet/Web software 0.72 0.401
6. The quality of content of Web-based courses 0.177 0.676
7. Institutional support and service 0.261 0.612
8. Accessibility of Internet/Web technology to students 1.98 0.166
9. Availability of technology infrastructure 1.441 0.237
10. Keeping up with the speed of technology changes 0.127 0.792
11. Technical problems 0.048 0.83
12. The ownership of the Web-based courses 3.125 0.084*
13. Lack of support and encouragement from my institution 0.009 0.93
14. Health issues 0.26 0.62
15. The use of Internet/Web technology in my subject area 1.215 0.277
16. Internet/Web technology may replace face-to-face classroom 0.302 0.57

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Student Decision Making in Technology Application

Table 6. Means ± Standard deviation for pre and posttest of levels of concern

Traditional Experimental
Item Pre Post Pre Post
Mean n Mean n Mean n Mean n
1. 3.38±1.135 24 3.29±.999 24 3.13±1.100 23 3.36±1.093 22
2. 2.92±1.142 24 3.00±1.142 24 2.86±1.167 22 3.05±1.253 22
3. 2.83±1.239 24 3.17±1.239 24 3.00±1.314 23 2.77±1.232 22
4. 2.63±1.056 24 2.83±1.090 24 2.65±.832 23 2.86±1.153 21
5. 2.96±.751 24 3.38±1.013 24 3.13±.757 23 3.05±.950 22
6. 2.92±.929 24 3.13±1.116 24 3.04±.928 23 2.95±1.174 22
7. 2.92±.974 24 3.00±.885 24 3.09±.668 23 2.95±.999 22
8. 2.75±1.073 24 3.17±1.049 24 3.22±1.126 23 2.95±1.090 22
9. 3.00±1.022 24 3.50±.933 24 3.35±1.027 23 3.05±1.090 22
10. 2.63±1.173 24 2.83±.963 24 2.74±1.096 23 3.05±1.090 22
11. 2.46±1.021 24 2.25±.989 24 2.39±.839 23 2.45±1.184 22
12. 3.75±.897 24 3.63±1.096 24 3.22±.998 23 3.33±.796 21
13. 3.42±1.283 24 3.38±1.173 24 3.35±1.265 23 3.32±1.041 22
14. 3.71±1.334 24 3.54±1.103 24 3.96±1.186 23 3.59±.796 22
15. 3.58±1.139 24 3.63±1.173 24 3.83±1.114 23 3.40±1.095 20
16. 2.88±1.541 24 2.83±1.129 24 2.64±1.217 22 3.00±1.298 20

technology experience. At the very least, both course delivery format. In fact, the online students
groups of students had intermediate skills in In- reported to have better Internet communication
ternet use, presentation applications, and common skills compared to the classroom group. This
productivity software, such as word processing. point is consistent with other studies of online
Additionally, many colleges offer workshops that learning because effective use of the Internet
provide training in the aforementioned programs. for learning and communication requires greater
However, despite the training and the importance interaction and use of different communication
that word processing and presentation skills hold, media such as email, online chats, and discussion
students did not acknowledge any expertise in forums. For successful Web-based instruction
the programs. Students reported to have fewer and improved learning outcomes, students must
competencies in the less commonly used skills engage in asynchronous communication in addi-
of programming and Web site development. In tion to the real-time, synchronous media during
investigating student technology skills, Dexter group discussions. Although the Internet is a great
and Riedel (2003) reported that students only communication tool, many students see no need
exhibited competency in technology that they for other tools other than email, and therefore fail
found useful to their learning process. to develop skills in other communication media.
Overall, the only significant difference between On the other hand, students who have more skills
the two groups’ technological skills was found in in various Internet communication technologies
the use of the Internet for communication. This is are more inclined to use the Internet as a medium
an important factor for students when choosing of learning.

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 Student Decision Making in Technology Application

Communication plays an important role in content. The similarities in responses students gave
determining the quality of online learning. Suc- to this issue revealed that regardless of the learn-
cessful online learning requires virtual learning ing environment (online or classroom), students
communities and increased peer interaction (Rovai preferred to use technology as an instructional
et al., 2005). Frequent and immediate communica- aid and communication tool.
tion leads to increased interaction and improves In examining students’ concerns about the use
learning. Because students value peer interaction of the Internet in online or classroom learning en-
and support (Falvo et al., 2004), educators must vironments, analysis of the statistical comparison
utilize various strategies to complement online did not show any significant differences in student
discussion in order to have effective communica- responses. Widespread access to technology and
tion (Ortiz-Rodriguez, Telg, Irani, Grady Roberts, support in using the technology are however cru-
& Rhoades, 2005). Furthermore, Ortiz-Rodriguez cial considerations. Respondents in both groups
et al. found e-mail to be an effective one-on-one were more concerned about technical problems
communication tool and online forums to be good impeding the use of the technology rather than
for group discussion. the effectiveness of the Web to improve academic
The learning environment and delivery format performance. The data reported that students did
are important to consider when making decisions not consider an institution’s role in a course to be
about course enrollment. In this study, students important as long as they were obtaining support
were told to identify some technological factors and services in completing the course. Students
that influenced their decision-making. Overall, were not very concerned about the institution that
students’ selection showed the significance of owned and delivered the course. This finding is
the Internet as a communication tool as the most incongruent with the view of Shin et al. (2004),
influential factor, although they had mixed percep- who found that affiliation with a university does
tions about the value of the Internet as a learning affect student online learning outcomes; a strong,
tool. The mixed perceptions about the instruc- student-university connection was found to lead to
tional value of the Internet could be attributed to positive learning outcomes and a more persistent
past technology experience that involved using online learning presence.
technology as a communication tool rather than a Students considered technology an add-on
learning tool. This experience could have swayed to the content that they are required to learn
students’ perceptions about how the Internet in- in order to graduate. Students voiced concerns
fluenced their decision-making. about developing new technology skills because
The fact that most students selected the avail- technology evolves quickly. This concern could
ability of other courses (item 12) on the Internet have contributed to hesitation on the part of some
as the factor that least influenced decision-making students to adapt to and embrace technology even
supports studies that report undergraduate students though they are aware of its potential. Software and
are less inclined to enroll in distance education hardware are constantly upgraded, and students
courses (Rovai et al., 2005). In this study, meeting are required to keep up to pace with the changes.
the maximum enrollment in the online section This could have diminished students’ abilities to
may have been due to the fact that the classroom develop competency even in basic technologies
section of this course had reached maximum such as word processors.
capacity enrollment. Some people might expect the classroom
Students in both groups were interested in students to have been more concerned about
using the Internet to help in course completion technology application because of the general
rather than as a tool to help them learn the course belief that online students have better techno-

980
Student Decision Making in Technology Application

logical competencies. Though such a premise Though the online students liked the constant
is understandable, the amount of time students communication and flexibility Web-based instruc-
spend online increases the likelihood of techni- tion provides, a danger exists that students may
cal problems, therefore making online students’ lack the discipline and commitment that online
levels of concerns identical to classroom students. distance education requires. Considering that the
Also, the Web was used to supplement classroom majority of the students in this study were young,
learning of traditional students and therefore was the flexibility of the online course had its compli-
not much of a concern. cations. For example, students tended to submit
The lack of significant differences in many assignments late and had difficulty coordinating
of the issues raised among the two groups is the online group interactions and activities, espe-
partly due to the fact that although the online cially when such interactions involved real-time
students completed the course online, they were communication. Distance education requires
also on-campus students and had access to the more self-discipline and planning compared to
same technology resources and facilities as their a classroom environment, where students rely
classroom peers. The course instructor was also heavily on instruction from the teacher.
available for meetings in case individual online Students’ responses revealed that technology
students needed to meet in person. use in a course was not a major issue of concern.
However, the course in which the students are
enrolled can make a difference. Some courses
CONCLUSION require more technology skills than others. In this
study, respondents were enrolled in an instructional
As both groups of students in this study were technology course that involved the development
full-time, on-campus students with access to the of technology skills and technology application in
same technology resources and support, this study curriculum; therefore students’ level of concern
found that students’ perceptions and experiences potentially may have been different compared to
were quite similar. Responses may have differed if they were enrolled in another course that did
if the online group completed the course while not focus on instructional technology. Students in
stationed off campus. The only notable difference this course were aware of the technology skills
between the two groups was that the online group and technical support they were to receive.
did not meet face-to-face with the instructor in Although the participants in this study were
a classroom-learning environment. Significant required to enroll in the online course, many other
differences could be found in many of the items on-campus students nationwide are enrolling in
in the study that addressed factors that influence online distance education courses as a way to
student decision-making and their levels of con- graduate more quickly. Completing an online
cern if the students do not have access to similar course is no longer complicated or overwhelming
resources. Although the subjects in this study were because many students develop technology skills
predominantly undergraduate education students much earlier than in the past, more technology
with similar access to technology resources and training and support is available, and access to
support, many online distance education students online courses delivered by colleges has increased.
are working adults with diverse experiences and However, the use of Internet is not limited to on-
expectations and different levels of technology line distance education as an increasing number
skills and support, and are enrolled in a course of faculty are also incorporating the Internet in
by choice rather than to complete a requirement. their traditional classrooms. No matter how the
technology is applied, the concern is less about

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 Student Decision Making in Technology Application

technology skills and availability and more about Dexter, S., & Riedel, E. (2003). Why improv-
how to incorporate technology as an effective ing pre-service teacher educational technology
instructional tool. In considering use of technol- preparation must go beyond the college’s walls.
ogy, students’ decision-making processes will be Journal of Teacher Education, 54(4), 334–346.
influenced by a combination of several factors, doi:10.1177/0022487103255319
notably how the Internet can facilitate and en-
Falvo, D. A., & Solloway, S. (2004). Constructing
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increasingly becoming popular among traditional
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doi:10.1007/BF02763532
examine how students can concurrently be on-
campus and distance education students in a Lim, C. P., Pek, M. S., & Chai, C. S. (2005).
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Sheard, J., & Lynch, J. (2003). Accommodating Shovein, J., Huston, C., Fox, S., & Damazo, B.
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ments: Imperatives for future developments. ing paradigms: Online learning and emancipatory
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Storey, M. A., Phillips, B., Maczewski, M., &
Shin, N., & Chan, J. (2004). Direct and indirect Wang, M. (2002). Evaluating the usability of
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275–288. doi:10.1111/j.0007-1013.2004.00389.x
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This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 885-890, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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984

Chapter 4.15
Transforming a Pediatrics
Lecture Series to
Online Instruction
Tiffany A. Koszalka
Syracuse University, USA

Bradley Olson
SUNY Upstate Medical University, USA

ABSTRACT hancing the lecture series as it was transformed

into online instruction. Implementation logistics
A major issue facing medical education training are described followed by an overview of the ben-
programs across the USA is the recent advent of efits, barriers, and initial project outcomes. Plans
universal mandatory duty hour limitations and for future enhancements and research projects are
the time pressure it places on formal face-to-face also discussed.
educational sessions. In response to these mandates
and associated issues many medical education
programs are exploring the use of online instruc- INTRODUCTION
tion to address issues of accessibility. This chapter
describes the instructional development process Designing good instruction is predicated on un-
followed to transform a classroom-based pediat- derstanding learning. Effective learning is predi-
rics residency lecture series into an on-demand, cated on accurately defining learning outcomes
video-enhanced, online instructional environ- and providing instructional environments that
ment. An overview of the learning principles support the achievement of learning outcomes.
and instructional sciences that guided the design Both are essential to successful online instruction
process is provided. The phases of the designed (Koszalka, 2007, p. 2).
solution are then described in the context of en- Principles of learning and the instructional
sciences were used to enhance the overall strength
of the pediatrics residency curriculum at SUNY
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch415

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, New Kidney, G., & Puckett, 2003). Thus, instruction
York. In response to the recent advent of universal is thought to be richest and most effective in
mandatory duty hour limitations and the time pres- facilitating deep learning when:
sure it places on formal face-to-face educational
sessions, the entire residency curriculum, consist- • Learners are engaged in solving real-life
ing of a year-long classroom-based lecture series, problems;
was transformed into a blended video-based online • Existing knowledge is activated as a foun-
format supported by application-based classroom dation to new knowledge;
experiences. The online lectures component was • New knowledge is demonstrated to the
not a straight conversion where lectures were learner;
simply videotaped and offered to the residents • When new knowledge is applied by the
through a distance education program, rather the learner;
demand for change was used as an opportunity • When new knowledge is integrated into
to re-evaluate the design of the lecture series and the learner’s world (Merrill, 2000).
apply sound learning and instructional design
principles to enhance the overall residency in- Application of instructional sciences and
structional process. design processes. The instructional sciences
Application of learning principles. Learning inform how activities can be designed to prompt
at its foundation is about change, change in hu- and facilitate required levels of learning that meet
man condition based on experiences. Principles expected outcomes. To design instruction and
of social learning theories posit that learning is learning experiences that apply learning principles
a construction of knowledge based on an indi- successfully an instructional system design (ISD)
vidual’s observations of, and interactions with, process can be undertaken. The process includes:
information and people around them. Learning can (A) analyzing the gap in knowledge (what does
occur both at surface and deep levels depending the learner know and what should they learn), (D)
on how individuals interact with new information. designing an instructional and learning solution,
Surface learning suggests storage and remem- (D) developing the solution based on the design,
brance of information, facts, concepts, principles, (I) implementing and testing the solution, and (E)
and procedures. It often results in recalling basic evaluating the results (Dick, Carey, & Carey, 2005;
information and demonstrating new procedures Smith & Ragan, 2005). An ADDIE approach,
and behaviors, for example. Deep learning, or guided by principles of learning and instruction,
critical thinking, suggests activation of higher is especially important when designing instruction
order thinking. Outcomes of this type of learn- for online applications, as the perceived separation
ing include constructing knowledge to evaluate, of learner and facilitator can be distracting to the
apply, diagnose, problem solve, debate, critique, learner or fail to provide information and social
and other activities that require successfully ad- learning interactions required by the learner.
dressing complex and ill-structured problems, such Distance education of the past was designed
as those encountered by medical professionals. to stand on its own as correspondence courses in
The construction or learning of knowledge at which learners received an instructional packet and
these different levels is supported through different submitted assignments at their own pace. There
types of interactions (instruction) with content and was little or no social interaction with peers or
people that accommodate individual preferences an instructor. Distance education today however
and learning styles of the learner (Akdemir & mostly refers to technology-delivered instruction
Koszalka, In-press; Akdemir & Koszalka, 2005; and learning activities that are designed to provide

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 Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

informational and instructional elements as well of mandatory work hour limitations that restrict
as social learning elements to actively engage residents’ ability to attend standard face-to-face
learners with content, peers, and the instructor lectures series (Higgins, 2006). The curriculum
through digital technologies (Grabowski & Small, analysis that was undertaken also revealed that
1997). The major benefit is posited to be providing the offered lecture series did not cover the neces-
instruction to those who have limitations of time or sary scope of content as outlined by the American
travel (Hawkridge, 1999; Stock-McIssac, 1999). Board of Pediatrics (ABP). As a result of these
Incorporating these interaction elements findings it was decided by Upstate’s Pediatrics
however, comes at a price. Learners in distance departmental administration to take advantage of
education seem to have a wide range of technol- distance education technologies to provide greater
ogy skills and content application knowledge access for the residents to ‘attend’ the lectures and
(Lamb & Smith, 2000). Thus, addressing the address the above noted challenges. Specifically,
needs of such a wide variety of learners can be a there were three gaps the institution has tried to
challenge. Designing for such a diverse audience overcome from the traditional formal didactic
often means incorporating multiple and rich rep- component of the pediatric residency program:
resentations of the same information (e.g., lecture,
readings, learning aides) and providing learners • Lack of overarching design in the core cur-
with multiple ways to interact with content and riculum to cover a defined scope of content.
demonstrate their learning (e.g., discussion boards, • Poor conference attendance due to manda-
online assessment, reflective journaling). Thus, it tory duty hour limitations making lectures
is critical when converting from classroom-based increasingly inaccessible.
instruction to online delivery that instructional • Lacked meaningful learning objectives
materials and learning activities be well integrated and measures of knowledge acquisition in
and aligned with expected learning outcomes, core lecture curriculum.
e.g., surface recall or knowledge application in
problem solving. The previous core face-to-face lecture curricu-
lum consisted of a 50-minutes didactic conference
series offered 3 days per week. At the end of the
THE PROBLEM WITH THE CURRENT academic year the same series was repeated with
RESIDENCY CLASSROOM-BASED the assumption that any missed lectures would be
CURRICULUM AT SUNY UPSTATE attended the next year by the resident as needed.
The 120+ annual lectures in this face to face lec-
Prompted in part by a recent citation for poor ture series were organized and presented monthly
resident attendance at the pediatric core conference according to the identified clinical domains. See
(classroom lecture) series a curriculum reform Table 1. It is important to note that missing from
effort was undertaken at SUNY Upstate Medi- this list of face-to-face lecture topics are the do-
cal University. As part of this reform an analysis mains of Dermatology, Genetics, Orthopedics and
of the formal didactic educational program was Pharmacology. Because Upstate has limited access
undertaken. This analysis revealed that as a result to content experts in these fields robust face-to-face
of significant clinical responsibilities the 36 pe- lectures in these content domains could not be
diatric residents could only attend approximately delivered. However, with the development of the
30-40% of the offered lectures. This attendance online curriculum content experts could be recruited
situation has recently been made worse across the to cover these domains so that our online curriculum
country in medical education with the introduction covers a proper and expected scope of content.

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Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

Table 1. Pediatrics residency curriculum listing clinical domains

Clinical domain *New

Domains Topics covered in clinical domain
Adolescent Med. Adolescent History; Adolescent Physical Exam; Eating Disorders; Depression
Cardiology
Developmental Peds. Patterns of Development & Disability; Spinal Dysraphism; Disorders of
Communication & the Autistic Spectrum Disorders; Disorders of Language, Learning & Cog-
nition; Diagnosis and Treatment of ADHD; Cerebral Palsy; Parent Partners in Health Educa-
tion: Introduction; Parent Partners in Health Education: Communication; Parent Partners in
Health Education: Educational Advocacy
Dermatology X Principles of Atopic Dermatitis; Acne; Newborn Skin
Emergency Med.
Endocrinology Type 1 Diabetes; Type 2 Diabetes; Diabetic Ketoacidosis (DKA); Hyperthyroidism; Acquired
Hypothyroidism; Congenital Hypothyroidism; Short Stature; Delayed Puberty; Precocious
Puberty
Gastroenterology Vomiting; Diarrheal Disorders; Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD); Jaundice (Part
1); Jaundice (Part 2); Gastrointestinal Bleeding; Malabsorption; Abdominal Mass; Refeeding
Syndrome; Celiac Disease
Genetics X Prenatal Diagnosis; Newborn Screening & Metabolic Emergencies;
Chromosomal Abnormalities; Teratogens; Malformations & Deformations;
Common Genetic Syndromes
Hematology/Oncology CBC Interpretation; Coagulation Disorders; Neoplastic Disorders; Pediatric Transfusion
(Indications & Complications)
Infectious Disease Public Health: Prevention of Infectious Diseases; Laboratory Diagnosis of Infectious
Diseases: Bacteriology; Laboratory Diagnosis of Infectious Diseases: Virology; Infectious
Gastroenteritis; Antiviral Therapy; Antibiotic Treatment of Common Respiratory Tract Infec-
tions; Pertussis; Tickborne Diseases; Enterovirus Infections; Respiratory Viral Infections
Intensive Care Med.
Neonatology Term Newborn - Part 1 (The Basics); Neonatal Resuscitation; Apnea, SIDS, and Sleep
Position; Management of Jaundice; Hematologic Problems of the Newborn; Respiratory
Disorders of the Newborn; Neonatal Abstinence & Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
Nephrology Hematuria and Glomerulonephritis; Congenital & Inherited Disorders of the Urinary Tract;
Proteinuria & Nephrotic Syndrome; Normal and Abnormal Renal Function; Urinary Tract
Infection in Children; Hypertension
Neurology
Outpatient Peds Immunizations; Infant and Child Nutrition; Monitoring Growth and Development; Disorders
of the Eye; Childhood Obesity; Child Abuse
Orthopedics X Infections of the Bones & Joints; Disorders of the Hip 2: Perthes and SCFE
Pharmacology X Developmental Pharmacology & Pharmacokinetics; Clinical Implications of Pharmacokinet-
ics
Pulmonology Hypnosis; Cystic Fibrosis - Diagnosis & Pathophysiology; Cystic Fibrosis - Treatment;
Bronchopulmonary Dysplasia; The Wheezing Infant; Allergy & Related Disorders; Urticaria,
Angioedema, Anaphylaxis & Food Allergies; Asthma (etiology, epidemiology & natural
history); Asthma (diagnosis); Asthma (outpatient treatment); Chronic Cough; Breathing
Disorders of Sleep;
Spirometry, Chest X-ray & Blood Gas Analysis
Rheumatology
*Expertise not previously available at Upstate to conduct classroom sessions in these domains

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 Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

The pediatrics faculty consists of 50 physicians domains. Figure 1 provides a view of the online
all of who are content experts, but who have vary- table of contents of the clinical domains (menu
ing degrees of expertise in instructional design on the left) that residents see once logged into the
and no formal training in instructional concepts course. Refer to table 1 for a complete listing of the
or designing online instruction. The lectures that clinical domains and topics covered within each.
they provided were of a similar quality typical of This online pediatric core curriculum is offered
most academic medical institution. The lectures through a commonly used Course Management
however consistently lacked educational objec- System (CMS) called Blackboard. Within each
tives and rarely had measures of knowledge ac- domain folder are the basic learning units that
quisition by which achievement can be assessed. comprise the core content of that knowledge
domain (figure 2). For example in the Genetic
domain topics on prenatal diagnosis, new born
THE PROPOSED PEDIATRIC screening and metabolic emergencies, chromo-
ONLINE CORE CURRICULUM somal abnormalities, etc. are accessible. Within
each of the topics is access to lectures, supporting
In order to address the issues of accessibility slides, reading materials, and short self-assessment
and lack of content scope it was decided by the quizzes.
department’s education committee to develop an By clicking on one of the learning topic fold-
online core curriculum that covers the full scope ers (e.g., Prenatal Diagnosis) inside the clinical
of content outlined by the American Board of domain (Genetics) the basic architecture of each
Pediatrics Blueprint Document (ABP 2006). The learning unit is revealed. This structure has been
ABP outlines the content that is tested by the kept intentionally simple and consistent across
national board certifying examination. domains to avoid interface complexity (Grunwald
The Associate Program Director for Resident 2006). In designing online learning environments
Education at Upstate took the lead in develop- it is desirable to keep the basic architecture
ing the pediatric online core curriculum. This simple so that learners will quickly learn to
core curriculum now consists of approximately navigate their way around the site without wast-
130 learning units divided into 20 basic clinical ing time and effort learning complex linking and

Figure 1. Main menu of pediatric core curriculum at Upstate Medical University

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Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

Figure 2. Learning unit architecture and navigation

technology strategies. This way the learner dedi- advantage of being able to start and stop a video
cates a majority of his or her cognitive efforts lecture at any time. They can also skip forward
towards learning the content rather than navigat- and backward within a lecture to review points
ing a complex interface. A common mistake often that they recall from a previous viewing, supple-
found in the design of online learning environ- mental reading or quizzing materials, or from
ments is to use features of the technology simply outside experiences. As mentioned previously
because they are available (Gilbert & Moore, the learners may also download the PowerPoint
1998; Kidney & Puckett, 2003; Koszalka & Ga- presentations and review them without the video.
nesan, 2004). Non-purposive - not explicitly re- The overall design of the online core curricu-
lated to a specified learning outcome - use of lum provides the residents with flexibility to re-
technical features can inhibit learning (Kersley, view required content domains and topics when
1997; Koszalka & Ganesan, 2004). Thus a con- they have time and access. To help them develop
sistent and easy to follow technical infrastructure deeper understanding of the content the lectures
is recommended. and presentation notes are supplemented with
The basic architecture of each learning unit learning objectives, focused reading materials,
in the pediatric core curriculum consists of four and self-check quizzes. Although provided as a
components: a video lecture that highlights the self-paced, anytime-anywhere accessible format,
essential points of the learning unit, a printable the delivery of the content online has also pro-
copy of the lecture slides, a review article that vided opportunities for the university to revise
serves as a summary document of the essential the format of classroom sessions.
material, and a quiz that assesses the learners’ The in class session are now more focused on
acquisition of the content material. The video case-based discussions that engage the residents
lecture is integrated with synchronized PowerPoint in applying information from the online lectures
slides to effectively present of the topic content. and activities. Thus, residents are now engaged
See figure 3. This component mimics face-to-face in surface and deep learning activities during all
lecture with the exception that learners have the aspects of the new curriculum with a focus on

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 Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

Figure 3. Sample video and synchronized PowerPoint topic lecture

discussion, application, and case-based social identified and learners were able to achieve ex-
learning activities during classroom sessions. pected outcomes. The following is a description
of each of the phases conducted during the de-
velopment of Upstate’s pediatric online residency
IMPLEMENTATION: PROCESS, core curriculum.
BENEFITS, CHALLENGES, Analysis Phase. The initial step in the cur-
AND INITIAL RESULTS riculum reform efforts involved analysis of the
curriculum content, learners, and environmental
The pediatric online core curriculum is the result factors to define the instructional problem and
of a two-year educational reform effort that em- scope of this project. As in any system, the educa-
ployed learning theory and the ADDIE model of tional systems is made up of multiple stakehold-
Instructional development. This model involved ers (e.g., administrators, educators and learners)
the analysis, design, development, implementa- who may have differing opinions of the problem
tion, and evaluation of an instructional solution to and different ideas of problem causes and what
Upstate’s pediatrics residency education program the next steps should be in reforming the current
challenges of non-attendance in lecture series, system. Lacking a common understanding of
gaps in presented content domains, and weak/ the problem will make it difficult, if not impos-
non-existent learning assessment approaches. This sible to reach consensus on possible solutions.
stepwise systems-based approach for designing Thus, the analysis phase is critical in identifying
and implementing instructional solutions involved gaps in knowledge and skills, describing the key
analyzing instructional problems followed by problems (gap between current knowledge and
designing solution that address identified learning expected knowledge), articulating causes of the
and instructional problems. Once the solution was gaps, and suggesting potential instructional and
designed instructional materials were developed learning solutions.
and the instruction was implemented and tested. The steps to perform a gap analysis primarily
Through out this process both the instructional involve collecting a variety of data from key of
product and the process were evaluated to verify stakeholders and the instructional and practice
that the product addressed the problem originally environments. Questions that are addressed to

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Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

stakeholders should be designed to elicit informa- • There were no clearly defined learning
tion from their perspective on current practices, objectives for each of the lectures in the
ideal practices, problems (gaps) faced by the core series and consequently no measure
educational organization, potential causes of of whether our learners had achieved those
identified problems, and potential solutions. The objectives.
data collection methods that Upstate used included
the following: Once these gaps were clearly defined it was
a relatively straightforward process to gain the
• External review of our educational pro- acceptance of the faculty on an online curriculum
gram by a nationally recognized pediatric that accomplished the following three goals.
educator and leader.
• Telephone interviews of 10 former pediat- • Create a designed curriculum that covers a
ric residents (5 in practice/5 in fellowship) defined scope (i.e. the American Board of
concerning their perceived strengths and Pediatrics blue print document).
weaknesses after having completed train- • Create a lecture series that is accessible to
ing at our institution. the residents when and where they need it.
• Survey of all department chairs about their • Develop learning objectives for the core
perceived educational needs within their lecture series that covers the scope de-
departments. scribed above and provides learners with
• Analysis of an external governing agency’s ways to check that they have achieved the
review of our educational program. objectives.
• Focus group discussions with current resi-
dents, faculty and the education commit- This proposal was presented to the faculty dur-
tee about each group’s perceptions of the ing a 3-hour workshop dedicated, in large part, to
strengths and weaknesses of the education- launching the online curriculum. The response of
al program. the faculty was overwhelmingly positive to this
project proposal as they were able to easily see the
The results of this data collection method were gaps and follow the rational for a proposed solution
analyzed in order to clearly define the gaps faced that would be helpful in closing identified gaps.
by the educational program from the perspective Design Phase. The chief step in the design
of the various stakeholders. These gaps were then phase is to devise an instructional plan that specifi-
synthesized into 3 statements that were easily com- cally addresses the gaps outlined in the analysis
municated and agreed upon by the entire faculty. phase. At Upstate the online curriculum was de-
The gaps that the Upstate pediatric residency signed to address the 3 gaps in access, content, and
program faced were as follows: learning assessment outlined above. In response
to the gap in the content scope of the face-to-face
• The face-to-face core lecture series did curriculum the ABP blueprint document was used
not cover the full scope of content defined to define the scope for the new online core lecture
by the American Board of Pediatrics blue curriculum. The ABP document, revised every
print document. 3 years, keeps up with the advances in medi-
• Lecture attendance was poor (<30-40%) cal knowledge and outlines the material that is
partially because of resident commitments covered by the annual certification examination,
to service obligations and mandatory duty thus is useful in preparing instruction that readies
hour limitations. residents for this exam.

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 Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

A major decision during curriculum design test of knowledge acquisition in the form of an
for delivery with any type of media is to define online quiz. By requiring the faculty to develop
the scope of the curriculum. Critical to these these basic components for each learning unit the
decisions is defining the boundaries of the core development of a more uniform core curriculum
content knowledge that is required within a content focused on the most important aspects of the key
domain. This is only possible in consultation with curricular topics was fostered.
individuals who have sufficient domain expertise Development Phase. The chief task of the
to make appropriate decisions as to what novices development phase was to build the instructional
do and do not need to master within the specific materials that were designed in the previous phase.
domain. If the choices of what to study are left During development of the online curriculum
entirely to the novice scholarly research suggests there were two main tasks to achieve. First the 50
that their learning will be less efficient and they faculty members in the department of pediatrics
will develop feelings of being overwhelmed by were introduced to models and sample templates
the volume of the material to cover (Leff, 2006). of curricular materials in the new instructional
Thus the ABP was helpful in defining content medium, BlackBoard. In order to accomplish this,
updates to the lecture series. prototype lectures were first prototyped and piloted
Thus, Upstate’s approach was to rely on an tested with pediatric residents. Once the pilot
external source (ABP blueprint document) to de- series was developed and implemented residents
fine the boundaries of the overall curriculum. The were surveyed to determine their satisfaction with
project instructional designer partitioned the ABP online pilot curriculum, which was overwhelm-
document and distributed it to the various pediatric ingly positive. This pilot study provided important
divisions with expertise to serve as the outline feedback that was used to enhance the prototype
for the material that they were responsible for prior to sharing with the faculty.
covering in the revised curriculum. This approach After testing the pilot series and obtaining
aborted any discussions/arguments that may have positive feedback a faculty development workshop
occurred between various stakeholders in regards was scheduled that was dedicated to launching the
to content ownership and facilitated the ultimate project to create the online curriculum. During this
timely development of the curriculum material. 3-hour workshop the faculty were introduced to
In order to address the accessibility gap the the pilot series and the user results. The response
solution was to develop the new core curriculum of the faculty to this workshop was quite positive
for an online environment. By doing so the mate- and it proved to be an instrumental step in moving
rial would be accessible to learners anytime and the entire development process forward.
anywhere. It is this accessibility that our learners The second step to the development phase
cited as one of the most appealing aspects about was to partition the ABP blueprint document
the revised pediatric curriculum. among the 19 divisions within the department
Finally, in addressing the 3rd gap, lack of learn- of pediatrics. This task was led by the project
ing objectives or measures of achievement, Upstate instructional designer who is also a board certified
required each of the faculty to include specific pediatrician. Once this document was partitioned
learning objectives in their video presentation and it was distributed to key faculty members within
4-5 multiple choice questions that related specifi- each division who served as section editors. These
cally to those learning objectives and presented individuals partitioned their sections of the ABP
content. Each learning unit was designed with blueprint document and distributed it among their
the same architecture of video lecture, followed individual faculty members to develop their lec-
by core reading material, and ending with self- tures covering the content outlined in their portion

992
Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

of this document. Each followed the guidelines Gantt chart (see Figure 4.), was developed to show
provided during the faculty development work- progress toward an agreed upon project timeline.
shop to revise or create their topic curricular This chart helped to facilitate the coordination of
materials, e.g., lectures, presentation, reading multiple aspects of a project within the timeline
list, and assessment questions. Once topics were and greatly enhanced the communication process
ready a technical development process was con- with the disparate faculty members involved in
ducted to videotape and synchronize the lectures the project.
and presentation slides, upload all instructional The 2nd step in the implementation phase was
materials, create online quizzes, and integrate the to verify that the technical infrastructure (e.g.,
topic into the BlackBoard interface. BlackBoard, video taping and editing suites,) was
Implementation Phase. The chief step of adequately in place and set up to support the
this phase is to implement the educational ma- various aspects of constructing the online cur-
terials that were developed in the previous step. riculum. This included obtaining the technology
At Upstate there were 3 main tasks required to to create video lectures with coordinated Power-
implement the online curriculum. First, it was Point slides that could be embedded in the CMS.
necessary to set up a project timeline to facilitate It also meant designating an individual to serve
communication and logistical management among as the central coordinator in the collection of
the 50 faculty members involved in the process articles & quiz questions for each of the 100+
of generating over 100 lectures. Project manage- lectures.
ment is critical to using limited project resources The 3rd step in the implementation phase was
in a timely manner, like technical development to set up a monitoring process for the learners’
and support personnel and video editing suites. progress through the curriculum. Once an online
A commonly used project management tool, a curriculum is designed and developed the in-

Figure 4. Portion of the core curriculum revision project gantt chart

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 Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

structional designer must decide how to monitor were (i) information on overall user satisfaction
learners’ progress thorough the curriculum. This with the online curriculum and (ii) suggestions that
is largely automated when using a CMS such as the users had for improving the curriculum. The
BlackBoard. However, decisions on what bench- level of satisfaction questions resulted in >90% of
marks will be followed in order to document a the survey respondents rating the pilot curriculum
student’s completion of a curriculum must still as outstanding or very good. Several minor sug-
be made. At Upstate the completion of the online gestions for improvements were provided based
quizzes was used as the marker of the learner’s on the two following open-ended questions:
completion of an individual learning unit. Bench-
marks for the expected number of completed • Please describe any technical difficulties
learning units by the end of each year of training that you experienced with the pilot phase
were identified, published, and distributed to the of the online lecture series.
residents. One additional part of implementation • Please suggest any changes to the online
is to test the instructional program and material lecture series that you would like us to
before final release. This assures that the materials make.
are accessible and working before the audience
begins to engage in the instruction. Suggestions in response to these survey ques-
Evaluation Phase. The final step of the in- tions as well as direct personal feedback from
structional development process is the evaluation participating residents were used to enhance the
phase. Two basic types of evaluation are common final version of the curriculum. Continued data
in such projects: process evaluation (formative) collection of satisfaction with the online curricu-
and outcome evaluation (summative). Process lum will be solicited and analyzed to continually
evaluation asks the questions, “is the project pro- upgrade the online curriculum throughout its life.
gressing according to plan and what enhancements The final (summative) outcome measures were
need to be made before final release?” Outcome designed to gauge whether the online curriculum
evaluation asks the question, “did the instruction effectively addressed the gaps that it was designed
address the gaps it was intended to at the outset?” to address. We queried:
Process evaluation measures for this project
included completion of the total number of lectures • Comparison of the scope of the final cur-
which have been placed into the CMS. Commit- riculum to the ABP blueprint document
ments were obtained from each of the divisions (verifying the final curriculum covers the
on the number of lectures that would be provided full scope of content as outlined by ABP)
to cover their respective domains as outlined in • The overall use rates of the online cur-
the ABP blueprint document. As the curriculum riculum by the residents to verify that we
has continued to be constructed over the past have adequately addressed the issue of
year it has been a simple matter of checking off accessibility.
each of the lectures from a master list once they • Review of uploaded curricular materi-
have been completed and uploaded to the online als to verify that each learning unit has a
course management system. At the time of this statement of the objectives followed by a
writing 90 of the final 130 lectures are complete measurement of the achievement of those
and available to our learners through Blackboard. objectives
One other measure examined as part of the
formative evaluation was the results of a learner The preliminary results of the review of the
satisfaction survey. The two main areas of interest scope of the online curriculum compared to the

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Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

ABP blueprint document reveal that of the nearly technologies emerge. There is also a greater need
90 lectures that have been developed to date, now to develop a better understanding of what
approximately 20% are entirely new lectures affects this new delivery mechanisms is having
on material that was not previously covered in on resident learning and practice in the long-term
our face-to-face curriculum. This is a significant and the relationships between online learning and
improvement over what our program was previ- board scores.
ously providing. When the curriculum is complete
a final analysis will be performed to see if there
are any significant gaps in the scope of content PLANS FOR THE FUTURE:
of the online curriculum compared to the ABP ENHANCEMENTS, RESEARCH,
blueprint document. CONCLUSIONS
The utilization rate that was expected of the
residents and provided to them as a benchmark was In moving forward with this project it will be
a 50% completion by the end of the first year of important to measure the future achievement of
the online curriculum. Our project team has been the learners exposed to this new curriculum on
actively recording and posting the online lectures norm referenced examinations like the American
for the past 8 months so 90% of the curriculum Board of Pediatrics’ certification examination. The
was accessible. The overall use rate of the cur- 3 and 5 year running averages will be followed to
riculum by the residents has been 40%. It is fully see how the new online curriculum effectives the
anticipated that the final use rate, after completing performance of the pediatric residents on exams.
the first year of development, will meet the 50% Other interesting future areas of investigation may
threshold for the curriculum. be to examine the barriers and affordances that
Finally, the online curriculum was reviewed to promote and interfere with the use of online cur-
verify that each learning unit has learning objec- riculum by pediatric residents or the use of new
tives and accompanying measures of achievement. technologies to make the learning engagement
Nearly 100% of the posted curriculum complies more portable and on-demand with new technolo-
with these criteria. Effective communications gies like smartphones. This will be particularly
of requirements, sample templates, and review important to examine, as it appears that E-learning
processes are credited with the nearly perfect and the use of new portable technologies will con-
compliance. tinue to grow in medical education. The needs of
Thus, following a systematic process of users will need to be clearly understood in order
instructional development, ADDIE, with ac- to avoid developing curricula that are ineffective
companying project management checks and and under utilized.
balances, professional development for faculty Following established instructional design
that provided rational for and clear steps toward processes and considering learning principles
curriculum re-form, technical support, and depart- becomes even more important as education shifts
ment buy-in led to the successful development away from face-to-face modes. This work for the
of an enhanced pediatrics online curriculum. Upstate Medical University pediatrics residency
The learning and instructional design principles program was deemed successful based on it ap-
provided a framework that guided the construc- proach to transforming its classroom lecture series
tion of robust and effective instruction that seem to online instruction using instructional design
to be well accepted by residents, the learners. principles and process.
Certainly enhancements will be necessary in the
future as content revisions are suggested and new

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 Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

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Retrieved November 1, 2003, from http://gwis.
Akdemir, O., & Koszalka, T. (Oct 2005). Ex- circ.gwu.edu/~et1/online.html.
pository and discovery learning compared: Their
effects on learning outcomes of online students. Kidney, G., & Puckett, E. (2003). Rediscovering
Presented at Association of Educational Commu- the first principles through online learning. Quar-
nication and Technology 2005 annual conference. terly Review of Distance Education, 4, 203–212.
Orlando, FL. Koszalka, T. (2001). Designing synchronous
Akdemir, O., & Koszalka, T. (in-press). Investigat- distance education: A demonstration project.
ing the relationships among instructional strate- Quarterly Review of Distance Education., 2(4),
gies and learning styles in online environments. 333–346.
Computers and Education. Koszalka, T. (May 2007). The nuts & bolts of
Dick, W., Carey, L., & Carey, J. (2005). The creating an online curriculum: A primer in: prin-
systematic design of instruction- sixth edition. ciples for designing effective online instruction.
Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Presented at the 2007 Pediatric Medicine Confer-
ence. Toronto CA.
Gilbert, L., & Moore, D. (1998). Buidling in-
teractivity in Web courses: Tools for social and Koszalka, T., & Bianco, M. (2001). Reflecting on
instructional interaction. Educational Technology, the instructional design of distance education for
38, 29–35. teachers: Learnings from the instructors. Quarterly
Review of Distance Education., 1(2), 59–70.
Grabowski, B., & Small, R. (1997). Information,
instruction, and learning: A hypermedia perspec- Koszalka, T., & Ganesan, R. (2004). Design-
tive. Performance and Improvement Quarterly, ing Online Courses: A taxonomy to guide
10(1), 156–166. strategic use of features available in course
management systems (CMS) in distance edu-
Grunwald, T., & Crosbie-Massay, C. (2006). cation. Distance Education, 25(2), 243–256.
Guidelines for cognitively efficient multimedia doi:10.1080/0158791042000262111
learning tools: Educational strategies, cognitive
load and interface design. Academic Medicine, Lamb, A., & Smith, J. (2000). Ten facts of life
81, 213–223. doi:10.1097/00001888-200603000- for distance learning courses. TechTrends, 44(1),
00003 12–15. doi:10.1007/BF02818203

Hawkridge, D. (1999). Distance learning: Inter- Leff, B., & Harper, G. M. (2006). The reading
national Comparisons. Performance Improvement habits of medicine clerks at one medical school:
Quarterly, 12(2), 9–20. Frequency, usefulness and difficulties. Aca-
demic Medicine, 81, 489–494. doi:10.1097/01.
Higgins, R., Cavendish, S., & Gregory, R. (2006). ACM.0000222273.90705.a6
Class half-empty? Pre-registration house of-
ficer attendance at weekly teaching sessions: Merrill, M. (1997). Instructional strategies that
Implications for delivering the new Foundation teach. CBT Solutions, 1-11.
Programme curriculum. Medical Education, 40, Merrill, M. D. (2000). First principles of instruc-
877–883. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2929.2006.02549.x tion. Retrieved December 5, 2007, from http://
www.id2.usu.edu/Papers/5FirstPrinciples.PDF.

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Transforming a Pediatrics Lecture Series to Online Instruction

Oliver, R. (1999). Exploring strategies for online Core Curriculum: The core curriculum is the
teaching and learning. Distance Education, 20, agreed upon scope of material that defines the
240–250. doi:10.1080/0158791990200205 significant knowledge that is contained within
a domain like pediatrics. It encompasses what
Olson, B., Koszalka, T., & Touhey, M. (May 2007).
would be reasonably expected for a practicing
The nuts & bolts of creating an online curriculum.
pediatrician to know.
Presented at the 2007 Pediatric Medicine Confer-
Course Management System (CMS): A
ence, Toronto CA.
packaged program that is used for creating, de-
Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., & Zva- livering, and managing online instruction. Often
cek, S. (2003). Teaching and learning at a distance. course management systems include menu and
Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall. template based tools to help developers easily
build content, communication, testing, and other
Smith, P., & Raga, T. (2005). Instructional
types of screens that support teaching and learn-
design-third edition. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley
ing. These systems often also include manage-
& Sons, Inc.
ment functions that support assignment grading,
Stock-McIssac, M. (1999). Distance learning: monitoring learner access, and completing course
The U.S. version. Performance Improvement evaluations. Examples of popular CMS include
Quarterly, 12(2), 21–35. BlackBoard, WebCT, and ANGEL.
E-Learning: Also referred to as online learn-
The American Board of Pediatrics. (2007).
ing, it is the use of internet technologies to deliver
Retrieved May 1, from https://www.abp.org/
a broad array of educational materials.
ABPWebSite/
Instructional Design: Phase with the instruc-
Wittrock, M. (1990). Generative processes of tional systems design process where instruction in
comprehension. Educational Psychologist, 27, planned that is designed to close and instructional
531–541. doi:10.1207/s15326985ep2704_8 gap based on learning theory and instructional
design theory.
Instructional Development: Phase with the
instructional systems design process where in-
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS structional materials and processes are built based
on a blue print developed during a design phase.
American Board of Pediatrics (ABP): The
Instructional Systems Design: Systematic
governing agency that certifies pediatric prac-
process for designing and developing instruction.
titioners within the United States of America.
Generally includes analysis, design, development,
The certification process involves passing a
implementation, and evaluation phases.
norm-referenced examination upon completion
Interface Complexity: A term that describes
of pediatric residency training.
the degree of complexity that a user encounters
American Board of Pediatrics Blueprint
when engaged with a digital medium like a web-
Document: This is a 212-page document that
site. With increasing complexity of the interface
outlines the core content of the American Board
of a webpage, for example, the user required to
of Pediatrics certification exam that is taken upon
dedicate cognitive energy to learning the intrica-
completion of pediatric residency training.
cies of the interface as opposed to the content that
is contained within the website.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Distributed Medical Informatics and E-Health, edited by
Athina A. Lazakidou and Konstantinos M. Siassiakos, pp. 410-424, copyright 2009 by Medical Information Science Reference
(an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.16
A Collaborative Approach for
Online Dementia Care Training
Colla J. MacDonald
University of Ottawa, Canada

Emma J. Stodel
Learning 4 Excellence, Canada

Lynn Casimiro
University of Ottawa, Canada

Lynda Weaver
SCO Health Service, Canada

INTRODUCTION or evidence-based theories. They are then better

positioned to promote social change.
There are several reasons why university-based Furthermore, collaborative projects provide an
researchers and community groups may choose educational opportunity for partners to develop a
to collaborate together on research projects. In- collective consciousness in addressing the issues
volving the end-users of the research data in the at hand (Gallagher, Easterling, & Lodwick, 2003;
research process often motivates them to integrate Karim, 2001; Minkler & Hancock, 2003). The
the results into new policies, procedures, and problem is viewed from multiple perspectives
education programs. Research outcomes therefore as university-based researchers and community
become more relevant to the community members professionals contribute unique strengths and
than would be the case using a more traditional- share research-related responsibilities within the
istic approach to research (Morrison & Lilford, social and cultural dynamics of the partnership
2001; Patton 1997). Community-based partners (Gibbon, 2002). Simultaneously, university-based
fully immerse themselves in a collaborative researchers are able to come to a better understand-
research process as they strive to underpin their ing of the community of interest and its changing
interventions with other complementary concepts realities. The cultural differences of both groups
are acknowledged, and sensitive strategies can
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch416 be collaboratively developed in which the roles

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
A Collaborative Approach for Online Dementia Care Training

and expectations are clearly outlined (Agency ulty of Education at the University of Ottawa who
for Healthcare Research and Quality, 2003). Full was conducting research on e-learning. Together,
advantage can be taken of the knowledge, expe- they agreed that conducting a project involving
riences, and perspectives of professionals in the frontline workers in LTC facilities that addressed
community as they provide input on all aspects this issue would be mutually beneficial. Additional
of the research project. Thus, the research process experts were recruited to join the project, includ-
becomes a collaborative, co-learning, community- ing psychologists as content experts, e-learning
building experience. course developers and pedagogy experts, and
There are obvious benefits to working in col- evaluators experienced in online course evalua-
laboration. However, real collaboration takes time; tion. Six pilot LTC facilities were identified, and
time to engage in meetings, complete accountabil- representatives from each facility were included
ity processes, and resolve problems. The delicate in the research team.
balance between democracy and efficiency can
be compromised when you have to choose be-
tween equal participation and looming deadlines THE ONLINE DEMENTIA CARE
(Stoecker, 2003). Weaver and Cousins (2004) TRAINING PROJECT
described this dilemma as assessing manageability
or having to make a choice between achieving The research group used the Demand-Driven
complete diversity on the researcher-community Learning Model (DDLM) (MacDonald, Stodel,
team and the unwieldiness of working with a Farres, Breithaupt, & Gabriel, 2001, see Figure
large committee. Compromise is often necessary. 1) to guide the design, development, delivery, and
This article describes our experiences using a evaluation of the bilingual dementia care train-
collaborative approach involving university-based ing program. The program was targeted towards
researchers and community professionals—in frontline healthcare providers (registered and
this case, long-term care (LTC) managers, ad- nonregistered) who care for persons experiencing
ministrators, and hospital-based educators and dementia in LTC facilities.
researchers—to create an online dementia care
training program. Conducting the Needs Assessment

As advocated in the DDLM, the first step of the

BACKGROUND project involved identifying the needs of the learn-
ers. The university-based researchers conducted
The Sisters of Charity of Ottawa Health Service three in-depth focus group interviews with seven
(SCOHS) is a corporation with a teaching chronic healthcare providers (prospective learners) and
care hospital and two LTC facilities. Community two site coordinators who would serve as the
professionals at SCOHS recognized that their on-site support persons for the learners during the
healthcare providers were facing challenging implementation of the program. Through the needs
behaviours from persons suffering from dementia, analysis process, community-based stakeholders
which has been known to lead to staff burnout, were able to provide input regarding the design,
distress, and high turnover rates. The community development, and delivery of the dementia care
professionals felt that this problem could be par- training program. The results of the needs analysis
tially ameliorated with staff education through are published elsewhere (MacDonald, Stodel, &
e-learning. They contacted a professor in the Fac- Coulson, 2004).

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Figure 1. The demand-driven learning model (MacDonald, Stodel, Farres, Breithaupt, & Gabriel, 2001)

Designing and Developing which limited the amount of content that could be
the Program included. Thus, content experts were advocating
for the inclusion of a wide range of content, while
The course facilitator, a content expert and psy- other stakeholders wanted to reduce the amount
chogeriatric nurse with no e-learning experience, of content, as they were aware of the limited time
was responsible for putting together the first draft the learners would have to engage in the program.
of the program content and learning activities. To Other issues related to time also affected the
ensure the content was authentic to the community collaborative process. The pedagogy team had
experience, as recommended by the DDLM, the limited time to develop the content and adapt it
course facilitator drew on her experiences work- to an online format, due to deadlines imposed by
ing with frontline personnel who provide care to the funding agency and delays in hiring qualified
individuals with dementia. Once she developed project staff. Once the content was approved, it
the content, the pedagogy team reworked it into was given to the instructional designer to be put
an appropriate format for e-learning. This was a online. The instructional designer developed the
time-consuming process, but one the academics online program using WebCT, the online course
felt strongly about as they were concerned with management system adopted by the University
respecting online pedagogical principles and the of Ottawa. However, the pedagogy team quickly
quality of the online course design. realized that, while having many advantages, this
The pedagogy team encountered competing system limited certain aspects of course design
tensions as they developed the content using a and evaluation. Time constraints and the initial
collaborative approach. Ensuring the content was decision to work with the University of Ottawa’s
comprehensive, another DDLM component, was Centre for E-Learning prevented the research team
difficult to achieve due to time limitations. The from exploring alternatives to WebCT.
content had to be chunked into sections that could The instructional designer questioned the ef-
be completed in 30-minute learning sessions, ficiency of the collaborative process adopted in

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A Collaborative Approach for Online Dementia Care Training

this project. He felt there were too many people had a coordinator whose role was to support the
trying to reach consensus. He postulated the lack learners in their learning and with the technology.
of efficiency was because “the roles of the people These site coordinators were an integral part of
involved were not well-defined.” Similarly, not the pedagogy team.
all stakeholders felt they were heard when they Throughout the delivery of the program, the
contributed expertise. One team member stressed site coordinators met with the pedagogy team for
that learners must be honestly informed about the 30 minutes each week via teleconference. These
time commitment required to participate in this meetings enabled site coordinators to keep track of
project, prior to their consent and participation. the timelines set out for the learners, and allowed
Another found the program hard to navigate, them to provide feedback to the pedagogy team
and suggested changes be made in the online regarding the learners’ experiences and progress
layout. However, despite these warnings, neither with the program. These meetings were instru-
the amount of content was reduced to meet the mental to the success of the program. Because of
learners’ expectations and needs, nor the naviga- the regular feedback from the site coordinators,
tion improved before the program was offered, the pedagogy team was able to address problems
and both were identified as weaknesses of the and concerns that arose in an expedient fashion.
program in the evaluation (MacDonald, Stodel, For example, when it became apparent that the
& Casimiro, 2006). These changes did not occur program required significantly more than two
due to time constraints and/or lack of project hours a week to complete, and that some of the
ownership. Compromise, rather than consensus, learners felt frustrated and overwhelmed, the
became the decision method of choice, especially pedagogy team promptly adapted the program
as the deadlines loomed closer. by reducing the number of required exercises and
A significant factor in the lack of project extending the deadlines to complete the program.
ownership was that the principal investigator A number of site coordinators attested that the
had to leave the project suddenly at the begin- learners immediately felt less pressure once the
ning of the production phase. This temporarily amount of work was reduced.
compromised the project’s leadership. Leadership
is necessary for the smooth running of a project. Evaluating the Program
This leader should bring expertise in optimizing
group functioning, such as defining roles and One of the reasons the community created a
orienting the group towards action. This person partnership with academics was to help develop
should also ensure equality among members and strategies for evaluating the program. The univer-
aim for consensus. sity-based researchers had specific knowledge of
evaluation and online data collection procedures.
Delivering the Program Using the DDLM evaluation tool (MacDonald,
Breithaupt, Stodel, Farres, & Gabriel, 2002) as
The completed program was delivered to 95 a guide, they drafted the evaluation instruments
learners at six sites in three provinces across and invited the pedagogy team to provide input.
Canada. Forty-nine (52%) enrolled in the French As a result, survey questions were added, deleted,
language program, and 46 (48%) enrolled in or modified. This collaborative process resulted
the English language program. Learners were in the development of relevant evaluation tools
expected to spend two hours each week, at their tailored to the needs of learners in LTC facilities.
convenience, reading the content and completing Further, the evaluation team conducted in-depth
the learning activities and evaluations. Each site semistructured interviews in order to obtain a rich

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description of the stakeholders’ experiences with the university-based researchers. This highlights
the program, specifically in terms of the DDLM another benefit of taking a collaborative approach.
components. Interviews were conducted with Writing this article involved a collaborative
ten learners, all six site coordinators, the course effort between three university-based researchers
facilitator, and the instructional designer. Know- and one community member. The collaborative
ing the importance of management buy-in for this approach added to the amount of time necessary to
program to be viable in the future, the pedagogy complete the manuscript, yet it added to the qual-
team also interviewed the higher management of ity and accuracy of the article on several fronts.
the six LTC facilities to gather their impressions of First, both the university- and community-based
the value of the program for their organizations. members’ perspectives were reflected. Second,
The evaluation team conducted, transcribed, perceptions of the process of running the project
and analyzed all the interviews, compiled and were shared and elaborated. Lastly, the workload
analyzed both the quantitative and qualitative data was shared between the authors. In the end, the
(French and English), and wrote the final report process of collaborating in the publication process
(MacDonald & Stodel, 2004). The evaluation was a positive experience in which co-learning
continued to be a collaborative process as both took place, and a stronger article resulted.
community professionals and university-based
researchers were part of the evaluation team.
Moreover, the evaluation team received input FUTURE TRENDS
from the pedagogy team. This decision making
process worked well; the group weighed the The implications and lessons learned from this
importance of outcomes relevant for the learn- research are important to consider when conduct-
ers’ practice—a reality best understood by the ing future research in this area. Although several
community—against the outcomes related to the of the community members were experienced
e-learning experience—a reality best understood at and capable of conducting research and dis-
by the university-based researchers. seminating the findings without the assistance
of the university-based researchers, they felt a
Disseminating Findings partnership with academics would strengthen
their research position in the field of e-learning,
The university-based researchers took the lead and they would gain information on quality e-
role in the dissemination activities. However, learning design. In turn, the academics wished
input received from community members was to apply their knowledge to the healthcare field,
critical to ensure the quality and relevance of the but lacked the intimate knowledge of this group
final products. Input from community members of learners. Consequently, they benefited from
allowed the university-based researchers to create the input of the community members and gained
a PowerPoint presentation and two professional valuable knowledge of the content area (dementia
posters comprising an overview of the project and care) and healthcare culture. Even though the
its findings that could be used by the community university-based researchers had much to gain
to share details of the project at conferences or from the partnership, this project was instigated
in their local healthcare communities. While and led by members of the community.
these individuals may not have had the time or Our experience suggests that taking a collab-
the interest to prepare the presentation material, orative research approach significantly increases
they were able to actively participate in the dis- the amount of time required to complete a project,
semination process by using materials created by though the research team felt it was a worthwhile

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A Collaborative Approach for Online Dementia Care Training

trade-off, given the contributions made by each ill-defined; each of us had a different view of
member. We acknowledge that failure, at times, whom the evaluation team comprised. Further,
to reach consensus and the pressure of timelines one of the pedagogy team members who had
to complete this project by a specific date com- experience in online pedagogy and e-learning
promised the quality of the design. From an e- applications in healthcare felt that her expertise
learning perspective, it is critical that the content was not used as much as it could have been. Not
be developed early in the process. A common only was this a frustrating experience for her, but
fallacy is that once the content is developed, it she also predicted many of the problems reported
can be put online quickly. during program delivery.
Stoecker (2003) suggested that it is an unre- In the end, the project resulted in an educational
alistic expectation that those involved in a col- opportunity for all involved (Minkler & Hancock,
laborative project be equal partners in all aspects 2003). The community of program personnel
of the process. His claim appears to be grounded succeeded in offering a generally well received
in concerns for the time demands on community e-learning program to help healthcare provid-
members. Indeed, as Israel, Schulz, Parker, Becker, ers manage persons with dementia. They also
Allen, and Guzman (2003) have suggested, efforts enhanced their skills for designing, developing,
were made to involve community members in the delivering, and evaluating a successful e-learning
publications resulting from the research process, program by using the DDLM. The university-
but few had the time to do so. Sullivan, Chao, based researchers learned more about healthcare in
Allen, Koné, Pierre-Louie, and Krieger (2003) general, and dementia care specifically, obtained
recommended that communities receive concrete further appreciation for healthcare providers’
benefits in return for their involvement in research needs for learning online, and became aware of the
partnerships, noting that without such tangible values and complexities of collaboration. Further,
benefits, the partnership may not be advantageous the university-based researchers also profited by
to the community. gaining access to data for research purposes.
We also realized how important communica-
tion is to successful collaboration. Working in a
large team means that many relationships need CONCLUSION
to be developed and maintained. In this project,
constructive criticism about the program was In sum, the adoption of a collaborative research
sometimes taken as a personal affront by the indi- approach with a community of professionals is not
vidual responsible for that aspect of the program, only beneficial but also desirable. Collaboration
and hard feelings resulted. This point becomes allowed multiple views, attitudes, and experiences
even more poignant when communication be- to strengthen the program. By describing the
tween members is conducted via e-mail where complexities involved in this process, we reveal
tone, emotion, and other nonverbal cues are lost. both the challenges and achievements inherent in
In the case of this project, misunderstandings in designing a quality online learning event through
communication caused some minor conflicts, but collaboration. Moreover, by addressing some of
effective communication also allowed the rifts to the details involved in this process, we hope that
be resolved. our experiences help others plan collaborative
Clarification of members’ roles at the begin- partnerships with community professionals, and
ning of the project is also critical. In writing this develop collaborative e-learning programs for
article, it emerged that the evaluation team was healthcare providers.

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plinary Evaluation, 1, 19–40.
events. Instructional design is historically ground-
ed in cognitive and behavioural psychology.
Pedagogy: The profession, art, science, theory,
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS principles, or methods of education, instruction,
and teaching.
Collaborative Research Approach: A re- Psychogeriatric Nurse: A nurse whose
search approach that uses the strengths of both practice is focused on older people (usually 65
researchers and community-based practitioners years of age or older) with mental illness and/or
to increase the quality of the research process and cognitive impairment.
the impact of the research outcomes. Web Course Tools (WebCT): An e-learning
Demand-Driven Learning Model: An e- platform and online course management system
learning model that is grounded within a construc- used extensively in colleges, universities, and other
tivist framework and defined by five interrelated educational institutions. WebCT supports online
dimensions that, in concert, create a high-quality tools such as discussion forums, e-mail, live chat,
e-learning experience: superior structure; three and whiteboarding, as well as content in various
consumer demands of content, delivery, and formats (e.g., html documents, Web pages, and
service; and learner outcomes. so on). WebCT recently merged with Blackboard,
E-Learning: Learning that takes place via another leading provider of educational software.
the Internet.

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Healthcare Information Systems, edited by Nilmini Wickramasinghe
and Eliezer Geisler, pp. 224-230, copyright 2008 by Medical Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.17
Gaming and Simulation:
Training, and the Military

Sheila Seitz
Windwalker Corporation, USA

Courtney Uram
James Madison University, USA

ABSTRACT learning domain objectives and the portability of

training. The military, as an early adapter of games
The purpose of this chapter is to provide a brief and simulation, continues to forge the way by
summary of the military’s use of gaming and integrating gaming and simulation, instructional
simulation to accomplish training. Historically, the design, and emerging technologies to achieve the
military has been a forerunner in the exploration ever growing demands of training.
of training techniques that incorporate aspects
of games and simulations. Training tools emerge
in various gaming formats such as simulations, INTRODUCTION
edutainment, commercial-off-the-shelf games
(COTS), and serious games. To develop training Gaming and the military have a long tradition
in the form of games or simulations, elements of together, beginning with the use of toy figures
instructional design must be considered to include within sandbox representations, progressing
learning objectives, game play, and feedback. to complex board games requiring complex
Emerging technologies provide possible solutions analytical skills, and evolving into current use of
to training challenges such as achieving affective sophisticated computer models, gaming engines,
and high definition 3-D graphics to create virtual
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch417 worlds of combat. The military has historically

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Gaming and Simulation

used technology to “maximize the efficiency and History of Gaming in the Military
effectiveness of all their activities, training and
education.” (Fletcher, 2009, p. 72). Current train- Roberts (1976) noted that gaming as training was
ing tools include a wide range of application of “often used to train military officers” (p. 3). Games
technologies. Simulators, sophisticated machines found in the military took many forms and emerged
relying on computational models to mimic the as effective methods for training. Chessboards
actual experience of soldiers, assist to train in vari- acted as terrain maps and chessmen as soldiers.
ous tasks such as driving a truck, steering a ship, Sand tables with miniature models to represent
flying an airplane, or shooting a weapon. Games armies gave leaders the ability to visualize battles
are created to encourage thought and practice in and play out possible scenarios. The Prussians
decision making from simple tasks to more com- instituted the practice of wargaming around 1824,
plex work of war planning. When simulation is with the American military adapting wargaming
combined with elements of gaming, opportunities for training later that century. William McCarty
emerge to encourage effective training with the Little admired the value of wargaming and ensured
unique audience of learners found in the military. that it became a significant part of the curriculum
The military considers each member a life- at the newly established U.S. Naval War College
long learner. This core principle presents many in Rhode Island. (Gray, 1995).
challenges to the development of training and Eventually, terrain maps and wooden blocks
becomes accentuated in the development of games replaced chessboards and chessmen as civiliza-
and simulations. Specifically is the challenge of tion progressed. By World War II, wargaming
reaching today’s military audience of Soldiers, marked an immense turning point for training and
Sailors, Marines, and Airmen; mostly made up of development. War games were something used by
young adult males. (Watkins & Sherk, 2008). They all super powers (Roberts). The simulation that
are members of what is known at the Net Gen, occurred during the game process was treated as
the generation cohort who came of age with the a training technique and evolved into paper based
evolution of the internet and exponential growth of exercises that integrated mathematical algorithms
technology’s role in society. For this military audi- to model elements of warfare such as movement
ence, “Learning is participatory; knowing depends and attrition (Smith, n.d.).
on practice and participation. Digital resources en- During the 1950’s the Rand Corporation used
able experiential learning—something in tune with ideas that emerged during the evolution of simu-
Net Gen preferences. Rather than being told, Net lation training and war gaming to create a board
Geners would rather construct their own learning, game. Building upon their research and the ideas
assembling information, tools, and frameworks of Clark Roberts, the project resulted in:
from a variety of sources.” (Oblinger & Oblinger,
2005). The military has responded with various “the formalization of the playing board with a
methodologies to include games and simulations, gridded overlay to manage movement and engage-
serious games, commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) ments; the use of a Combat Results Table to for-
computer games, and Massive Multiplayer On- malize the results of the battle; the incorporation
line Games (MMOG). This chapter discusses the of terrain types that influence combat activities; a
success and challenges of these methodologies, turn-based play mechanism; and the use of dice to
identifies critical aspects of instructional design add random outcomes to the battle” (Smith, n.d.,).
when developing games for military training, and
suggests emerging technologies be examined as With the onset of the computer age, the abili-
new methodologies in the military training field. ties of wargaming as training grew exponentially.

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A presentation by Hilton G. Weiner at the 35th (Bennett, 1993, Hillestad, Bennett, & Moore,
National Meeting of the Operations Research 1996, and Davis, Bigelow, & McEver 2001). As
Society of America in 1969 (Weiner, 1969), ex- mentioned by Bankes (1991), many of the models
amined the trends of the time in regards to military did not adequately reflect the new requirements
gaming. He likened the games with “confronta- of warfare, a shift from the force on force of the
tional analysis” (p. 1) and identified the ability of Cold War to more of contingency based opera-
computers to advance the technique. Specifically, tions known as Military Operations Other Than
he noted that computers allowed greater detail in War (MOOTW) (Joint Publication 3-07, 1995).
simulation and provided accelerated bookkeeping Yet, the focus of wargaming as a training tech-
skills. These advancements furthered abilities nique remained that of increasing understanding
of time-sharing, multi-agency and standardiza- as opposed to outcome based performance, i.e.
tion. However, he felt that while phenomena of winning the war. (Schwabe, 1994).
warfare such as machines and munitions could Today, games and simulations function as
be captured in the war games, much work was military recruiting tools (Zyda, 2005), educa-
needed to capture the other phenomena of mo- tional learning tools (Gredler, 2004; Gee 2003),
tivation, morale, and miscalculation (p. 5). He and corporate training tools to foster learning in
called for further research in the improvement of professional, corporate, or adult education. As for
understanding the phenomena and increasing the the military specifically, games and simulations
ability to model them. are teaching tools at all levels of education (Ba-
The use of wargaming in training continued to bus, Hodges, & Kjonnerod, 1997). Collective and
evolve throughout the 1970s and at the beginning individual training designs benefit from the critical
of the 1980’s, an emphasis was placed on combin- thinking and flexibility encouraged by games and
ing the best features of war gaming and analytic simulations. These learning tools address many
modeling to build strategic analysis for existing objectives: rehearsing behaviors, teaching skills to
threats of nuclear warfare. Building upon RAND’s troops, and assisting policy makers in evaluating,
expertise in these areas, the US Defense Depart- identifying, and improving protocol.
ment supported the efforts of the Rand Strategy Current regulations within the military identify
Assessment Center (RASC) which guided much distributed learning as a key to facilitating con-
of the research and advancement in the area of tinuing education programs (AR 370-1, 2007).
training and war gaming throughout the decade. Included within distributed learning are various
(Davis & Winnefeld, 1983). Davis (1986) called forms of gaming and simulation described as in-
for the need to create computer programs that were teractive multimedia instruction, computer aided
transparent yet able to explain the decision that instruction, simulation, and interactive training
occurred during the simulations of wargaming. technology (including stand-alone and on-line
While much advancement was made with the now games.) Training commands are encouraged to le-
familiar Red and Blue Agents programs (Schwabe verage “distributed–learning concepts, when cost
& Wilson, 1990), the end of the decade and the efficient and effective training will result.” (p.15)
Cold War would bring new demands to the field. The military possesses a rich history of train-
Throughout the 1990’s, investigators of ing and education to draw upon as it continues to
wargaming as a training technique recognized in develop and implement games and simulations as
numerous studies the need to advance the models viable training tools. Central to this effort is the
driving the artificial intelligence with the computer ability to consider the learner, more specifically
programs and increase the ability to share data the range of learners that exist in the military, when
across those institutions engaged in the field. designing games and simulations for training.

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As noted by Klopfer, Osterweil,& Salen (2009): software.” (Federation of American Scientists,

“Lastly, it is important to acknowledge that games 2006; Zyda, 2005). The primary difference, when
and learning has a history that predates the advent considering military applications, may be found
of modern video games…This history has taught in the purpose or application of the game.
us several important things, not the least of which While it is important to understand that games
is that players determine how they learn.” (p.8). and simulations differ in many aspects; they often
share an important commonality. Each works
Range of Gaming within Training to foster experiential learning (Gredler, 1996).
Within this model of learning, elements such as
The study of gaming within the military is some- reflection and debriefing are significant (Thatcher,
what confounded by the wide range of definitions 1990; Kriz, 2003). If the context of the game or
that exist to explain what is and is not consider simulation is primarily to construct a story whose
a game. As noted by Klopfer, Osterweil, and intent for learning is to encourage game play for
Salen (2009), “…perceptions of what games are entertainment, it remains a game albeit with learn-
(are or aren’t) continue to cast a heavy shadow ing requirements. The game may employ experi-
over the games and learning space.” (p.7). The ential learning as an element, perhaps a motivator.
range of games considered for training, to in- However, the game would not be classified as an
clude occurrences within the military, are games, “instructional game”. According to Tennyson and
simulations, serious games, COTS games, and Jorczak (2009), “Instructional games have specific
massive multiplayer online games (MMOGs) . learning outcomes as primary goals.” (p. 5).
Perhaps the best approach in examining games A helpful comparison of games and simula-
within military training is suggested by Caspian tion within the military is found with America’s
Learning (2008), “…it is more useful to look at Army and DARWARS Ambush. America’s Army
the general literature placing these terms in their is a game that was developed specifically for the
cultural context.” (p. 14). purpose of recruiting new soldiers by the U.S.
Army. The game takes the form of a first person
Games and Simulations shooting perspective and role plays the life of
a soldier. While some military units have used
Games and simulations have unique characteristics the game for training, its primary purpose and
that differentiate them from each other (Kirkley design is to attract young men who enjoy gaming
& Kirkley, 2004; Prensky, 2001; Ricci, Salas, & and may gain an interest in the U.S. Army while
Cannon-Bowers, 1996). Games are defined by playing. DARWARS Ambush is a simulation game
Gredler (2004) as “competitive exercises in which that simulates a vehicular movement (patrol)
the objective is to win and players must apply sub- within a combat environment. The purpose of
ject matter or other relevant knowledge” (p. 571). simulation is to train multiple people within an
Simulations conversely are “open-ended evolving immersive environment how to react to possible
situations with many interacting variables” (p. ambushes when part of a vehicular patrol. While
571). Understanding games paves the pathway DARWARS Ambush evolved from a stand-alone,
for recognizing the structures, standards, and single player simulation to the current version of
techniques found in simulations (Aldrich, 2004). an immersive environment that changes based on
Mike Zyda, a professor of gaming at the University lessons from the actual combat environment and
of Southern California and a key contributor to involves multiple players, its primary training
the successful game, America’s Army, explains purpose persists.
that, “The definition of games is story, art and

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The military’s success with games and simu- outside of the goals, such as analytical analysis,
lations may be found in the wide variety and recruiting, and doctrine development. However,
continuous adaptations that are applied as train- more research is needed to determine what learn-
ing needs increase and diversify. At the National ing outcomes can be systematically achieved by
Defense University, gaming and simulation have the use of individual and multiplayer games to
been combined to create learning environments train adult participants in acquiring knowledge
which foster analytic skills and enable the pro- and skills while sustaining the ability of games to
cess of concept validation leading to doctrine provide intense and engaging experiences (O’Neil
development. (Joint Forces Quarterly, 2009). To & Perez, 2009).
do so, one must consider that, “useful analyti-
cal environment in which to identify and weigh Serious Games
policy options and needs is the goal of good
game design. (McCown, 2005). Flexibility and When applied in a non-entertainment realm, gam-
adaptability can be found in projects such as the ing and simulation technology results in serious
development of various leadership games noted games (Zyda, 2005). According to Susi, Johannes-
in the work of Iuppa and Borst (2007). During son, and Backlund (2007), the term serious games
these projects, developers experimented with the have been defined, but no true definition of what
balance of computer modeling for simulation and it actually is exists. Taken as a whole, Susi, Johan-
the interplay of human actors with virtual avatars nesson, and Backlund’s (2007) interpretation of
to achieve training objectives. Over time, they serious games from present research is defined as
found what worked and did not work was based “digital games used for purposes other than mere
on its appropriateness toward implementing the entertainment” (p. 2). Serious games emerged
training objective. from research within the military training field.
Challenges with games and simulations are Observing great potential for other occupational
most exemplified in selection of the appropriate training, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation funded
instructional delivery to meet the training objec- the Serious Games Initiative (www.seriousgames.
tive. Choosing an advanced technological tool com). Serious Games “…are characterized by
simply because it is available does not guarantee their specificity and applicability for particular
effective training. Investigations into simulators work-related purposes.” (Klopfer, Osterweil,&
(computer generated environments to replicate Salen, 2009, p.21).
the actual skill which the learner must perform) The 1980’s decade marked the time when
supports this; as Yardley (2003) states that in train- serious games, which often take the form of
ing, one must consider if the technology is, “… simulations and games in electronic formats,
appropriate for increasing the use of simulation were used throughout the military (BinSubaih,
and strategies for purchasing and implementing Maddock & Romano, 2009). As described earlier,
simulators.” This finding emerged as he studied the these electronic wargaming formats would use
Navy’s desire to balance training which normally computer modeling and data capabilities to create
occurred at sea with the possibilities of what could simulation centers where soldiers would gather
be done while ships are in port. to analyze and fight wars against the computer.
DARWARS and America’s Army are moti- The goal was a performance oriented outcome
vating examples of the diverse goals which can where the decisions were analyzed and evaluated
be achieved through games and simulation. The rather than simply trying to “beat” the computer.
military continues to lead the way in developing As computing ability grew, so did the complex-
the possibilities both within training goals and

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Gaming and Simulation

ity and effectiveness of these serious games to intelligence model. The participants expressed the
achieve training. need for feedback from a human instructor vital
Not until 2002 were serious games recognized to their learning. Continuing to improve models
by other organizations. The Serious Games Initia- and consolidative representation, especially in
tive furthered interest in serious games beyond the such a dynamic combat situation, is one goal of
military. This form of gaming was distinguished by the Modeling and Simulation Center Information
its purpose “to train people for tasks in particular Analysis Center (Henninger, 2009).
job”. (Klopfer, Osterweil,& Salen, 2009) The Also of interest was the finding that although
serious game industry, described as flexible and the participants were of the digital native genera-
adaptable, has developed into a $20 million dollar tion, not all found the technology to be intuitive
market (Van Eck, 2006). The military invests most or familiar. (Beal, 2006). Ensuring a serious game
heavily in the serious games market. (BinSubaih, is navigable without interfering with learning is
Maddock & Romano, 2009). an important task of the developer. As pointed
Serious games cover a wide range of training out throughout this chapter, stating clear training
opportunities for the military. These include: objectives for the games was critical.
tactical experience, ambush, rifle range, foreign Given the high cost of creating in-person train-
language and culture, leadership, post traumatic ing to address the skills at the center of serious
stress disorder and obstacle courses (BinSubaih, games objectives, makes this genre of game a
Maddock & Romano, 2009). Sawyer and Smith center piece for further research and investiga-
(2008) created a taxonomy to capture the range and tion. As computing ability allows the fidelity
application of current serious games development of the experience to increase, it cannot be con-
efforts. Within the taxonomy, military training sidered a panacea for all training. However, its
is identified as “defense” and examples such as effectiveness and potential justify development
games for health (rehabilitation and wellness) and to continue, especially as training budgets are
games for training (solider support) are recognized. high visible targets both in military and corporate
One example of a serious game endeavor by the budget scenarios. The military’s contribution to
military that models the type of electronic games serious games is significant; yet the influence of
commercial and civilian entities are interested in is the military within body of research for serious
that of games developed for dismounted infantry games and training must be acknowledged and
leaders. (Beal, 2006). The project included three addressed. National education and workforce
games to teach leadership skills at different orga- development goals may differ, generating more
nizational levels experienced by infantry leaders. varied requirements from research. (Federation
Successes of these serious games included the of American Scientists, 2006).
ability to represent realism and fidelity to the
actual combat environment due in large part to Commercial-Off-The-
the involvement of subject matter experts early Shelf (COTS) Games
on and throughout the development of the games.
The learners also valued the opportunity to learn Current markets of COTS games include a plethora
desired leadership skills; the findings found this of titles that carry a military theme. A small sample
factor to be more important than ensuring the of these games include: Call of Duty, Close Com-
games were fun and entertaining. bat: First to Fight, and Full Spectrum Warrior.
Challenges in implementing these serious Because these titles are COTS, it is safe to assume
games involved capturing feedback for a high the primary purpose of their development was
level of required cognitive skills in an artificial not training but rather entertainment. However,

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the military’s National Simulation Center at Fort no effective instructional measure or support is
Leavenworth, Kansas, endorses the use of these added.” The communities these authors refer to are
games as training tools, validating their potential the developers of games and simulation for training
in preparing soldiers for combat situations. In their and adult education purposes. While few would
publication, Commander’s Guide to Games for dispute that learning occurs while gaming, the
Training, (2006), it is noted, “Games can provide challenge for adapting COTS for military training
an alternative training environment at a lower is in achieving the specificity of the learning goal
cost. The tradeoff is a reduction in fidelity.” (p.5). and the requirement to measure training effects to
The success of COTS development can be justify critical resources. Other challenges such as
partially attributed to the investment of the en- licensing fees and use of appropriate technologies
tertainment industry in the wargame genre. As to achieve training also exist.
noted by Macedonia (2000), “The military cannot To balance the evident worthiness of COTS
afford to ignore advances in industry, where the for training with the need to ensure the targeted
graphics systems for game consoles and personal learning is achieved within training, it would be
computers have nearly doubled their performance helpful for future training developers to provide
every nine months for the last five years.” While policy and guidelines in this area, “Subject to the
the fidelity, which is the ability of training to evaluation and trialing of games, the policies and
recreate the actual environment where the task practices for the effective use of games must be
must be performed such as the war zone for the produced.” (Ford, Barlow & Lewis, n.d.)
military, is decreased by moving from a realistic
environment to a virtual world, the savings in Massive Multiplayer Online
terms of both fiscal and time cannot be ignored. Games (MMOGs)
Another element contributing to the success
of COTS in military training is that of providing Massive multiplayer online games (MMOGs) are
a training environment familiar to the target audi- another type of gaming medium the military is
ence. (Ford, Barlow & Lewis, n.d.). Many soldiers exploring. MMOGs offer collaboration and shar-
today grew up alongside the internet and are quite ing of knowledge, skills, and values with other
comfortable using the technology for the purpose players both inside and outside of the game (Gee,
of learning. COTS provide a motivating environ- 2003). MMOGs encourage individuals to think as
ment through its natural design of engagement. If a team and “make soldiers to think critically about
soldiers are aware of the training purposes with their surroundings and enhance their situational
COTS, they may overcome the outcome based awareness” (Curtis, Thomas & Ritter, 2008).
orientation (play to win) and focus on the feedback In their attempt to create elements of military
given by the game to grow in understanding of training that address changing tactics of asym-
their personal skill development. metric threats, Fu and et.al (2007) investigated
The primary challenge in using COTS as a the use of MMOGs in developing and distributing
training tool is achieving the goals of training. training demonstrations. While training demon-
“COTS gaming systems do not generally have strations exist in many forms to address different
the assessment components that are critical for objectives, Fu, et.al, focused on 2-D animated
effective training.” Hussain and Ferguson, (2005). representations with the intent to achieve proce-
This finding is shared by O’Neill and Perez (2009), dural knowledge objectives. They used MMOG
“There is general consensus in our community in the development of the demonstration, seeking
that learning with interactive environments, such synchronous feedback from soldiers currently
as games and simulations, is not effective when implementing tactics in the war zone who pro-

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vided current and relative data. The format of a Key Factors when Implementing
2-D animated representation provided a familiar Games as Training
training format for the target audience of soldiers.
While the training demonstration did not attempt Objectives
to achieve all training requirements, it proved
worthy of development to provide one type of The first task in designing games for training
training tool within a toolkit of training sources. is to ask, “What task(s) do I want the learner to
Challenges with MMOGs and use in mili- perform after completing this training?” This is
tary training include security, cost, synchronous especially relevant for military training: “Clearly
participation and connectivity of the technology. defined training objectives are critical to training
Because applications of MMOGs involve real effectiveness. Training game developers should
time interactions between avatars driven by actual define specific training objectives before software
soldiers, knowledge exchanged should be shielded development begins.” (Beal, 2006).
from possible enemy actors. This requires similar In their study of military training, Fletcher and
security measures used with existing military Chatalier (2000) clarify the role of objectives:
networks; the unique requirement of 2-D virtual “Training objectives are most often expressed
world representations further implicates current in terms of what students can do (skills), what
challenges in this area. (Axe, 2008). While signifi- they must know (knowledge), and/or the attitudes
cant cost savings can be realized with MMOGs by they must possess after they finish the instruc-
reducing the logistical requirements of bringing tion. In training, the objectives can be derived
soldiers and equipment together to train, the cost directly from the skills and knowledge required
to develop realistic virtual representations must be to perform a job. In the absence of these objec-
carefully managed. The success of using MMOGs tives, relevant, systematic design, development,
in the development of the training demonstration implementation, and evaluation of the instruction
relied on synchronous participation of soldiers. is unlikely”. (p.14).
Saving logistical costs in moving soldiers to a By nature, objectives must be measurable.
central place to train and away from the war zone Within a gaming context, determining if low level
is one advantage of MMOGs application; how- cognitive skills such as knowledge or comprehen-
ever, bandwidth and connectivity have persisted sion are achieved is a simple task. Multiple gaming
throughout the current decade as challenges for the elements have been created to move game play
military. The advantage of MMOGs may be lost to along by requiring the measurement of learn-
the lack of connectivity and bandwidth required. ing and provide designers many options. While
Despite these challenges, the benefits of developed for game play, these elements prove
MMOGs and the possibilities in developing useful in evaluating learning. Simulation training
future training remain worthwhile. As noted in designers have developed strategies allowing the
a research study of wargaming and distributed measurement of higher level cognitive skills such
learning (Van der Hulst, Muller, & Roos, 2008), as analysis and synthesis.
“…decision making can only be mastered by However, measuring affective skills such as
repeating the task as many times as possible in motivation and attitudinal change is much more
a controlled yet relevant reality, combined with difficult. One strategy is to integrate decision
intensive reflection upon one’s own performance.” points within the training and record the action
MMOGs demonstrate promise in providing train- of the learner. Choices are aligned to objectives
ing avenues of relevant reality and the ability to and measure whether the desired outcome is met.
access reflection and feedback. Yet, this is only one strategy; if more games are

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 Gaming and Simulation

to be developed for training purposes, designers serious games, most applications of games and
will need multiple approaches to achieve any simulations within the military motivate the user
affective behavioral goals. Writing measurable, by providing the expected training within the
sound objectives to attain affective performance experience of playing the game. While studying
learning goals continues to be a significant factor cadets who played a COTS game for training
to creating successful training tools. purposes, researchers reported that, “We found
that leaders who are serious about using games
Game Play for training want to use them to learn leader tasks
and skills; they are less motivated to use them for
A key characteristic of games is often referred fun.” (Beal, 2006, p.8).
to as “game play”. Rollings and Adams (2003) The challenge for developers of military
define game play as, “one or more causally linked training games becomes in implementing game
series of challenges in a simulated environment.” play within instructional design of a game whose
Associated with this description are terms such purpose is training. If successfully accomplished,
as: competition, story, and reward. Game play this can increase learner motivation with a posi-
provides a strong link between games and learn- tive effect in meeting performance outcomes. The
ing. “The promise of games is that we can har- developer’s challenge is to work with instructional
ness the spirit of play to enable players to build designers to integrate elements of game play
new cognitive structures and ideas of substance.” that create desired effects of motivation without
(Klopfer, Osterweil,& Salen, 2009). interfering or distracting from the training goals
Yet, the goal to build cognitive structures is of the game.
not always the game developer’s goal. This is Iuppa and Borst (2007), in developing story
where design goals for games that are to be used in based simulation for the military, identified ele-
military training differ from those of commercial ments of game play that can assist in achieving
game developers. Commercial games are primarily training goals. These include: navigation (allowing
concerned with game play and interweave learning the learner to move around within the game and
and game play to motivate the user to continue. A create a “sense of agency”); purpose (if the learner
fine balance between failure, which is expected, understands purpose of game play then becomes
and advancing forward, which is desired, is often motivated to participate in the simulation); and
described as key to a successful commercial game: competition (which can be with other people or
“The secret of a videogame as a teaching factors such as a clock). The authors also state
machine isn’t its immersive 3-D graphics, but that narratives “afford the opportunity for learners
its underlying architecture. Each level dances to acquire tacit knowledge and leadership skills
around the outer limits of the player’s abilities, through anecdotes.” (p.60)
seeking at every point to be hard enough to be
just doable. In cognitive science, this is referred Feedback
to as the regime of competence principle, which
results in a feeling of simultaneous pleasure and In order to achieve the balance of game play
frustration--a sensation as familiar to gamers as (failure and success); the game design must be
sore thumbs.” Gee (2008, p.67). able to prevent the player from experiencing too
Games designed for military training may much failure. Various types of feedback exist for
engage in the interweaving of learning and game this function, the most predominant tool being
play, however, the primary purpose of training game hints or clues. While these tools occur in a
drives design not game play. As mentioned with subtle manner (between scene transitions or as an

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Gaming and Simulation

optional navigational button), they become criti- this virtual world, objectives translate to behav-
cal in assisting the player to advance within the ioral goals.” (p.5).
game. The player thus learns through feedback. To link these critical elements of objectives and
Instructional design principles for adults state feedback, a variety of game play tools have been
the importance of feedback within effective train- created to target specific aspects of learning. De-
ing. Lieb (1991) noted that adult learners often velopers at Virtual Heroes are focusing on integrat-
require specific knowledge, or feedback, regarding ing biofeedback data to learners while they engage
their learning to meet training objectives. The most in a simulation (2008). This technique is similar to
common form of feedback is to provide correct an athlete that might monitor their heart rate while
answers to exam questions. Other techniques exercising, adjusting their actions in accordance
include visual clues that represent the correct with their goals. Another technique found in the
information and compare against the information simulations that Iuppa and Borst (2007) describe
the learner generated. In analyzing the feedback, simply provides text based feedback to the player
the learner comes to understand the knowledge based on the decision they made during the game
and can apply it within the training task. play. The feedback includes whether the decision
Many leaders in the military find that a key was correct or not, a review of the decision made,
to the success of military training is the inclu- and an explanation of how the decision is related
sion of feedback to the soldiers during and after to the desired training objective. These examples
a training event. The feedback is provided in a model the spectrum of technology within games
formal process known as the After Action Review that can be implemented to provide feedback, an
(AAR). Unique to this process is that the soldiers essential element of effective training.
generate the critique of the learning themselves,
facilitated by the instructor or observer as opposed Emerging Technologies
to the instructor or observer solely providing com- and Military Training
ments. Research has documented the difficulty
in integrating feedback, “Modeling the human As the military continues to develop the use of
cognitive skills required for effective feedback games and simulations to meet their training mis-
during mission execution and critical thinking sion, challenges continue to arise. Two specific
during after-action reviews has proven very dif- challenges that appear to persist are: (1) achieving
ficult…to incorporate into stand-alone training affective domain objectives and (2) portability. In
games.” (Beal, 2006, p.8) searching for solutions, an examination of emerg-
Since many games and simulations are imple- ing technologies is useful.
mented without instructors or facilitators, it is
important design the game or simulation to include Achieving Affective Domain Objectives
AARs. According to software developers, Virtual
Heroes (2008): One key to effective training mentioned in this
“These data points (AAR) accomplish several chapter is to identify measurable objectives, to
critical goals. First, they ensure congruity between include those for the affective domain. Tradition-
instructional and game design; learning objec- ally these objectives would measure learners’
tives are now measureable outcomes. Second, motivation, attitude, values, and other affective
AARs translates to clear return on investment descriptors with instruments such as question-
for organizations who select learning based game naires, surveys, or indicator instruments. Training
products. Third and arguably most importantly, in that centers around affective domain objectives
may rely on intangible actions such as the informal

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learning that occurs when learners communicate The challenges of implementing such a social
with each other regarding the training content. network include the ability to mitigate the risk
To achieve these objectives can be challenging; of soldiers’ confidentiality and maintaining high
emerging technologies may offer some solutions. quality moderators who facilitate dialogue and
While emerging technologies encompasses ensure program integrity. Developer’s must also
hardware and software products, this discussion of consider how to create game play that calls for so-
affective domain objectives is focused on specific cial networking tools while remaining focused on
Web 2.0 tools. Web 2.0 internet technologies, such learning objectives. However, the ability of social
as social networking tools, blogging and virtual networking tools to assist in achieving affective
worlds are emerging as parallel opportunities for domain objectives cause them to be worthy of
learning in addition to serious games and simula- further investigation and experimentation within
tions. Moreover, the technologies are proving to be training programs.
particularly effective training tools for the military. Blogs are web-based platforms for hosting
Social networking sites, such as MySpace, discussions around specific topics. These types
Facebook and LinkedIn provide a location on the of dialogues have long existed in electronic plat-
web where people can interact with each other to forms, primarily within e-mail exchanges or on
form and support relationships. These sites include discussion forum boards. However, the structure of
e-mail and instant messaging and encourage the blogs has emerged as the preferred form by users
user to generate their own content to display and of electronic communication methods (Brogan,
share. The U.S. Army has incorporated this concept 2008). Blogs often adapt guidelines such as e-mail
to some extent with its Army Knowledge Online policies to avoid abuse of the tool. Among the
(AKO) program. AKO is a central location on many advantages of blogs are that they increase
the World Wide Web for soldiers to utilize many trust while building a collaborative environment.
services, among them the ability to dialogue with Since blog postings are permanent, they build
each other through the use of discussion forums. a wealth of collective knowledge. Participants
Topics on these discussion forums are generated tend to avoid posting information that is false
by soldiers and by moderators, chosen for their because of the audience’s ability to question and
subject matter expertise. hold authors accountable. Promoting blogs may
Considering social networks for integration send a message to soldiers that they are trusted to
with games in designing training programs reveals share; censorship becomes the exception rather
much potential. “Social networks themselves may than the rule.
also be powerful learning tools. … social network- The military has had mixed experience with
ing application supports the game, but is not a blogs. Many soldiers have posted their own ex-
game itself.” (Klopfer, Osterweil,& Salen, 2009, periences within a blog format for the world to
p.14). Utilizing a social networking tool within read. Due to concerns of compromised informa-
a training program with affective domain objec- tion unintentionally reaching the enemy, policies
tives has many advantages, including the ability were established to mitigate the risk. Soldiers
to support soldiers with communication tools that continue to share their stories online in blogs;
are familiar and appealing, especially when they however, content must be screened by leadership
are isolated by their mission or location. Social to ensure that sensitive information is not being
networking tools can also facilitate the dialogue compromised. The military as an enterprise hosts
required for successful implementation of this public affairs (PA) sponsored blogs which are
type of training. considered a tool in the PA mission. Discussion

1016
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forums continue to be the primary dialogue tool For the military, virtual worlds can enable
within training realms. those soldiers who share a common interest in
By adding blogs as a tool within a training the subject matter of the training to dialogue
program that is primarily dealing with affec- and extend learning beyond the training con-
tive domain objectives, developers expand the tent presented in a standalone version. Osmotic
program’s ability to reach a variety of learners. conversation is that information which flows in
Also, learners’ can gain a sense of ownership not the background hearing of members so that they
only of their learning, but as part of the training may pick up relevant bits as though by osmosis.
program itself. Combining these aspects with a (Merriam-Webster, 2008). It is a tool that may
gaming format may prove to be powerful strategies assist in achieving affect domain objectives. In
to achieve challenging training goals. Second Life, members have the ability to be in a
Virtual world is a term often used to describe large group, yet eaves drop on the conversations
a 3-D computer simulated environment where which are occurring in the background. The in-
people interact via an avatar. The extent to which formal nature of osmotic communication can be
content is mostly generated by the users is unique realized within the virtual world format. Second
to virtual worlds. (Rezed.org, 2008). Virtual worlds Life uses a tool called “spatial audio” defined as
are an example of a term described by Dede (2007) the moving of an avatar away from another avatar
as a MUVE, an acronym for Multiuser Virtual that allows side conversations, which is impossible
Environment. In his research, Dede explores within traditional telephone conferences. While
MUVEs as a possible format for schools in the the military is exploring the use of virtual worlds in
future. Virtual worlds and MUVEs are relatively many aspects such as recruiting, conferencing and
new (Second Life began in 2003). They share many training based on primarily cognitive domains, it
attributes of serious gaming formats, yet little data may also consider expanding exploration of virtual
exists regarding these formats as a viable training technology to affective domain centered training.
tool. Many large corporations and universities are A model for utilizing gaming as an integrator
exploring the potential of MUVEs and virtual of formal and informal learning emerged during
worlds for educational purposes. an attempt to create a conceptual plan to deliver
The military is exploring the use of virtual an alcohol and substance abuse prevention train-
worlds. The U.S. Army teamed with commercial ing model grounded in persuasion theories for
entities to launch five pilot projects in 2008. (U.S. the military. The current face-to-face training
Army, 2008) The pilots focus on various training relies on the instructor’s ability to manage active
venues to include information models for wounded resistance by the students, facilitate respectful
soldiers, collaboration between representatives of collaboration and move students toward personal
several different federal agencies, and preparation behavioral change. The model is structured around
of new recruits with virtual drill sergeants and a series of activities that provide formal learning
recruiters. Forterra Inc., a commercial creator of (dissemination of information) and informal learn-
virtual worlds, supported the U.S. Army in an en- ing (students sharing their personal experiences,
deavor to fill training gaps existing for deploying views and perceptions). Often it is interactions
units (McCaskill, 2005). Testing of a prototype and conversations that occur between the students
demonstrated that virtual worlds can support a participating in the training that becomes the
wide range of military training audiences with most influential component in moving students
relevant experiences based upon current combat toward change.
conditions at multiple levels of warfare. Traditional models of e-learning typically
begin with an underlying structure for disseminat-

1017
 Gaming and Simulation

ing information. Layers of interactivity are added training that is effective, yet saves money and
throughout the training to engage and motivate time – limited resources of the military.
the learner thus improving their retention, com- Emerging technologies such as streaming
prehension and ability to apply the information video, virtual worlds, file compression, and various
presented. Elements of the alcohol and substance communication tools advance the ability of the
abuse prevention training easily converted to this military in meeting its distributed learning goals.
format; however, lost in the translation were the Most games retain the trait of portability; they can
affective elements, such as the student interac- be delivered to the learner in almost any location
tions and conversations which are necessary in via electronic methods. This feature has become
applying persuasion theories. Web 2.0 internet critical as the military continues long-term combat
technologies demonstrate the potential to achieve operations in remote locations.
the affective elements. The challenge is how to Web 2.0 applications provide the military with
integrate e-learning and Web 2.0 technologies scalable and sustainable tools that are adaptable
to create an effective training model; and a pos- when delivering the program anywhere, anytime,
sible solution may be gaming. Through gaming, for anyone. A technological advantage of current
the core element of the training model is able to virtual worlds such as Second Life, is the small
deliver information while simultaneously engag- memory space on a computer that is needed; most
ing the affective domains with Web 2.0 internet of the program is streamed via internet to avoid
technology components. cumbersome updates and large data requirements.
Current efforts in the realms of military training Designing training that combines gaming and
reveal a model shift from traditional instructor-led simulation with emerging technologies takes
training to more diverse, multiple-delivery type advantage of tools to meet affective domain
systems centered on the student. Included in these objectives and utilizes applications that meet
systems are gaming platforms such as simulations distributed learning goals of portability while
and scenario-based gaming. By positioning the possibly reducing costs and time requirements.
game as a central platform for the alcohol and Reflected in research is the ability of distributed
substance abuse prevention training, the student learning to conserve resources (Prensky, 2001).
is afforded the opportunity to control the learn- Future investigations should focus on the ability
ing situation and become motivated to achieve to measure effectiveness of these programs with
the objectives set forth in the training tasks. The learners and ensure that training design focuses
model described is currently in development; it on its primary purpose to assist the learner in
remains to be seen whether developers will cre- building and developing skills.
ate a training program with the ability to achieve
affective domain objectives.
CONCLUSION
Portability
“Games can play a number of roles in learning, but
The military approach to training is to define objec- they are most effective as learning environments
tives for student outcomes and the requirements when they have well-integrated instructional guid-
for the training program, then devise alternative ance and/or instructional support.” (Munro, 2009)
approaches to satisfy them. (Fletcher & Chat- This is a fact the military not only recognizes but
elier, 2000). The military’s focus on distributed embraces as they attempt to expand their ability
learning evolved from multiple goals; however, a to deliver training anywhere, anytime for anyone.
significant factor is the ability to deliver individual The varieties of games that exist provide multiple

1018
Gaming and Simulation

opportunities for learning, but it is important to Axe, D. (2008, August 4). Is the Army’s vir-
identify what the games were designed for (learn- tual world already here? Retrieved from Wire.
ing versus entertainment) before establishing com Web site: http://www.wired.com/danger-
expectations for the game player. Developers room/2008/08/more-mmog/
of military training must understand the desired
Babus, S., Hodges, K., & Kjonnerod, E. (1997).
outcomes and ensure that sound instructional de-
Simulations and institutional change: Training US
sign is incorporated. The key factor for selecting
government professionals for improved manage-
training tools should focus on appropriateness
ment of complex emergencies abroad. Journal
rather than technological features or efficiently
of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 5(4),
priced deliveries. Emerging technologies appear
231–233. doi:10.1111/1468-5973.00061
promising when creating games that require a
blend of informal and formal learning and are Bankes, S. C. (1991). Methodological Consider-
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Technological issues such as portability become Value of Intelligence and Electronic Warfare.
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Beal, S. (2006, March). Using games for training
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This work was previously published in Design and Implementation of Educational Games: Theoretical and Practical Per-
spectives, edited by Pavel Zemliansky and Diane Wilcox, pp. 341-357, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an
imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.18
Leveraging the Affordances
of an Electronic Game to
Meet Instructional Goals
Yuxin Ma
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Douglas Williams
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Charles Richard
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Louise Prejean
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

ABSTRACT design principles from the literature on electronic

games, instructional design, and intrinsic motiva-
Electronic games have the potential to support tion and how these principles informed the design
learning by doing and enhance student motivation. of Conquest of Coastlands. The principles and
However, there is little guidance in the literature the related case study may inform the design of
on how to leverage the affordances of electronic future electronic educational games and generate
games to design effective instruction. This chapter research questions to be investigated in empirical
is our effort to start to accumulate knowledge to research.
guide the design of electronic educational games.
We present a case study describing how the
unique components of electronic games enabled INTRODUCTION
the design of Conquest of Coastlands, a learning
environment delivered as an electronic game. We The Federation of American Scientists (FAS)
describe how our team synthesized two sets of released a report in October 2006, proposing
digital games as a solution to reshape education
(2006). The report lists a series of research and
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch418

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

development challenges. One main area of chal- These views provide valuable insights on the
lenges focuses on the design of games for learn- effective dimensions of electronic games in edu-
ing. How can we design games that contribute cation. However, how do instructional designers
to instructional goals? To answer this question, transform the two affordances of electronic games
we need to understand the affordances (Gibson, to enhance motivation and simulated experience
1977) of the electronic games, the potential and into effective design of instruction? How should
possibilities that the media may offer to enable elements of electronic games be designed to meet
effective learning. instructional goals? This chapter explores these
Electronic games have two affordances for questions by presenting a case study of how the
impacting learning: the promise to support learn- unique components of electronic games enabled
ing by doing (Kirriemuir & McFarlane, 2003) the design of Conquest of Coastlands, a learning
and the motivational effects of games. Support- environment delivered as an electronic game.
ers of electronic educational games emphasize This chapter starts with a theoretical framework
the potential of electronic games in providing that identifies the components of electronic games
simulated real world experiences. Squire (2006) and describes two instructional design models
considers game playing as designed experience, and a motivation theory, all of which are guiding
in which students learn through participating and the design of our learning environment. Then, it
performing in the game world. Gee (2007) states presents an overview of the game and the quest
that the games that he is interested in “are digital that we are developing. Next, it describes the
simulations of worlds that are ‘played’ in the sense instructional elements identified for the quest and
that a player has a surrogate or surrogates through discusses how we leverage two affordances of the
which the player can act within and on the simula- game to support effective instructional design.
tion” (p. 1). These are epistemic games (Shaffer
& Gee, in press) in which learners play the role of THEORECTICAL FRAMEWORK
professionals such as engineers, urban planners,
journalists, or lawyers in authentic simulations Components of Electronic Games
of a society. It is argued that these games help
learners develop ways of thinking and knowing Electronic games usually have two components:
valued by respective professions. story and game play. Although some game design-
Advocates of electronic educational games ers argue that story is not a necessary element in
often cite the work on intrinsic motivation to sup- all games, we consider it a key element in elec-
port the use of games in education. Psychologists tronic educational games (Williams, Ma, Prejean,
(Lepper & Malone, 1987; Malone, 1981) analyzed & Richard, in press). A story in an electronic
computer games and identified a list of elements game consists of characters, settings (context),
that are motivating, including challenge, curios- and events (plots) (Stapleton & Hughes, 2006).
ity, fantasy, and control. Flow (Csikszentmihalyi, Characters act to pursue the object of their desire
1991) is another theory related to motivation. It or motivation. This action constitutes the plot.
describes a sense of control, deep engagement, and In the course of their pursuit or quest, characters
exhilaration when one is involved in an optimal encounter obstacles or problems that interfere with
experience. Research shows that intrinsic moti- their achieving of the goal. This is the source of
vation and flow positively contribute to learning conflict, which is the essence of drama. Charac-
(Cordova & Lepper, 1996; Csikszentmihalyi, ters seek solutions to problems and take action
1991; Hektner & Csikszentmihalyi, 1996). to overcome obstacles. The drama consists of the
ongoing friction between the characters’ motives,

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Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

the obstacles they confront, and the choices they task practice is a “divide-and-conquer” approach
make in confronting them. in which the learner practices constituent skills
Game play describes “what the player does” required to complete the whole task. The 4C/
in the game. It can be broken down into the con- ID model advocates teaching the whole task at
stituent game mechanics, including goals, rules, the beginning of the instructional program and
tools, cause, effect, and consequence (Stapleton embedding part-task practice in the context of
& Hughes, 2006). It describes how the player fol- the whole task.
lows the rules and uses the tools and resources to Just-in-time (JIT) information. JIT informa-
achieve the goals of the game and how the game tion provides the step-by-step knowledge needed
responds to the player’s action based on certain for part-task practice. JIT information is offered
cause-effect-consequence rules. when it is relevant; it fades away when the learner
acquires more expertise.
Four-Component Instructional The strengths of the 4C/ID-model lie in its
Design (4C/ID) Model strong theoretical base. We concur with Merrill
(1999) that this model has synthesized the best
The four-component instructional design (4C/ from existing instructional design models and
ID) model (van Merrienboer, 1997) is a model incorporated theories derived from current cog-
for teaching an integrated set of knowledge and nitive psychology research. The 4C/ID model
skills required for solving complex problems and is not only influenced by the classic works on
completing complex tasks. There are four inter- instructional design (Gagne, 1985; Merrill, 1983;
related components in the 4C/ID model: learning Reigeluth, 1983), which are based on behavioral
tasks, supportive information, part-task practice, and cognitive psychology; it has also integrated
and just-in-time (JIT) information. components from more recent constructivist in-
Learning tasks. Learning tasks are the concrete, structional design theories and models (Collins,
authentic whole-task experiences similar to com- Brown, & Holum, 1991; Spiro, Feltovich, &
plex real-world problems. Repeated practice of Jacobson, 1991). The integration of instructivist
learning tasks allows learners to generate abstract and constructivist approaches are made possible
schemata from concrete experiences. Learning in this model because of the influence of cognitive
tasks are categorized into simple-to-complex load theory (Sweller, van Merrienboer, & Pass,
classes. The order of the task classes and the 1998). The impact of the cognitive load theory
specific instances of the tasks define the overall is best reflected in the concept of “reflective
sequencing of the instructional content. expertise” (van Merrienboer, 1997) discussed in
Supportive information. Supportive informa- the model. Reflective expertise is the ability of a
tion is provided to assist with the non-recurrent learner to generalize learning using two transfer
aspects of the learning tasks. It includes mental mechanisms: domain-specific automated process
models, cognitive strategies, and cognitive feed- to address familiar aspects of problems; and heu-
back related to reasoning and problem solving. ristics operating on cognitive schemata to solve
Inductive-inquisitory and inductive-expository unfamiliar aspects of problems. With such exper-
strategies are appropriate for teaching supportive tise, when presented with a problem, a learner can
information. quickly solve the familiar aspects of the problem
Part-task practice. Although learning tasks by automatically applying the rules, thus freeing up
may provide enough practice for the recurrent working memory to deal with unfamiliar aspects
skills, part-task practice may be needed to reach of the problem using heuristics and cognitive
a high level of automaticity for these skills. Part- schemata induced from previous experiences

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 Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

and examples. The learning tasks and supportive Cognitive apprenticeship advocates six instruc-
information are primarily designed to promote tional strategies: modeling, coaching, scaffolding,
schema-based transfer. Constructivist strategies articulation, reflection, and exploration. Modeling,
such as cognitive apprenticeship (Collins et al., coaching, and scaffolding strategies help students
1991) play an important role in achieving this acquire knowledge and skills through observation
transfer. Part-task practice and JIT information and guided practice.
may enable rule-based transfer. Instructivist Modeling. Cognitive apprenticeship typically
strategies (Gagne, 1985) that take a “divide-and- starts with modeling, which provides students with
conquer” and “drill-and-practice” approaches can an opportunity to observe expert performance of
be of value to facilitate rule-based transfer. a task in order to build a conceptual model of the
The 4C/ID-model not only has a solid theoreti- processes for completing the task. Jonassen (1999)
cal foundation, but also features a strong research categorizes modeling into two types, including
base. Empirical evidence of the model has been “behavioral modeling of the overt performance
demonstrated in a series of studies. Research has and cognitive modeling of the covert cognitive
been conducted with regard to the training of fault processes” (p. 231). After students observe the
management (Jelsma & Bijlstra, 1990; Morris expert performance, they are engaged in the
& Rouse, 1985), computer programming (van completion of the task themselves.
Merrienboer & De Croock, 1992), and statistical Coaching and scaffolding. Coaching and scaf-
analysis (Pass & van Merrienboer, cited in van folding strategies provide the support students
Merrienboer, 1997). The studies demonstrate need to accomplish the task and to bring students’
that strategies based on the 4C/ID-model tend performance closer to expert performance. Coach-
to provide better transfer than the conventional ing involves observing students’ performance
strategies (van Merrienboer, 1992). The 4C/ and providing hints, feedback, further modeling,
ID-model informed the design of ADAPTIT, a reminders, and new tasks to address specific is-
computer-based training design tool that helps sues in students’ performance. Scaffolding can
professionals to design training courses for com- be provided by offering suggestions, help, cue
plex cognitive skills (The ADAPTIT Consortium, cards; the teacher can even perform parts of the
2003). Analysis of evaluation data indicates that task that are beyond students’ ability. Coaching
this tool has met the expectations for efficiency and scaffolding should gradually fade as students
and effectiveness. become more competent in performing the tasks.
Articulation and reflection. Articulation and
Cognitive Apprenticeship reflection strategies enable students to gain access
to and control over their own thinking. Articu-
Cognitive apprenticeship (Collins et al., 1991) is lation refers to requiring students to articulate
an instructional design model built on traditional their knowledge, reasoning, and problem-solving
apprenticeship. In traditional apprenticeship adults processes. Teachers can encourage students to
teach children skills such as speaking, farming, articulate their thinking by asking for explanations
and sewing by showing them how to complete and elaborations, or requiring them to explain their
the tasks and helping them when it is their turn ideas to peers in cooperative groups. Reflection
to try. In cognitive apprenticeship teachers help involves helping students compare their own
learners acquire transferrable cognitive skills by problem-solving processes with those of the ex-
demonstrating the thought process for complet- perts, thus making it possible for them to modify
ing certain tasks and guiding the learners as they their processes. Techniques to enhance reflection
work on the tasks themselves. focus on reproducing or replaying both expert

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Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

and students’ performance to offer opportunities Intrinsic Motivation

for comparison.
Exploration. After students become compe- Malone and Lepper (Lepper & Malone, 1987;
tent in solving the problems with no support, Malone, 1981) developed a theory of intrinsic
exploration should occur. Exploration involves motivation after analyzing related literature and
pushing students to find and solve problems on conducting experiments on electronic games. They
their own. Students may be given general goals identified four categories of design features that
(e.g., exploring why the stock market crashed in enhance intrinsic motivation, including challenge,
1929) and they can focus on specific sub-goals curiosity, fantasy, and control. The first category
of interest to them. The purpose of exploration of features focuses on developing an optimal level
is to encourage students to become automatic in of challenge for the learner. Performance goals
setting problem goals and solving the problems. should be personally meaningful and the attain-
The 4C/ID model and cognitive apprenticeship ment of the goals should be uncertain. However,
are the two main instructional design models that the sense of uncertainty should not be to the extent
inform the design of Conquest of the Coastlands. that it damages the learner’s self-esteem; instead,
To conceptualize the complementary role of these the completion of the challenging goals should
two models, we identified two categories of in- contribute to enhanced feelings of self esteem.
structional elements: problem and support (Table To achieve this, there should be goals of varying
1). These are the main elements in instructional difficulty so that the learner can work at a level
design models that emphasize the role of authentic appropriate for their ability. Hidden information
experience in learning (e.g., Hannafin, Land, & and randomness may also enhance the uncertainty
Oliver, 1999; Jonassen, 1999; Schank, 1999). of the goals.
In these learning environments, the student is The purpose of the second category of design
presented with a problem, a project, or a task in features is to enhance curiosity, including sensory
a rich context. A variety of resources and tools curiosity and cognitive curiosity. Sensory curiosity
are available to support the learner. From the can be facilitated with the use of perceptual stimuli
perspective of this framework, the learning task such as light, music, animation, graphics, and video
in the 4C/ID model is the problem to be solved. and audio effects. However, the enhancement of
Supportive information, JIT information, and part- sensory curiosity should not distract the learner
task practice offer support for accomplishing the from instructional tasks. “Cognitive curiosity is
whole task. Cognitive apprenticeship offers ad- evoked by the prospect of modifying higher level
ditional support to guide student learning through cognitive structures” (Malone, 1981, p. 363).
observation and guided practice. It is the desire of the learner to better organize
one’s knowledge. The key to evoke the desire
is to create a cognitive dissonance (Festinger &
Table 1. Instructional elements based on 4C/ID Carlsmith, 1959) by highlighting the incomplete-
and cognitive apprenticeship ness, inconsistency, or a lack of parsimony in the
learner’s understanding.
Instructional Elements
The third category of design features is con-
Problem/Project/Task Learning task
cerned with giving the learner a sense of personal
Support Supportive information
control by providing choices and personaliza-
JIT information
tion opportunities. For example, the learner can
Part-task practice
be given the choices concerning the characters,
Cognitive apprenticeship strategies
names, fantasies, icons, and other bells and

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whistles irrelevant to the instructional aspects more instructionally effective than exogenous
of the activities. Information and feedback is fantasies because of the inherent relationship
personalized based on these choices. between the fantasy and the content.
The last category of design features relates to
fantasy. Malone defines fantasy-inducing environ- CONQUEST OF THE COASTLANDS
ments as those that evoke “mental images of things AND THE GLIM QUEST
not present to the senses or within the actual experi-
ence of the person involved” (American Heritage Conquest of the Coastlands is a role-playing
Dictionary, cited in Malone, 1981). Fantasy is electronic educational game with a science fic-
appealing because of its cognitive and emotional tion/fantasy setting. Pursuing larger strategic
impact. The cognitive benefits of fantasies lie in objectives, the player character will be challenged
that fantasies provide analogies and metaphors with a variety of problem solving “quests,” which
that enable the learner to use existing knowledge form the main plotlines of the interactive narrative
to make sense of the new information. Fantasies and will provide the immediate motivations for
have emotional appeal in that they arouse strong player-character activities in the game. Each quest
emotions through stories related to conflict and is designed to achieve specific learning goals.
war, competition, and interpersonal relationships. The game takes place amid an ancient conflict
There are two types of fantasies: endogenous and between two sentient species and their struggle
exogenous. In endogenous fantasies, there are for dominance on a planet in another solar sys-
inherent connections between the fantasy and tem. While not technologically sophisticated, the
the content and the goals of the fantasies match planet’s two rival sentient species have reached a
the instructional goals. For example, Civiliza- turning point in their evolutionary history where
tion is an endogenous game for teaching history. it is likely that one—the Mruk-ma—will likely
In this game, the player builds civilizations and drive the other—the Sheft-ma—into extinction.
ensures its growth by balancing issues related to The Mruk-ma are aggressive, sea-faring spe-
infrastructure, resources, diplomacy and trading, cies, while the Sheft-ma are city-builders who
technological advancement, city management, and make their home in “The Coastlands,” along the
military. The fantasy advances as the civilizations marshy seashores and river valleys of Mertis’
evolve. Social studies can be taught by using this lone continent. For the vulnerable Sheft-ma, the
game. On one hand, the player needs the historical strategic key to their self-defense is a deteriorating
knowledge to succeed in the fantasy. On the other system of fortifications built in the coastal wetlands
hand, the player needs the fantasy as a context to surrounding their cities. But these wetlands are
understand historical knowledge. In exogenous mysteriously disappearing at an alarming rate,
fantasies, the connections between the fantasy and the threat of invasion by Mruk-ma fleets is
and the content are superficial; the same fantasy growing.
can be used as “sugar-coating” for a variety of A decisive change comes when the survey ship
content. For example, a Speedway game in which of an advanced alien race crash-lands in the oceans
the students’ race cars move at the same speed of Mertis. Arriving in escape pods from their
as they correctly answer arithmetic questions is doomed spaceship, the strangers, called Cilati,
considered an exogenous game. In reality, arith- are scattered around the planet. Now hopelessly
metic skills are not required for car racing; it is stranded on Mertis, some of the alien crew man-
an artificial connection. The same game can be ages to make their way to The Coastlands, where
attached to any other content. Researchers argue they are warmly welcomed by the Sheft-ma. The
that endogenous games are more interesting and Cilati survey team brings with them precious

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Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

scientific knowledge, technology, and methods supportive information, part-task practice, and
that could dramatically shift the balance of power just-in-time information.
in the conflict between the two rival species. The
survival of the Sheft-ma will depend on whether Learning Tasks
they can effectively utilize the science and tools
of the Cilati to rebuild their crumbling forts and In this curriculum, the learning tasks involve
defend their disappearing coastlines. addressing environmental issues similar to those
The Cilatis are a highly advanced race of found in the real world. The tasks are organized in
space-faring explorers. Extremely long-lived, a simple-to-complex order. The electronic game
they traverse the galaxy in pursuit of knowledge addresses problems that have less variables/factors
about other planets and other life forms. Cilati at play, followed by classroom activities which
ships have visited countless worlds, quietly ob- present more complex problems. Much support is
serving the species that inhabit them. Generally, provided in the game because students have little
they never interfere in the cultures they study, and experience dealing with these issues. Performance
they seldom even make their presence known. constraints and modeling examples are offered to
However, it quickly becomes apparent that the reduce the cognitive load.
Mruk-ma have adopted a radically new strategy The central problem presented in the glim
in their struggle with the Sheft-ma: ecological quest focuses on exploring a drastic reduction on
warfare. By attacking the delicate environment the harvesting of glim, a fish found in the coastal
on which their peaceful rivals depend, the Mruk- regions, which is a key staple of the Sheft-ma diet.
ma hope to wreck the Sheft-ma civilization and The game provides an opportunity for the learner
eliminate their species. to explore an ecosystem that has been disturbed
Our team is currently developing the glim quest by an invasive species and other biotic and abiotic
in Conquest of the Coastlands. It is a four-week factors. Performance constraints are provided;
life science and environmental science curriculum learners are required to follow a set of scientific
for children ages 11-13. The curriculum consists inquiry heuristics to approach the problem. At the
of approximately 10 hours of electronic-game beginning of the inquiry process, they are asked to
activities followed by approximately 10 class create a data collection plan; during the process,
periods of hands-on, classroom-based activities. they write a progress report from time to time;
The primary goal of this curriculum is to teach an toward the end of the process, they develop a final
integrated set of knowledge and skills that allow report in order to draw conclusions and discuss
students to address environmental issues. For findings. A modeling example is available to il-
professionals, such expertise may take years of lustrate how scientists follow the inquiry process
education and experience to develop. Our four- and develop various plans and reports to solve
week curriculum will focus on relatively simple an environmental problem related to acid rain.
but still complex and authentic problems.
Supportive Information
INSTRUCTIONAL COMPONENTS
OF THE GLIM QUEST Supportive information, including the mental
model of the balance of the ecosystem, scientific
The 4C/ID model provides an overall framework inquiry skills, and cognitive feedback, is provided
to structure the instructional aspect of the game. to assist with the non-recurrent aspects of the
This section describes the four instructional learning tasks. They are related to two primary
components of the glim quest: learning tasks, learning outcomes: scientific inquiry and the bal-

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 Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

ance of the ecosystem. Students are expected to Part-Task Practice

acquire knowledge and skills needed to understand
and conduct scientific inquiry, including “asking The learning task of the game involves recurrent
questions, planning and conducting investiga- skills such as interpreting graphs of fish catch data
tions, using appropriate tools and techniques to and water quality data. These are the secondary
gather data, thinking critically and logically about learning outcomes of the curriculum. Part-task
relationships between evidence and explanations, practice provides opportunities for the learner to
constructing and analyzing alternative explana- acquire these skills. To give the learner a sense of
tions, and communicating scientific arguments” context, part-task practice should be embedded in
(National Research Council, 1996, p. 105). the game rather than as a prerequisite for playing
Students should also obtain an improved mental the game. More part-task practice is available in
model of the interdependence and balance of the the associated classroom activities.
ecosystem components.
We employ both inductive-inquisitory and JIT Information
inductive-expository strategies to design the in-
struction for supportive information. For example, JIT information provides the step-by-step knowl-
the inductive-expository strategy is used to help edge needed for the learner to perform the recurrent
the learner understand how various factors lead to aspects of the learning tasks. For example, for the
the imbalance of the ecosystem and related conse- learner to practice reading and interpreting graphs,
quences. We present several case studies of coastal a tutorial is available to teach the knowledge
issues and then draw out the relationship among and skills necessary for the practice. The tutorial
various factors such as farm run-off, construction presents concepts and principles related to graph
of levees, and the introduction of invasive species. interpretation, gives examples, and provides cor-
We use the inductive-inquisitory strategy to teach rective feedback to the practice.
complex relationships among organisms as well
as between organisms and the environment. For LEVERAGING THE AFFORDANCES
example, a principle that we want the students OF THE GAME To Promote
to learn is that an invasive species can disrupt Learning By Doing
the balance of an ecosystem; the change in the
ecosystem caused by the invasive species may Components of electronic games can be lever-
impact a native species directly or indirectly. To aged to support the instructional elements. Table
teach this principle using the inductive-inquisi- 2 shows how the instructional elements in Table 1
tory strategy, we provide an analogical encoding are mapped with the components of the electronic
(Gentner & Markman, 1997) tool, which presents game to guide the design of instruction. For ex-
two examples illustrating the impact of invasive ample, two components of electronic games, story
species and the learner is guided to identify the and game play may serve as devices to situate the
common principle underlying both examples. problem and the context. The story describes the
Research shows that analogical encoding is more characters, the settings, and the events related to
effective than the pure discovery approach. For the problem. The game play presents the goals
more information on the analogical encoding tool, for the learner and defines the rules and tools for
see the work of Williams, Ma, Feist, Richard, and achieving the goals. To provide support to the
Prejean (2007). learner, characters in the story and tools in the game
play may deliver supportive and JIT information

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Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

Table 2. Instructional elements and components of the electronic game

Instructional Elements Components of the Electronic Game

Problem/Project/ Learning task Designing the story and the gameplay to present the learning task
Task
Support Supportive information Delivering supportive information, part-task practice, and JIT infor-
mation by characters in the story and tools in the game
JIT information
Part-task practice
Cognitive apprenticeship strategies Implementing cognitive apprenticeship strategies via characters in
the story and/or tools in the game

as well as facilitate part-task practice and enable quest has its own detailed setting that contributes
cognitive apprenticeship strategies. to the overall game story.
Characters. Characters add to the richness and
Designing the Story and the Game authenticity of the learning task. For example, the
play to Present the Learning Task learners first come to know details about their own
character’s motivations and other key figures in
Presenting the learning task in the context of story the opening cinematic. The player character’s main
and game play may enhance a sense of authentic motivation in the game is to preserve and restore
experience. In contrast with traditional methods the Sheft-ma’s fragile coastal ecosystem. The
of knowledge representation, games provide a cinematic also provides a glimpse of the dreaded
rich description of situations and tasks which Mruk-ma scouts who are spying on the Sheft-ma
are more meaningful to students. They allow the coastlands. As the player character begins each
players to identify fully with a character, act on the quest, characters facilitate presenting the goals
plot, and experience the cause-and-effect of their and details of each learning task. For example,
actions. This is important because contemporary in the interactive cut scene for the glim quest, the
learning and instructional theories (Jonassen, learner takes on the role of the player character, a
1999; Schank, 1999; Spiro et al., 1991), includ- talented and courageous young apprentice who is
ing the 4C/ID model (van Merrienboer, 1997), given a task to investigate a fish depletion problem
all emphasizes the role of an authentic context that is threatening the survival of the Sheft-ma.
in facilitating learning by doing. Events/plots. The opening cinematic and the
Presentation of the glim quest learning task interactive cut scenes depict the back-story of
is primarily through three elements: the game the game and quests and provide a context for
cinematic that introduces the back-story of the each learning task. During the interactions with
entire game, an interactive cut scene that focuses non-player characters, task goals are clarified and
on the specific challenge in the quest, and several needed details are provided. As the plot unfolds,
interactions between the learner and non-player the player character encounters obstacles such
characters. The following aspects of story and as determining what data to gather and how to
game play design have a critical role in develop- interpret the data.
ing a rich context for the learning task. Goal. Providing the player with clear goals,
Setting. A compelling story begins with a rich consistent with those in the game narrative, is
setting. In our game, the opening cinematic intro- essential to effective game play and further facili-
duces the learner to the setting: a fictitious planet tates presentation of the learning task. The goal
where two opposing species are in conflict. Each of the glim quest matches the player character’s

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 Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

motivation to preserve and restore the coastlands, Sheft-ma elder is learned in many disciplines pos-
and is clearly presented to the player character. sessing a folk understanding of the forces at play
Rules. Rules help clarify the end goal of the in the natural world. To help the learner with the
learning tasks. There are two sets of rules that quest, the Sheft-ma elder discusses his hypotheses
define the winning of the glim quest. The first based on his own experience and folk knowledge.
set of rules concerns whether the player character The Cilati mentor guides the learner through the
follows the instructions of the mentors to success- scientific inquiry process, introducing conceptual
fully complete the scientific inquiry process. The information needed to complete the inquiry and
second set of rules is related to Sheft-ma values, taking into consideration of the Sheft-ma elder’s
including knowledge, stewardship, practice, and folk understanding.
critical thinking. The player character may gain The PDA is a main tool that provides sup-
more points if s/he adheres to these values. These port to the learner. It facilitates communication
rules are presented during the interactions between between the learner and the Cilati mentor, allows
the player character and the non-player characters. data collection and analysis, and enables presen-
Tools. The presentation of the learning task tation of case studies and related information.
is coupled by an introduction of tools that the Case studies are used extensively to provide the
player character has available to complete the supportive information. The cases are stored in
task. During the interaction between the Cilati the case library in the PDA and the analogical
mentor and the player character prior to his/her encoding scaffold is also embedded in the case
departure on the quest, the mentor provides the library. Part-task practice and JIT information on
player character with a personal digital assistant how to interpret graphs is facilitated by a tutorial
(PDA), a versatile device based on the Cilati’s embedded in the PDA.
advanced technology. This serves as the primary
tool for the player character to complete the quest. Implementing Cognitive
Other tools common to electronic games, such as Apprenticeship Strategies
a map tool and an inventory, are also available to via Characters and Tools
the player character.
The story elements in the electronic games can
Delivering Supportive Information, easily support cognitive apprenticeship strate-
Part-Task Practice, and JIT gies. In stories, the hero usually has a mentor
Information by Characters and Tools (Campbell, 1949) who provides tools and advice
to support the adventure. Meeting with the mentor
Providing support by characters and tools as the not only advances the plot in the story but also
story and game play unfold adds to the authen- offers an opportunity to use cognitive apprentice-
ticity of the experience. As the plots evolve, the ship strategies.
opportunities for providing support naturally occur A more interesting example of how the char-
when the player character encounters obstacles. acters and tools in this game support cognitive
In the pursuit of the goal, the player character apprenticeship strategies involves the interaction
confronts the problems with the support provided supported in the PDA sketch tool. The tool allows
by characters and tools in the game. the learner to work as a forensic sketch artist to
In the glim quest, the learner is mentored by determine the key characteristics and classifica-
two non-player characters, a Cilati and a learned tion of the invasive species. Near the start of the
Sheft-ma elder. The Cilati provides support and quest, a non-player character shares a strange
guidance to the player in conducting research. The skull with the player character. The skull is not

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Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

of any creature with which the local Sheft-ma are inquiry process in several communication reports
familiar. In order to determine what the organism they submit to the Cilati: the data collection plan,
is, the Cilati asks a series of questions concerning the progress report, and the final report. These
the organism’s characteristics. For example, the reports are supported by the PDA.
Cilati begins by discussing the teeth embedded The final strategy of cognitive apprenticeship,
in the skull, explaining that examining these exploration, is not implemented in this version
can provide hints on the types of food they eat, of the game. However, it is supported by the
which is a key factor for determining where the classroom activities. The learners are given open-
organism fits in the classification taxonomy. The ended, broad research issues, and they work in
sketch tool, appearing to be under the control of teams to generate research question and conduct
the Cilati, displays teeth of herbivores, carnivores, investigations to answer the questions.
and omnivores found on Earth, and asks the learner
to select the ones that most closely resemble those LEVERAGING THE
found in the skull. The Cilati confirms or rejects AFFORDANCES OF THE GAME
the learner’s selection, eventually guiding the TO ENHANCE MOTIVATION
learner to understand that the invasive species is
an herbivore, and concludes the interaction by From the theory on intrinsic motivation, we
drawing the teeth in the sketch tool. The Cilati identified four principles to inform the design of
goes on to guide the player through examining the glim quest. The following describes how our
the other features of the skull. The sketch tool effort in applying these principles.
interaction allows the Cilati to model the cogni-
tive processes involved in identifying the features Developing a Meaningful Challenge
of an organism. with Optimal Levels of Difficulty
The next two cognitive apprenticeship strate-
gies, coaching and scaffolding, are facilitated Our first effort to enhance intrinsic motivation
through the interaction between the learner and the (Lepper & Malone, 1987; Malone, 1981) focuses
Cilati. For example, the Cilati asks the learner to on developing a meaningful challenge with an
follow the scientific inquiry process to investigate optimal level of difficulty. In our game, the
the fish depletion problem. Scaffolding is provided challenge is for the learner to identify why fish
by requiring the learner to use a set of scientific catches decline dramatically for Sheft-ma fisher-
inquiry heuristics. A particular noteworthy aspect men. This challenge is meaningful because: (a) it
of the game is its affordance to facilitate coaching is a problem in a rich context with a potentially
via the non-player characters and within the con- devastating impact on the well-being of the Sheft-
text of the story. The learner develops and submits ma, and (b) it resembles authentic environmental
a progress report to the Cilati, who reviews the problems on Earth. To ensure that the performance
report and provides individualized feedback. In goals are challenging but attainable, we provide
reality, it is the teacher who provides the feedback. various types of support described earlier in the
However, the game allows the teacher to deliver chapter. We have not implemented other strategies
the feedback assuming the role of the Cilati, thus that may provide the optimal level of difficulty,
maintaining the authenticity of the story and keep- such as designing performance goals at variable
ing the learner immersed in the context. difficulty levels and adding hidden information
The game also enables the implementation of and increasing randomness. We will explore these
articulation and reflection. The learners are encour- strategies in the future development of the game.
aged to articulate and reflect on their scientific

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 Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

Enhancing Sensory and Developing an Endogenous Fantasy

Cognitive Curiosity that is Emotionally Appealing

Commercial electronic games enhance sensory To develop an endogenous fantasy, we align the
curiosity with the design of three dimensional goals of the story and the game with instructional
(3-D) environments, cinematics, as well as goals. In Conquest of Coastlands, the goal of the
stirring audio effects and music. Styled after story and the game is to address an environmental
the commercial games in terms of the interface issue. This goal also serves as the instructional
design, Conquest of Coastlands integrates these goal.
state-of-the-art media with the design of the story, Different fantasy context appeals to different
the game play, and the instruction. The game is people because learners have different emotional
also designed to augment cognitive curiosity by needs and different fantasies address different
evoking cognitive dissonance in the learner. We needs. To attract diverse learners, we try to address
adopted Socratic method (Collins & Stevens, a variety of human emotional needs such as fear,
cited in Malone & Lepper, 1987) as a means to love, hope, trust, faith, and fortitude. For example,
trigger a sense of cognitive dissonance through in Conquest of Coastlands, we use vivid 3-D and
dialogs between the Cilati mentor and the learner. 2-D arts as well as cinematics to depict Mruk-ma
The mentor asks questions and provides feedback as dreadful creatures that perform deadly attacks
in order to reveal problems in the learner’s think- on Sheft-ma villages. Drastically declining fish
ing and therefore to generate interests in learning. catches may soon lead to famine in the Sheft-ma
city state; the learner is driven by the love for his
Providing Choices and or her country to investigate the problem.
Personalization Opportunities
CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
In Conquest of Coastlands, we give the learner
a sense of control by providing opportunities In spite of the growing interest in developing
for choosing names and gender, customizing electronic educational games, there is little guid-
the clothing, and selecting a secret code. These ance in the literature on how to design effective
elements are irrelevant to the instruction, but electronic educational games. Educators have
they provide a sense of control that is motivating little experience in designing electronic educa-
to the learner. In addition, we also personalize tional games and the computer game industry
some of the feedback. The teacher, responding lacks expertise in integrating effective pedagogy
in character as the Cilati, provides personalized into game design. This chapter is an effort to start
feedback on the reports submitted by the learner. to accumulate knowledge to guide the design
We expect this feature to be both motivating and of electronic educational games. It presents a
instructionally valuable. It is costly to design case study of our experience in leveraging the
elements for personalization and choices, so we affordances of the electronic game to design a
have limited these features in the current quest. learning environment delivered as an electronic
We will further explore and evaluate these strate- game. It describes how we synthesized two sets of
gies in the future. principles from the electronic games, instructional
design, and intrinsic motivation literature and how
these principles informed the design of Conquest
of Coastlands. The first set of principles describes
how we align components of the electronic game

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Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

with instructional elements to meet instructional Another example relates to design principles that
goals. The second set of principles presents our may enhance motivation. The implementation of
effort to leverage the affordances of Conquest of these principles (e.g., the enhancement of sensory
Coastlands to enhance motivation. curiosity) with the cutting-edge technology is
This chapter may be beneficial to both game expensive. Although theoretically these strategies
developers and researchers. For developers of may enhance motivation, the motivational gains
electronic educational games, the principles and may not be significant enough to justify the cost.
related examples presented in the chapter may Future research is needed to address this issue.
inform the design of their games. Although some
of the principles are specifically related to the 4C/
ID model and cognitive apprenticeship model, they REFERENCES
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
W. C. (1998). Cognitive architecture and instruc-
tional design. Educational Psychology Review, Affordances of Instructional Media: The
10(3), 251–296. doi:10.1023/A:1022193728205 potential and possibilities that instructional media
The ADAPTIT Consortium. (2003). Final re- offer to enable effective learning
port of the ADAPTIT project (scientific version) Endogenous Fantasy: In endogenous fan-
[Electronic Version]. Retrieved October 15, 2007 tasies, there are inherent connections between
from http://www.adaptit.org/files/ADAPTIT%20 the fantasy and the content and the goals of the
final%20report%20(scientific).pdf. fantasies match the instructional goals.
Flow: Flow is a theory on motivation (Csik-
van Merrienboer, J. J. G. (1992). Training for re- szentmihalyi, 1991). It describes a sense of control,
flective expertise: A four-component instructional deep engagement, and exhilaration when one is
design model for complex cognitive skills. Edu- involved in an optimal experience.
cational Technology Research and Development, Game Play: It describes “what the player does”
40(2), 23–43. doi:10.1007/BF02297047 in the game. It can be broken down into the con-
stituent game mechanics, including goals, rules,
tools, cause, effect, and consequence (Stapleton
& Hughes, 2006). It describes how the player fol-

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 Leveraging the Affordances of an Electronic Game to Meet Instructional Goals

lows the rules and uses the tools and resources to Part-Task Practice: Part-task practice is a
achieve the goals of the game and how the game “divide-and-conquer” approach to teach one or
responds to the player’s action based on certain a limited number of constituent skills at a time
cause-effect-consequence rules. in order for the learner to reach a high level of
Just-In-Time (JIT) Information: JIT in- automaticity for these skills.
formation provides the step-by-step knowledge Supportive Information: Supportive infor-
needed for the learner to perform the recurrent mation includes mental models, cognitive strate-
aspects of the learning tasks. gies, and cognitive feedback related to reasoning
Learning Task: Learning tasks are the con- and problem solving. It is provided to assist with
crete, authentic whole-task experiences similar the non-recurrent aspects of the learning tasks.
to complex real-world problems.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education, edited by Richard
E. Ferdig, pp. 1127-1142, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

1038
 1039

Chapter 4.19
A Video Game, a Chinese
Otaku, and Her Deep
Learning of a Language
Kim Feldmesser
University of Brighton, UK

ABSTRACT gage in discourse. Video games may be one way

to address these challenges. In order to do this,
It is a buyer’s market for employers in today’s however, more must be understood about the ways
global village, where having another language in which games support these theories, the way
under your belt could make the difference at individuals learning a second language interact
an interview between employment or the dole with them, and what researchers and developers
queue (unemployment line). Learning additional of serious games must know to support this use
languages rapidly has been the goal of immer- of games. This chapter will outline the relevant
sion schools, and their approaches are effective theories for second language learning, describe
in many respects because they make use of how they operate in games, and present guidelines
situated learning experiences in communities for research and development of serious games
of practice. Such experiences present their own and second language acquisition.
challenges however, as living in the country of
the chosen language for a considerable period of
time may not be possible. Migrant workers too INTRODUCTION
may be shunned by native speakers, particularly
if they have little or no knowledge of the native Tell Me and I Will Forget
language, reducing learning opportunities to en- Show Me and I May Remember
Involve Me and I Will Understand
- Confucius 430BC
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch419

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

This is a longitudinal qualitative study of how The Research

a ‘virtual world’ of commercial off-the-shelf
(COTS) video games was providing a safe space For the sake of brevity, the background to how the
for an intermediate-level second language learner. research was initially set up has not been included;
The study investigates her ability to develop deep the details of how the subject Zoe was found, the
learning of English by engaging in extensive video year-long platonic relationship of the author with
game-play in the target language. Drawing on the subject as a support tutor in her curriculum
Vygotskian principles of research, which focus studies, and how, through many conversations
on the process and not the outcome of develop- about learning styles, she agreed to participate
ment, this small-scale research project explored, in this study have also been left out. Similarly,
through interview, the process of learning to play the ethical considerations that were taken into
Deus ExTM. account prior to, during, and after the study have
I chose the title of this project having read been edited, only including those areas which
Tobin’s (1999) experiences with his son entitled may impact on future research.
An American Otaku. As the computer miniatur-
izes into ‘must-have’ fashion accessories such as The Subject
mobile phones and handheld gaming devices, a
new generation is buying into the cyber age. Tobin ‘Zoe’ is from China and in her early twenties. She
(1999) used it to describe his son’s fanaticism has been studying in England for nearly three years.
with the role-playing game Warhammer™ and She remained with the same host family for this
his immersion into cyberculture at the beginning time. She came to the UK having completed her
of the millennium. As a father of a teenager, he Chinese (full board) high school studies with the
asks himself pertinent questions about the possible intention of improving her English sufficiently,
ramifications of using this new technology—such so as to enter a UK university. She was preparing
questions as whether a life on the Net can be sat- applications to universities during the time of this
isfying, and whether his son’s self-confidence and study. She proudly announced her Communist
the interpersonal skills he is developing through roots to me—that her father was a prominent
e-mail communications can translate into real member of the Party in her city and that she would
life? Will he have ‘real’ (face-to-face) friends? need to undergo a re-education program on her
Do otaku grow up to be happy, normal adults? return to China (in order to reintegrate with Chi-
The fixation on new technology that stigmatized nese society), having completed her studies in the
otaku a decade ago is now in common use among West. She was keen to study Japanese culture on
teenagers growing up in technologically advanced her degree course (citing that “you should know
societies that are rapidly being changed by the your enemy better than your closest friend”) and
technology of the integrated circuit and the In- looked forward to living as an exchange student
ternet. The title reflects how the subject, Zoe, a with a Japanese host family for a year.
mainland-Chinese English Language student, was
drawn in to extensive video game-play by effec- Preparatory Measures
tive game design despite the barrier of the second
language. Like an otaku, she would spend many Participant exposure to gore, violence, and death
hours alone playing the video game Deus Ex on through the playing of Deus Ex was addressed
her laptop in the host family bedroom. and procedures put in place whereby the subject
could contact the researcher directly should any
concerns arise from video game-play. Also, an

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

agreement was reached whereby the researcher or disappointment to her parents by her actions
could terminate the study if evidence of video surfaced during tutor support on a number of oc-
game-play was having detrimental effects on the casions throughout my year as her personal tutor.
subject’s health, her studies, or her social life.
Communication lines to the subject’s course tutors Research Material
and host family were established and maintained
throughout the study and for some time afterwards. The video game focused on in this chapter is the
Despite these safeguards, Zoe decided not to first-person shooter/role-play game Deus Ex made
play Deus Ex for at least three weeks of her own by Eidos Interactive (n.d.). The reasons for using
volition before informing me or asking me for Deus Ex are pedagogic in that it provides a thor-
help with the game for the first time. The first ough training session at the start of play in order to
interview starts at this point, after Zoe had had develop the player’s skills. Additionally, the vast
possession of the game for six weeks. I told Zoe narrative script is dual-coded, with all dialogue
she could keep the games until she intended to subtitled and a copy of all conversations stored
return to China (in six months time) so that she did and easily accessed in Denton’s (your character’s
not feel the study had disrupted our relationship, name) databank, giving another form of backup
as I felt that if I had removed the games after the to aid the learner. The game-play is paused and
interviews, she may have felt rejected and used by is not jeopardized while accessing the databank
the research process. Addiction such as befits the for facts or while reviewing a conversation. The
title otaku is well documented, and many gamers game is designed to stretch the player into new
would admit to spending more time playing video zones of proximal development, not in a hack
games than watching television. Zoe clearly fits and slash way often used in inferior video game
into this category. I also presented her with a good design, but in a thought-provoking way, demand-
bilingual dictionary as a present which she was ing the player/learner step beyond their regime
very pleased to receive, explaining that she could of competence (Gee, 2003, p. 71) in order to
tell her parents she had been given the dictionary advance skills ready for more challenges later in
“in order to help in research” and that it would the game. Deus Ex makes you question allegiance
act as a lessening blow if she admitted to having and commitment to government agencies fighting
played hours of video games. She indicated dur- terrorism, develops leadership skills, and hones
ing the second interview that her mother did not survival skills in hostile environments. It cannot be
object to her playing Civilization III (another game played half-heartedly, demanding weeks of regular
I lent her) if it was helping her with her studies. play in order to reach its natural conclusion. The
594: Zoe: yeah, in the last few minutes…also commitment is rewarded through a virtual world
last week I told my Mum I play this game and I that is both compelling and, as Gee (2003, p. 5)
say how useful it is…(Kim: What does she say?) described it, “life-enhancing.”
She say “Alright, if you think it’s useful.” (Kim:
So she was quite happy to…) because I tell her
this game just helped me to understand more SOCIOCULTURAL THEORIES
and understand well during my Maths, Religious OF LEARNING
Studies, and World Development…nearly every
single subject so this is very helpful. The Zone of Proximal Development
This piece of information was most reassuring
as I had concerns about parental approval despite How we learn language, and particularly how
Zoe’s maturity. Zoe’s concerns about causing upset we learn a second or other language, has been

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

researched by many disciplines. Second Language history, their goals and motives, as well as the
Acquisition (SLA) is a relatively new field of resources available to them, including those that
investigation and as such has generated numerous are dialogically constructed together. (cited in
theories. Pica (1998) comments on the theory-less Dunn & Lantolf, 1998, p. 415)
but theory-laden field of SLA:
Research by Aljaafreh and Lantolf (1994)
Theory-less in that, as most major textbooks re- revealed that the potential level of development
mind us, there has yet to emerge a single, coher- of the learner could be ascertained by the degree
ent theory that can describe, explain and predict of assistance required in order to carry out an
second-language learning. Yet it is theory-laden activity and also “the visible ability of the learner
in that there are at least forty claims, arguments, to utilize forms of external assistance” (Lantolf
theories, and perspectives that attempt to describe & Thorne, 2006, p. 277). That assistance could
and explain the learning process and predict its be supplied by a teacher or more knowledgeable
outcomes.(Pica, 1998, p. 9, cited inBeatty, 2003, peer, from a book such as a dictionary definition
p. 79) or from contextual clues provided by the environ-
ment such as learning to say “bless you” when
SLA research is informed by the psychological someone sneezes, for example.
research into behaviorism and cognitive theories Aljaafreh and Lantolf (1994) define develop-
of memory and learning (Bartlett, 1932; Skinner, ment in the language acquisition context as:
1957; Chomsky, 1965; Krashen & Terrell 1983;
Swain, 1983; Gass, 1988; Skehan, 1989; Schmidt, the study of how mediational means are appro-
1994; Gupta & MacWhinney, 1997; Shimizu, priated by the individual as a result of dialogic
Tang, Rampon, & Tsien, 2000; Churchland, 2002; interaction with other individuals….The potential
Fauconnier & Turner, 2002), theories of human level of development of the learner is suggested
and child development (Bruner, Goodnow, & by the kinds of assistance needed to carry out
Austin, 1957; Subrahmanyam, Greenfield, Kraut, the activity and the visible ability of the learner
& Gross, 2001), first language acquisition and to utilise forms of external assistance…assis-
socialization studies (Slobin, 1985; Watson- tance should be graduated—with no more help
Gegeo 2001), and cognitive anthropology (Lave provided than is necessary, for the assumption
& Wenger, 1991; Chaiklin & Lave, 1996). More is that over-assistance decreases the student’s
recently the field of sociocultural theory, based agentive capacity. At the same time, a minimum
on research by Vygotsky (1978), Bakhtin (1981), level of guidance must be given so that the novice
and Luria (1982) among others, has been included can successfully carry out the action at hand.
in the SLA research arsenal. Related to this is that help should be contingent
The theory of the zone of proximal develop- on actual need and similarly removed when the
ment is part of the Social Development Theory person demonstrates the capacity to function
proposed by Vygotsky (1978). independently. Graduation and contingency are
Aljaafreh and Lantolf (1994, cited in Dunn critical elements of developmentally productive
& Lantolf, 1998) describe the zone of proximal joint activity. This process is dialogic and entails
development as: continuous assessment of the learner’s ZPD and
subsequent tailoring of help to best facilitate pro-
…the framework, par excellence, which brings all gression from other-regulation to self-regulation.
of the pieces of the learning setting together—the (Lantolf & Thorne, 2006, p. 277)
teacher, the learner, their social and cultural

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

Vygotsky’s research showed that at a given the gaming environment—to be in control of the
time, an individual’s development was afforded various elements—and therefore demonstrate
and constrained by his or her ZPD. The indi- learning within her own ZPD. The additional
vidual’s capacity to respond to and benefit from factor of having to play in an L2 environment
certain kinds of interaction such as prompts, suggests that in order to make these advances in
body language, or verbal remarks that would al- game-play, Zoe would have had to decode the
low him or her to carry out an activity he or she language along the way. This would be indica-
would otherwise be unable to perform provided tive of language learning. Transformation over
Vygotsky not with a capacity of ability as so many time is at the heart of this method. The process
tests reveal, but the potential growth or proximal of decoding and reusing the language as ‘one’s
development to be expected from the subject. own’ demonstrates the use of higher-order skills
This ‘provoked development’ he referred to as and L2 development within the ZPD. This would
the experimental-development method and at demonstrate deep learning had occurred.
other times the instrumental method. Vygotsky
elaborates thus: Deep Learning

The [ZPD] defines those functions that have not Deep learning is important in this study because
yet matured but are in the process of maturation, it shows that the language has been acquired and
functions that will mature tomorrow but are cur- can be used as an instrument or artifact of language
rently in an embryonic state. These functions rather than a memorized semiotic ‘out-of-context’
could be termed ‘buds’ or ‘flowers’ of develop- symbol. An example of the latter would be testing
ment rather than the ‘fruits’ of development. The student memory by showing the students a set
actual developmental level characterizes mental of flash cards of target language, waiting a few
development retroprospectively, while the [ZPD] minutes, and then asking them to write down as
characterizes mental development prospectively… many as they could remember. Although some of
the [ZPD] permits us to delineate the child’s im- the target language may be part of the subject’s
mediate future and his dynamic developmental own lexical set, the test does not impinge on the
state, allowing not only for what already has subject’s understanding of meaning. They could
been achieved developmentally but also for what memorize the letter shapes for example and have
is in the course of maturing. (Vygotsky, 1978, no relationship to the semiotic association with
cited inLantolf & Thorne, 2006, p, 267; author’s the words presented. Just as a toddler blurts out
emphasis) an expletive (if exposed to them) without under-
standing the semiotic meaning but relishing the
Vygotsky had already formed the key principle reaction it generates, learning can be a veneer
of the ZPD concept—the difference between the on the surface without any engagement with
actual level of development already obtained and meaning. Deep learning involves the learner in
the cognitive functions comprising the proximal complete understanding. Weigel (2001) defines
next stage. It was this that is attractive to educators, deep learning succinctly:
as it gives a yardstick to understanding aspects of
students’ emerging capacities and could be used Deep learning leads to understanding and long-
for effective diagnosis of future development. term retention of information through the criti-
Over the period of time Zoe was playing Deus Ex, cal analysis of new ideas and may be defined as
observable changes had occurred. These changes ‘learning that promotes the development of condi-
would signal maturation of her ability to process

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

tionalized knowledge and metacognition through musical performance that we lose our sense of our
communities of inquiry’.(Weigel, 2001, p. 5) surroundings. Gamers twitch or involuntarily jerk
as something happens in the game environment
Conditionalized knowledge here is defined as for example. Goleman adds:
knowledge that specifies the contexts in which it
can be useful. This requires the learner to think Because flow feels so good, it is intrinsically
about how the knowledge can be applied in a rewarding. It is a state in which people become
particular circumstance. It requires engagement utterly absorbed in what they are doing, paying
with the meaning to provide some form of concrete undivided attention to the task, their awareness
example in order to create an artifact that can be merged with their actions. (Goleman, 1995, pp.
used in the mind of the learner. The interviews 90-91)
revealed some of the above characteristics of
Zoe’s development of conditionalized knowledge Although flow has been cited in a number of
within her ZPD, as the excerpts from the interview research articles, there is little empirical research
demonstrate. into what flow actually is. Csikszentmihalyi de-
fined the flow response as a “holistic response”
Flow or an “optimal state of experience in which there
is order in consciousness…This happens when
Regular video game players will engage with a psychic energy, or attention, is invested in realis-
well-crafted video game for a number of hours tic goals, and when skills match the opportunity
at a time. I wondered if this intense focus of for action” (1990 cited in Marr, 2000). Marr
attention was the same as ‘flow’, as posited by (2000) highlights the fact that there has been no
Csikszentmihalyi (1988, cited in Arnold, 1999, p. experimental investigation into the nature of the
15). Arnold describes flow as “a state of optimal somatic states that parallel flow; specifically, the
experience—effortless movement of psychic “visceral and musculoskeletal concomitants to
energy.” Goleman (1995) emphasizes the impor- flow have never been examined.” Whether flow
tance of the presence of this state for learning to is self-generated by increased dopamine levels
take place: in preparation for the anticipated task as Marr
suggests, or a form of meditative state is reached
Flow represents perhaps the ultimate in harness- where certain perception channels are elevated
ing the emotions in the service of performance causing others to be diminished has yet to be fully
and learning. In flow the emotions are not just researched. Nevertheless, good video games do
contained and channeled, but positive, energized produce a state of flow where attention is fully
and aligned with the task at hand. (Goleman, directed at the task presented. I chose the video
1995, cited inArnold, 1999, p. 15) game Deus Ex because of its compelling storyline
and almost flawless linking of game-play and
A gamer may experience the sensation of feedback mechanisms, such as Denton’s databank,
flow as they become more adept at a game. We which make it not only an exciting game to play
could liken it to spectating a professional sports but also a thought-provoking one.
event where we almost feel the movements of the We start the interview evaluation with Zoe’s
players which can be observed as the involuntary experiences playing the first-person shooter Deus
muscle twitches in the leg as a goal is scored be- Ex, a dystopian, cyberpunk world set in the 2050s
cause we are so in tune with the event. Perhaps where a mysterious pandemic is rapidly spreading
it is the way we are sometimes so engrossed by a across the globe. Terrorist organizations flourish

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

as government agencies attempt to maintain or- with the game. She called me first of all to let me
der and stability. You, the player, are about to be know she had stopped playing Deus Ex as she did
trained as a special agent, and all that you know not want to “kill any more Chinese policemen in
is you are ‘nano-augmented’ and the second agent the game.” She sounded a little upset and I was
to be so endowed. Nanotechnology by this time concerned because my experience of game-play
has become sufficiently advanced that ‘nanites’, did not involve having to attack these characters.
small robotic organisms the size of a human cell, We start the interview with Zoe describing her
can be injected into the body and give the player initial reactions to playing Deus Ex.1
superhuman powers. In Deus Ex you and your 131. Zoe: (sitting in front of her laptop) the
brother Paul, who is already working as an agent lucky thing is…when I show some medicine or
in the field, are nano-augmented. There are 11 kind of weapon I can see the shape…I can know
skills used by JC as a special agent: computers, what exactly it is…this is the only thing…I know.
electronics, environmental training, lock picking, Zoe is using visual clues to find out what items
medicine, swimming, and skills with weapons in the virtual environment are used for. In the
from low-tech, melee weapons such as knives next utterance she indicates the game is difficult
and mini-crossbow, pistols and rifles, to heavy to understand. She has not accessed the databank
weapons such as rocket launchers and explosive to find out her mission objectives, but is awaiting
devices. Each of these skills has four levels of aural instruction (from the very effective game
mastery (untrained, trained, advanced, and master) prompts acting as a form of other-regulation when
that can be increased by earning additional points the player strays away from the game’s mission
as you play the game. You start the game with a objectives). She has accessed the map provided
nominal set of points, which you can use to develop and may have used the compass provided by the
you character skills. Deciding how to upgrade your HUD (heads-up display) to work out directions
skills creates a unique character every time you within the environment. Zoe is finding out about
play the game, and overdeveloping one skill at the design of the game, which Gee (2003) calls
the expense of another could leave you with fewer the design principle.2
choices of how to solve problems or puzzles within 133. Zoe: when I’m playing this Deus Ex
the game or may enhance a particular style of play because…but I’m quite understand because they
you favor. Wise decisions need to be made because give me map…that will tell me where you should
once made they cannot be undone. You may be a go…when they go there…actually I don’t know
player who avoids confrontations and decide to what I need to do…so when I face to the enemy
develop your character’s spy skills—lockpick- I just know I got to shoot them to protect myself
ing, hacking, and bypassing security systems for and I just walk anywhere until the ‘contactor’ just
example. Deus Ex is said to be among one of the tell me…‘ah’…you need to do something else…
few role-play games (RPGs) on the market that which means I arrive to the right place so I need
can be played without resorting to violence (except to carry on next mission.
for one unavoidable confrontation), which makes It took her two weeks of play to begin to feel
it unique in providing many alternative styles of confident within the environment, where she was
game-play to reach the same objective. able to develop strategies in order to survive. This is
not dissimilar to the orientation of a tourist arriving
The Interview in a foreign city. Also, the ‘contactor’ Zoe refers to
is a character at the UNATCO headquarters who
The interview was conducted at Zoe’s host family has access to Denton via a neural infolink—the
home, upon her request for assistance to proceed game design effectively has a coach guiding you

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

around the first level. The explicit information many ways in which play may affect children’s
on-demand and just-in-time principle ensures cognitive development, but also their social and
the player is given relevant help just when it is emotional development. Vygotsky (1978, cited
needed. As the player becomes more competent, in Lantolf & Thorne, 2006, p. 185) believed that
the guidance offered is reduced until it is no longer play embodied imagination and that it contained
necessary. This reflects the other-regulation to all the developmental levels in a condensed form.
self-regulation used in Vygotsky’s (1978) genetic Through make-believe play, children were able
method stated earlier. to extend themselves beyond their own cognitive
135. Zoe: Yes! Really funny but…yes the first abilities and therefore present themselves with the
week…I’m just like this kind of confused…and next appropriate ZPD through a process of self-
in the second week I’m just improved…I can reflection and metacognitive thinking. Gee (2003,
understand more…play more martially. p. 67) refers to the self-knowledge principle, which
She has developed a “save-game” strategy states that the virtual world is constructed in such
in order to replay unsuccessful parts in order to a way as to make learners think about themselves
“get them right.” This reflects Erickson’s (1956) and their current and potential capacities as well
moratorium principle and Gee’s (2003)practice as the game domain they are playing in. The game
principle. The psychosocial moratorium principle environment acts upon the player by provoking
(Gee, 2003, p. 67) enables learners to take risks development within their ZPD. The somewhat
in the game environment because real-world con- hostile environment of Deus Ex forced Zoe to
sequences are lowered. Freedom to experiment make numerous game-saves or lose the progress
without direct real-world consequences permits she had made if her character suddenly died.
the learner to develop game (and laterally, real-
world) concepts about life through trial and error. 137. Zoe: I save many times…because sometimes
Begg, Dewhurst, and Macleod (2005) comment I will make a mistake.
on the value of this principle in the training of Kim: you go back and play a different part of
medical doctors, who can make mistakes with the game
their virtual patients without real-world con- Zoe: Yes.
sequences, meanwhile learning and improving Kim: so you could actually be at the beginning
their performance. Good COTS video games of the game playing it at one time and then
constantly juxtapose real and virtual realities so you could be later, playing a different part
that your projected identity (i.e., the character you of the mission
portray in the game—see Tripartite identities and Zoe: actually, I don’t do that…I just continuing…
knowing yourself) is forever being questioned but I’m worry about I will done something
and molded throughout the game. The concept wrong so I always save.
of play has been at the center of many theories
of learning, as it could easily be observed in ac- Good COTS video games tap into our in-
tion through children’s daily activities as they nate sense of survival and self-preservation, and
learned about their environment and their social encourage us to project this onto the character
and emotional world with peers and adults. Piaget we are becoming in the game. Zoe had become
(1962), Bruner (1983), Vygotsky (1978), and Luria emotionally involved with her virtual identity as
(1982), among others, sought to identify how play JC Denton, UNATCO agent. Her desire to show
functioned in the cognitive processes of child me the part of the game where she dispatched
development, and later as maturation takes place. Anna Navarre, another top agent at UNATCO,
Sociocultural theories of play have identified the would demonstrate her competence as a player.

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

Anna’s augmentation utilized older robotics Zoe would want to delete the record of achieve-
technology, and her destruction brought about ment of destroying a powerful enemy, and so
by Denton may be symbolic of the technological perhaps this particular scene was too shocking
race for supremacy where outmoded ways must to Zoe and deleting it may have been cathartic
make way for the new. Anna Navarre is one of the for her. However, she remembers all the details
few game characters that has to be ‘terminated’ quite clearly.
in order to progress through the game—stealth
and avoiding conflict both work effectively as 145. Zoe: (showing Kim earlier save where Anna
strategies otherwise. However, at line 193 Zoe is still alive) this lady…I kill her…you tell
remarks that Anna just “explode herself.” The me I’ve got several chance to kill her….
reason is based on Zoe having found two parts of Kim: there’s different ways actually…yeah.
a code word that act as a ‘killswitch’ or detonation Zoe: but I kill her in aeroplane.
device when spoken to Anna Navarre, a way for Kim: you did?
the government agencies to ultimately control Zoe: Yes.
their creations should they get out of hand. Zoe Kim: alright…erm…interestingly if you do that
had accessed this code through hacking computers the game immediately presumes that you’re
in the UNATCO headquarters. Once the two clues the enemy…is that right?
had been found, it was only a matter of repeating 151. Zoe: No, no yet! I’m very lucky because that
them in sequence during a conversation with Anna communicator, the contactor, and then he
for the kill switch to take effect. Zoe was taken by says ‘oh you shouldn’t kill her’ but he say
surprise (193: I just be injured) as the blast from you did anyway…he says…because at this
Anna’s mechanized body detonating caused her time only me and you know you kill her so
to lose health points. I will help you to cover up this thing.

194: Kim: She…you didn’t have to do anything… Zoe returns to her boss’s office and has to select
you attacked her or? a response—which she does (emboldened below).
Zoe: No just talking to me and suddenly she She, as the projected identity JC Denton, has
explode herself. now effectively lied to her boss. Zoe has already
Kim: Oh, that’s interesting, how did that happen? started to form a virtual identity, which she is
Have you got that saved? prepared to protect in the game environment by
Zoe: I don’t think so because I don’t like that fabricating the truth.
part…perhaps I delete already (pause)…
Yes I delete it. Excerpt from Deus Ex Script3
Kim: Are you deleting it because…I mean…why JC DENTON: I have some bad news about
are you deleting parts of games that you’ve Agent Navarre.
saved before? MANDERLEY: No shit. What the hell happened
Zoe: something I think is not that important be- in there?
cause I can save some (tape ends). JC DENTON: Lebedev. A surprise attack.
MANDERLEY: I find that hard to believe. You’re
It appears that Zoe unwittingly terminated digging your own grave if you cover up for
Anna without fully realizing what she was do- your brother.
ing. She also erased games that she claims were JC DENTON: Yes, sir. I’m not covering up for
unimportant or because she required space for her Paul, sir.
college work (523). It made no sense to me that

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

MANDERLEY: Because he’s gone, JC. I hope say ‘Oh yeah great…you’re such a hero and
you’ll understand this. The Coalition has you done many many things’ something like
shut down his augmentations and activated that and ‘I wish I can go with you to carry
the killswitch. on this mission’ something like that…and I
JC DENTON: Activated…what? just think…they just like my brother or er,
MANDERLEY: Some very important officials we have very good partnership…I have very
have become nervous, nervous about Paul good relationship with all these soldiers…
but also about you. feel very comfortable and I’m be free to go
JC DENTON: I think I’ve proved myself. Can into the UNATCO or go out…I’m very free
they really kill him—by pressing a button? to go around that location…but suddenly…
MANDERLEY: Yes—and you, too. So take I’m being arrest and I’m thrown into security
these orders seriously. They’re sending you prison and all these people…they’re not my
to Hong Kong. friends at all…suddenly I feel it’s a trap…
just like trap and….
The above dialogue highlights the threat of Kim: so you needed to delete that part of the
a killswitch implanted in all nano-augmented game yeah?
UNATCO agents, which Zoe did not quite grasp 210: Zoe: Yeah, such a very erm…depress
as a concept. She had some concept of her own memories…it’s not a good memory which
character exploding uncontrollably once she was depress me.
in Hong Kong (248). She may have spent con-
siderable time playing the game with it ending What is apparent from the above quotes is that
abruptly because she had not addressed the need deleting the game saves from the computer has not
to deactivate the killswitch. deleted the emotional trauma associated with the
The earlier comment on game deletion is inter- loss of status, position, power, and camaraderie
esting to note because in line 202, Zoe is recalling she had initially with the UNATCO characters in
the scene where she gets arrested and imprisoned the game. More noteworthy are how the comments
at the UNATCO headquarters, having been on the made by the AI (artificial intelligence—non-player
run from UNATCO for Anna Navarre’s murder. characters that respond to your character to cre-
ate the illusion of reality) are memorized almost
202: Zoe: Yes, very…what can I say…just the verbatim by Zoe, expressions that to a native-
whole situation been changed…because speaker playing the game would be considered
before I’m the member of UNATCO and ‘throw-away’ lines in the game-play scenario.
suddenly I’m be arrest and they will take Zoe has adopted a strategy of clicking on every
all my weapons and medicine and any kind AI character until no more useful information is
of things and they throw me into a kind of forthcoming and the phrases presented are super-
little room. fluous to the plot. Here is an example:
…
208: Zoe: because before I never played this GUARD 1
game and you never told me he will face If you need help, talk to one of the receptionists.
this situation and suddenly (Kim: (laughing) You do not require a security pass to visit the first
sorry…) and all the people…because…can three levels of offices.
you remember…at the first few missions Late night….
when I complete them I back to UNATCO My feet are killing me.
center I see many many soldiers and they Hope you find who you are looking for.

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

The last three phrases are padding, but for a Zoe had made associations in order to understand
language learner they can be informative collo- the context of her character JC Denton within
quial expressions in the L2 . Zoe has been accessing the gaming environment and was also able to
these (for each and every character) throughout emotionally identify closely with the character as
the game. More significantly, she is able to recall Denton becomes hunted as an enemy of UNATCO.
the expressions easily from their embodiment Gee (2003, p. 209) makes reference to three more
within the video game storyline. Deus Ex pro- key principles that enabled Zoe to learn within
vides the player with a “memory bank” of past the game’s environment. The first two are the
conversations, written word-for-word. This gives situated meaning principle and the text principle,
the learner an opportunity to access the language where signs and signifiers are understood because
both aurally and visually. This reflects the dual- of their embodiment in the context of the game,
coding theory research of Paivio (1990, 1991) and where moving back and forth between text
and Clark and Paivio (1991, cited in Rieber et al., and embodied experience permits growth within
1996, p. 2). Within Deus Ex, referential process- this learner’s own ZPD:
ing opportunities occur at cinematic cuts or when
a player clicks on an in-game character in order To understand or produce any word, symbol,
to obtain information. Referential processing is image or artifact in a given semiotic domain, a
particularly important because dual coding theory person must be able to situate the meaning of that
predicts that learning will be enhanced when in- word, symbol, image or artifact within embodied
formation is encoded in both systems (i.e., dually experiences of action, interaction, or dialogue in
coded). Information that is dually coded has twice or about the domain.(Gee, 2003, p. 24)
the chance to be retrieved and used (Kobayashi,
1986). There is no limit to the number of times a A language learner must have access to the situ-
learner accesses this information, which enables ation where that word or symbol, image or artifact
them to repeat and create representational struc- was taken from in order to create meaning—an
tures undisturbed by other elements of the game. embodied experience of action, interaction, or
Although there is no appropriate grading of the dialogue. This is defined as active learning or
language in COTS games, given the opportunity situated learning. The richly immersive world of
to employ study skills, a learner can access a video games can supply highly detailed embodied
much richer use of the L2 than may be possible experiences. Gee (2003) highlights the need for
within immersion classrooms for example, where the player to be able to participate in ‘affinity
pedagogic principles of “comprehensible input” groups’ or ‘groups’ within the semiotic domain.
and “caretaker talk” (Ellis, 1994, pp. 248-267) This is the third principle alluded to above, the
limit teachers’ use of the language as they guard semiotic domains principle. Zoe was clearly proud
learners against unnecessary exposure to certain to be a part of UNATCO, but her affinity group no
(grammatical and pragmatic) forms of language longer regarded her as a friend. Zoe has trouble
and monitor the quantity of content delivered so accepting this loss and creating a new affinity
as to avoid cognitive overload. COTS video games group in Hong Kong. The metalevel thinking
were never designed with language learners in about semiotic domains principle focuses on the
mind, so none of the above restraints are present ability of the learner to apply critical thinking (i.e.,
during game-play. In fact, they have been created not passive thinking) about the relationships of
to be richly immersive environments for a native semiotic domains being learned to other semiotic
speaker. The language learner receives exposure domains. Zoe’s awareness of her imminent death
to the L2 as it was originally intended. Clearly, by activation of the killswitch clearly worried her,

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

having seen its effect on Anna Navarre. Now she headquarters and find Tracer Tong in Hong Kong
is on the receiving end. Her inability to locate which reinforces Gee’s (2003, p. 67) committed
Tracer Tong in Hong Kong may have led her to learning principle, concerning commitment to the
seek external assistance from this researcher in virtual character within a compelling virtual world.
order to preserve her virtual self as successful
agent, although as you will see later, other events Tripartite Identities
were preventing Zoe from forming her new identity
with the affinity group in Hong Kong. Gee (2003) argues from a sociocultural perspective
Zoe had put in many hours of game-play in that learning as deep, critical learning will come
order to develop Denton’s skills—the achieve- about only if the learner has made the commitment
ment principle states that there must be sufficient to take on the identity of “a person who can learn,
rewards offered at each level of the game to al- use and value the new semiotic domain” (Gee,
low the learner to continue towards mastery and 2003, p. 59). In other words, unless the learner
sufficient signposting given for the learner to has decided that the new domain is accessible to
recognize when he or she has been rewarded. In them as a member of this new community, they
Deus Ex those rewards are improvements to your cannot participate in it because they do not consider
core skills or your weapon accuracy or upgrading themselves eligible or even capable members of
of your augmentations. However, Zoe appears this new group. Zoe’s reluctance to associate with
more taken by the AI comments of her being an the terrorists in Hong Kong may have hindered
effective agent in the field (see 208 above). her ability to progress any further or resolve the
The intertextual principle could be seen as pressing issue of the killswitch, the terrorists being
having a more global understanding of certain the only ones with the technology to deactivate it.
categories of text, through exposure to a number Perhaps the semiotic label ‘terrorist’ had powerful,
of embodied experiences within a number of do- negative associations for Zoe to the extent that she
mains. Zoe travels to Hong Kong where she will did not want to associate with them. To develop
meet a ‘terrorist leader’ that was supporting Paul, her virtual identity, Zoe must perceive herself as
her character’s brother, another nano-augmented “a person who can learn, use and value the new
agent who has been terminated by UNATCO for semiotic domain” (Gee, 2003, p. 59). Zoe would
his involvement with Tong and his cohorts. Zoe need to forge links from her primary real-world
will have no choice but to drop the identity she identity (the multitude of identities she portrays to
created at UNATCO and start to build a new one others in society) to her secondary virtual identity
using the embodied experiences the game presents (the way she perceives herself as a character in
her with. Her ability to cast off the old and adopt this game). Our real-world identity is what helps
the new will also be a guide as to her ability to us understand who we are, and includes our moral,
recognize the intertextual ‘genre’ of building a cultural, and political viewpoints too. In the third
personal identity and will be a measure of how identity, the projected identity, the learner builds
she has developed within her ZPD as the game through projecting their own wishes, goals, aspira-
provokes her towards this goal. Sadly, Zoe is tions, and personality onto the virtual identity and
reluctant to identify herself with Chinese terror- is a combination of the other two. It is through this
ists, although UNATCO regards her as a common process of juxtaposition of real-world and virtual
criminal now and the memories of this depress world identities that we achieve deep learning via
her (210). Despite this, she continued to play—in our projected identities (Gee, 2003, p. 66).
game-play terms she would have had to play for There is nothing to stop Zoe from restarting
a considerable time in order to exit the UNATCO the game or mission and playing the character JC

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

Denton in quite a different way. This is a com- who killed my parents and caused…I lost
mon strategy among gamers as they learn from my brother…and I’m going to find out the
the experience of failure in the game as to what truth in Hong Kong and I need to find out
works and what does not within the confines of the people who is called…strange Chinese
the game. It also enables you as the player to name…Tang Sing Tong or something like
direct your game-play according to the desired this.
combination of real-world and virtual-world
identities (the multiple routes principle). If Zoe As a player Zoe appears more confident and
had simply played the game without participat- aware of the goals she needs to achieve at this stage
ing in the game domain—that is, as an external of the game now that I have provoked her ZPD,
observer—her description of her arrest would and she starts to self-regulate her thoughts again.
be vague and non-committal. However, she was
highly emotionally charged, even after not having 242: Zoe: I feel quite weird because…when I
played for three weeks. She was also not happy arrived Hong Kong…I got so many thing I
to enter the game environment again during the need to do…first…and then second.
interview, describing it as scary. Kim: (laughs) can you remember them…after
3 weeks?
Interview Continued: 244: Zoe: I remember he said I need to find this
Provoking Zoe’s ZPD guy…what’s his name?
Kim:Tracer Tong.
The emotional bonds Zoe had created demonstrat- 246: Zoe: yeah, Tracer Tong (this guy).
ed a strong virtual identity had been developed, Kim: yeah, why do you need to find Tong?
along with her projected identity as a good team 248: Zoe: because he said I need, I must to con-
player within the UNATCO staff and soldiers. tact these people because he’s a friend of
Losing this bond was quite painful for her. I would my brother and then I can get more details
argue that Zoe’s projected identity as an important from this guy. I think he’s the leader of ter-
member of the group within the game was formed rorists in Hong Kong. [So I have to.] And
by her virtual self becoming an integral part of the another thing is my brother and I…we are
community of practice (Lave & Wenger, 1991) no natural people we are been…what can I
that consisted of agents working for UNATCO. say…our body is been modify…can I say
Zoe had put herself on the virtual payroll at UN- that…with part of some…just like…robot…
ATCO! Once she had lost this identity (through some systems which is in our body…my
the intentional game design of terminating agent brother already die…this is why I need
Navarre), the loss may have been such that her to…when I…in UNATCO, I need to send
motivation to continue had all but stopped. Nev- some details from his dead body and the
ertheless, she found the game so compelling she people…I’m quite confused because they
eventually asked for my help. At this stage in the say something like…I’m quite special and
game-play, Zoe, as JC Denton, is unsure of her quite unusual…I’m different compared with
character’s real identity and background, though my brother because I didn’t…(what can I
she has some certainties. say) very strange…I don’t understand this
part…just that…I didn’t…oh! very strange
218: Zoe: yeah, I think so…but at the time I’m but at least I am sure when I arrive in Hong
definitely sure that UNATCO is my enemy… Kong they said my body will be explode or
because I know that they are the organization something…over…my life will be over…

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

so I only got 12 hours to a life…I need to but I’m still alive…but the thing is…in my
find out Tracer Tong to sort out this problem. brother and I…inside of our bodies there
249: Kim: okay, so Tracer Tong knows the answer is something what UNATCO gave us…and
to stop your body exploding. something like killswitch…I think it is a
Zoe: yeah, something like that. kind of explosion system.
Kim: it’s a time bomb.
In line 248 Zoe is summarizing her goals on an 264: Zoe: yeah, which will…when they are turn…
‘actions to do’ level, while on a metalevel she is switch on the key and then we will explode
recreating her virtual identity and her character’s ourselves…something like that.
reason for existence. She is aware that her brother
Paul is dead and that UNATCO is to blame, is In line 261 Zoe hesitates to say ‘dead’—per-
the enemy (218), and is also responsible for JC’s haps she still does not accept that her character
parents’ death. Notice too how Zoe has resigned will die soon, without any enemy confrontation
herself to accepting the need to associate with the occurring, if she does not act fast. By line 264
affinity group of terrorists in Hong Kong, almost I have provoked understanding of certainty of
under her breath, as private speech (so I have to). death unless she takes action to locate Tong. I
Zoe had called me to help her at this stage locate the Primary Goals screen and ensure Zoe
of the game as she seemed overwhelmed with understands these (265) and the location of Max
the complexities that were unfolding within the Chen, another potential ally and link to Tong’s
game narrative. I decided to clarify the urgency whereabouts. She recalls a scene vividly from
of canceling the killswitch as a priority (249). I inside Chen’s Lucky Money Club (282), which
direct her to an important conversation with Jock, she used as a refuge from MJ12 commando units
the helicopter pilot, an ally. (super-robots that are created to up the stakes of
the in-game demands on the player).
256: Zoe: Hmm (reading). Twelve hours. Kills-
witch. 282: Zoe: because I get some details from Max
Kim: yeah, I think that’s the keyword here. Chen I think…and another strange thing
Zoe: Yeah. is, when I get into Lucky Money and that
Kim: that they’re talking about the killswitch… Max Chen and then somebody follow me,
in other words… actually…they get into the Lucky Money
Zoe: so I will be… and shoot us…and Max Chen has lots and
261: Kim: dead (Zoe: dead) so that’s what hap- lots of bodyguards that in battle with these
pened to your brother…so UNATCO can guys…and then the both of them…many
switch this thing on…(Zoe: off) well people die…when the battle finish…and
basically, once they start the switch…it’s then I just go to the…what can I say…go
like they press the switch, 12 hours later to the front room of Lucky Money…many
you’re dead. many people lay on the ground…I saw the
262: Zoe: yeah, I remember this…oh yes…when people who follow me…they are like kind
I stay in UNATCO center…when I met my of policemen but I don’t think they are…
former boss…when he talk with that guy they looks quite…they not natural people
(Kim: Walter Simons) yeah…and then the because they’re wearing kind of machines,
guy who in the Walter Simon he saw me and something….
he said ‘We will kill you. You won’t alive Kim: do they move like people, or you haven’t
in next 24 hours’…something like this… seen them move yet…they’re just dead.

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

284: Zoe: I think I saw one…they are very very 396: Zoe: I can go into here, but when I…
powerful…really hard to kill. Yeah. So I strange…I don’t know…(giggles) perhaps
didn’t join the battle! Too hard!…I thought because you’re here!
‘Oh my God!’ (Kim: (laughs) okay…prob- Kim: because I’m sitting here it suddenly works!
ably wise!) Yeah, when I saw they are follow (laughs)
me I just ran into the Max Chen’s room and 398: Zoe: you’re lying, you’re cheating!
I closed the door…when they finish I open Kim: what was happening before?
and go out. 400: Zoe: before when I press this kind of keys
(the F keys along the top of the keyboard)
This rich description of a massacre and the the game would suddenly just be…stopped.
power these new characters wield appear to have
frightened Zoe into a state of inaction. I decided Nevertheless, they worked when I used them,
to investigate her use of augmentations, as she which Zoe was pleased to observe. Returning to
would need these to survive the next stages of (300) indicates why there may have been problems
the game. I discovered she was poorly equipped with the augmentations.
as a player in this department (289) and that she
considered the augmentations practically useless. Kim: let’s take a look at your health now.
300: Zoe: I’m always being very healthy...and I
292: Zoe: I don’t use that actually…I think already…
they’re useless! Perhaps because I didn’t Kim: you’ve got 253 (normal game supply is four
upgrade them…so they only comes out very or five per mission!)…now is that from pick-
slightly…result…so they are not that helpful. ing them up in the game or (Zoe: No)
Kim: but you upgraded your strength, yeah? have you used ‘cheats’?
294: Zoe: it’s not that helpful…i think if I can up 302: Zoe: of course used ‘cheats’.
to four…level four then might be very useful. Kim: okay tell me.
295: Kim: so your actual augmentations…you 304: Zoe: because in the game.
don’t really switch them on then when you Kim: tell me about using ‘cheats’…how many
go into a battle or…(Zoe: no) when you’re ‘cheats’ have you used?
trying to avoid people or… 306: Zoe: erm, just several times...one I changed
296: Zoe: I even try once but…it’s not that helpful. this medicine number…number of this
medicine box and er, number of ammos…I
Interestingly she seems reluctant to experiment had lots and lots of weapons but…most
with using the augmentations in any aspect of the useful one I think is this one…(points to
game. Even the built-in augmentation of a light sniper rifle) 2006 ammo because it’s very…
is not used. There appear to be technical reasons. you can see the details with this one…first
the maxi range is very good and you have
393: Kim: do you ever use your light? silencer…very very quiet…I think ‘maxi’
394: Zoe: this is why I’m want to talk about with range is the most important thing…it’s very
you…I don’t know why this game…they… high…I can shoot very far away and then…
it takes a long time to…when I press F12 without people knowing.
and then it switch on the light but you have
to wait a long time to start to move. Zoe has resorted to using cheats to gain unlim-
395: Kim(to start to move?) show me…right ited health, unlimited ammunition, and advance all
you’ve got a light. her physical skills. She was also distancing herself

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

from potential enemies and picking them off like a which was inappropriate because there were no
sniper—an effective strategy. Her off-hand manner threats initially, as the military police were friendly
with regard to the use of cheats (302) indicates she towards her character JC Denton. However, Zoe
considers this to be an expected compromise by decided she needed to get some information from
gamers and not at all unusual. She either decided the police headquarters in the marketplace. The
that augmentation is not helping her achieve her character Maggie Chow offers to help JC, but she
goals or she felt the need to supplant the dearth is merely using him as a pawn in her own game
of augmentation canisters with other (unlimited) to incite a feud between the two triad gangs. She
options. Two questions come to mind: Is aug- gives the code for a secret vault in the police HQ
mentation considered to be akin to ‘defiling the to JC, but the answers he is looking for are not
body’, which is considered unacceptable in some there—the first double cross the player experi-
cultures, and does that hold true for the Chinese ences in the game. This action resulted in Zoe
culture; and is Zoe using cheats to compensate shooting at least one Chinese military policeman.
for her unwillingness to use the augmentations? (There may have been two more in the station—I
Using cheats is certainly an accepted part of gamer decided not to look as I believed Zoe was deeply
strategy to continue playing, despite the real-world embarrassed at committing such acts, and this
inabilities of the gamer (Gee, 2003, p. 187). Good may have been the reason for such a long delay
COTS video games allow for degrees of autism before informing me of the difficulties she was
among its players, and cheat codes permit players experiencing). A number of possible solutions
to overcome particular weaknesses that would could have been available to her, but she did
otherwise prevent their continuing or participat- not seem to have considered them—using a riot
ing in the game. Despite giving herself endless prod to render AI unconscious or wearing a camo
health kits and unlimited ammunition, Zoe came suit (345 below) were not being considered by
to realize she is no match for the demands being Zoe, neither to avoid detection when snooping
made on her character in the virtual world and so around nor as a strategy to escape when under
retired from play for three weeks. Nevertheless, attack—both very effective strategies. What was
the game was so compelling that Zoe was unwill- more surprising was the disdain she held for the
ing to return the CD-ROM to me even though I objects discarded as rubbish (Zoe: I’ve already
had offered to take it back during one tutorial threw them over 5 already). I decided to provoke
session; instead she was determined to solve the her ZPD on this issue.
issues that were still vividly active in her mind
three weeks later. She had already discussed the 340: Zoe: (reading from Denton’s databank)
lack of strategies (41) at the beginning of the game computing system…they can render an agent
and was now confronted by the need to provide invincible to…
another set of strategies at a much higher level. Kim: is that ‘invincible’?
She had advanced-level skills using the cheats so 342: Zoe: ‘invisible’(Kim: Ohh! ; Zoe laughs)
she was effectively playing as a ‘grand master’, to both humans or bots by dynamically…
but without augmentation, she was mortal. Aug- Kim: etcetera etcetera yeah…a bit of technical
mentation leads to possession of god-like powers, English there…(reading) dynamically re-
as the initial cinematic introduction and the title fracting light and radar waves…so, basically
of the game itself indicates. Zoe had reached the it makes you invisible.
limits of her ZPD. Her strategies were now use- 344: Zoe: but they are not very useful.
less to her. In fact, she was still using a New York
UNATCO ‘shoot on sight’ strategy in Hong Kong

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

There is still reluctance to use this equipment 352: Zoe: yeah, it’s Chinese people’s fault…I
for some reason. I decide to provoke another area think until today, Chinese people’s minds
altogether—her culture. haven’t been independent, haven’t been…
(pause) rescued…you can say…we are
345: Kim: it’s like a magic cloak (Zoe: hmm→). still in limited opinion…just like can you
well, you’ve got one so let’s see how you remember why, the past hundred years why
could possibly use it… (Zoe: I’ve already China been ruined by Western people…
threw them over 5 already.) I’m sure you because the last Chinese dynasty we closed
could find some more. What’s interesting our market…we closed Chinese land…we
about this is that at the moment you are don’t allow our residents go out to trade
saying you can’t play any further because with another country. (Kim: right.) We are
you keep getting shot by Chinese police. no interest in outside world.

Zoe ‘complained’ to me that she could not Zoe has been reflecting deeply on Western and
play Deus Ex any further without “having to Chinese cultural differences and is heavy with
shoot Chinese military police.” I now discover emotion about Chinese people being misunder-
she has disposed of at least five opportunities to stood in the West. Her comments about Chinese
become invisible while investigating situations people’s minds not having been independent, and
and places, thereby remaining undetected and not having been rescued provokes questions in my
avoiding bloodshed. own mind about whether they are independent
and rescued now. Does Zoe consider they are? I
346: Zoe: it’s not only like that…I’m not pleased provoke further.
to play foreign game which (inaudible ‘when
they travel?’) China because I think Western 353:Kim: okay, so how does that…
people they always misunderstand Chinese 354: Zoe: We’re proud of our civilization. So
culture and people and life…they always until today is same thing happen. Even we
criticize them, they always blame something open our market we are pleased people to…
which they don’t agree. foreign people trade with us…to do some
347: Kim: I’m sorry…who disagrees? commercial thing.
348: Zoe: Western people. 355: Kim: my point is, here you are in this game
but you won’t go any further…why is that?
There seems to be considerable bottled-up 356: Zoe: This is what I’m talking about.
emotion. I persist. 357: Kim: okay, explain again ’cos I can’t.
358: Zoe: my feeling!
349: Kim: about what?
350: Zoe: about anything I think because for West- I understand her argument to be that Western
ern people China is too foreign, too foreign minds do not understand Chinese culture because
and many cultures can blame many issues… China has been “closed to the West for so long.”
can bring up many issues and many things What I don’t understand is how a Chinese player,
people don’t accept and they disagree with. playing an American secret agent, still finds it okay
351: Kim: but my issue here is that you’re playing to kill a Chinese military policeman without any
the game, you’re in China, your Chinese, justification (other than needing to get into the
naturally by birth…so… police station in order to continue her mission).

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

The proof must be in the game itself, so I decide pick up something people will run there to
to investigate. rung bell. (Kim: sure.)

359: Kim: just go into the game, show me where Zoe has not experimented or if she has, she has
you are in the market. forgotten as it is quite possible to walk around the
Zoe: (looking at Saved Games) Lucky Money… market with a drawn weapon without encountering
no I get out from there. any opposition. It is the discharging of weapons
Kim: so what’s happened…have you met Max that causes the alarms to activate. She has taken the
Chen at this point (Zoe: yes) and have you word of a Chinese policeman AI character as ‘law
been into the Versalife building? to be obeyed’ and she obeyed it. Interestingly, the
Zoe: no yet because I cannot. real-world law (within Zoe’s domain as a Chinese
Kim: okay, so it’s locked to you. national) appears to be stronger than the virtual
Zoe: (perhaps I will meet some enemy) I’m just game law at this stage. The real-world semiotics
scared play this game sometimes! have powerful representations in the virtual world
until such time as the player wishes to break those
Zoe claims to be quite frightened by the game codes, as Zoe does by shooting a policeman, pro-
environment, but retains her composure while we tected by the psychosocial moratorium principle.
look around the market. Zoe may have spent many hours of game-play
trying to find answers to Tong’s whereabouts, fully
371: Kim: okay, so you’ve looked at data cubes knowing her virtual life was coming towards an
and what do you do when you read that? end. In an act of desperation, I believe she resorted
If you just click on it…that’s the free map, to violence against the military police in an effort
okay…so you’ve picked up the map…erm, to try to uncover mission-critical facts, unaware
so have you been involved in any gun fights that this was a ‘red herring’ in the game design.
or anything in the market at all…or are you The game does not just spoon-feed the player with
just walking through the market…you’re not facts and information—the player must tease it
actually shooting anybody in the market. out of the game environment, which is hard work.
Zoe: I’m not, because when I arrived there at Gee (2003, p. 90) calls this the probing principle.
first time…I think the policemen they move For example Zoe:
by themselves…but before there’s another
policeman sitting…standing in there…he 1. Probes the virtual world to gather data,
was standing there and I talking to him and 2. Creates some hypothesis based on this data,
he said ‘no one can show their gun in this 3. Reprobes the world by applying the hypoth-
market’ so I always just take my empty hand esis to see the effects, and
go into there. If I pick up any weapons from 4. Responds to the feedback.
my pockets and then I think the policemen
will start to shoot me…something like this This principle could be seen as cyclic for every
because when this residents saw me take a independent action the player carries out in the
gun people will terrified and will run away. game, and a player may need to juggle a number of
Kim: what, you’ve done that? these separate cycles depending on the complexity
Zoe: I didn’t (Kim: oh you haven’t then) but of the storyline. Gee (2003, p. 90) comments that
I suggest it will happened and there is a without this strategy in place, a player would not
warning bell..(Kim: yeah yeah) yeah, if I get very far in a video game. Clearly, Zoe had tried
everything in her power to progress through the

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

game. She had reached the limits of her ZPD as far Kim: okay, so you feel you need to go in there
as the game domain was concerned. I provoke her for some reason?
development at this critical stage, but first notice 384: Zoe: because inside have first a TV control
something strange about the way she holds her system I can, when I go there I can switch
fingers over the keyboard of her laptop. I ‘drive’ off. Then I can go to many place.
for a moment to see what the problem is. Kim: why do you need to switch that off?→
375: Kim: let’s just go down this road…how 386: Zoe: I dunno—sometimes I think it’s im-
do you…(keyboard configuration to control portant (giggles).
character movement does not work for Kim)…
oh, you use different patterns altogether to go In 376 Zoe refers to a Chinese policeman
forward…(Zoe: there’s a robot in there) and the who she has shot dead. She mentions the act but
robot’s ‘green’ (friendly) at the moment, okay. refers to the character as this (not him). Unless
Zoe has changed the key bindings, which con- she means to utter the phrase “I kill(ed) this man,”
trol movement and bring up information screens but in her next breath she identifies him by using
and call up weapons and other devices from her the job title ‘Chinese military police’ but does not
inventory. I did not clarify what changes she add gender (policeman). I wondered if this was
had made so as not to interrupt the flow of her a strategy to lessen the act and divorce herself
description of the current situation. Watching the from it by remaining gender-neutral or gender-
contortions she had to put her fingers through to less. Her argument for having to enter the police
carry out simple movements was revealing as she HQ using violence demonstrates her overarching
had positioned many keys in close proximity— aim to meet the game goals even if it meant kill-
nevertheless she still seemed unsure of which keys ing a Chinese authority figure. In contrast to her
did what. This could have been what was causing concerned voice on the phone when she called
her such difficulties in fending off opponents to tell me about not wanting to kill any more
earlier in the game and now presented a problem Chinese characters in the game, Zoe seems quite
of control at a higher level of play. Additionally, calm now. It is as if, having shown me the deed,
laptop keyboards are much more compact and do she has been absolved of the crime. I decide to
not offer the raked profile of a large keyboard, retrace my steps and ensure she understands all
but lie flat, which could be presenting Zoe with the basic elements of the storyline.
more physical control issues. I return the laptop
control to Zoe. 405: Kim: how do you feel about the two games…
i mean…do you think you’ll carry on with
376: Zoe: (aside: you see this, I kill this). Deus Ex?
Kim: who’s that? Zoe: perhaps not…really…if I will play again…
378: Zoe:Chinese Military Police (smiles). perhaps I will start in the middle or from
Kim: so you did shoot him? the beginning start because…as now I’m
380: Zoe:  yes. in Hong Kong…I feel is…the story of this
Kim: okay→ um…why did you shoot him? game is getting deeper and more complex.
382: Zoe: because I need to get into there (indicates Kim: it gets even more complex…i assure you.
police station) yeah…when I picked this, Zoe: Yes, of course…because in the beginning
opened this (Kim: that’s the police station I’m a member of UNATCO…and at the
is it?) Yes. When I get into there but I’m end I’m joined to terrorism group…and
no allow in. then become enemy of UNATCO…and
UNATCO is a fake…is not right…is work

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

for money…is no work for government… to take these things away’…and I think it’s
no work for the residents…this is…which is alright…but…the second time…i mean…
disappoint me…a lot and shock me…and… after I achieve this goal…after I complete
on the other hand…. this mission…the next time when I see this
thing is…they are just next to my brother’s
She seems keen to start over with the new dead body…well…i dunno…i think some-
information, although there is reluctance too and thing wrong about those things…which is
she has not come to terms with the concept of not right.
working outside of a government framework in Kim: but you’d learnt to recover them…what
the Hong Kong environment, which I suggest is and then UNATCO own them…UNATCO
to do with her Communist Party upbringing and have them.
her unwillingness to associate with terrorists, 416: Zoe: I think they have them just for…it’s
even in a virtual world. I check her comprehen- an important element to support their secret
sion of the plot. testing…or something…do you think so?

409: Kim: did you understand the plot with the I was surprised that Zoe had not grasped the
Grey Death…this sort of plague and the special significance of these objects. She had
vaccine that you’re trying to find…did you a photo and description of one in her data files
understand that part of the story…you know and had risked her virtual life on a number of
you had to find those big green canisters… dangerous missions in order to secure them for
sort of bubbling liquid? UNATCO. The whole narrative of Deus Ex is based
Zoe: Yes. on their very existence, but Zoe seems to have
411: Kim: do you know what they were…part missed the point: Ambrosia is a vaccine against
of the story? the Grey Death, is manufactured by Versalife,
Zoe: before I don’t know…because I remember and is in short supply, hence the importance of
the contactor he always tell me ‘you need UNATCO preventing it from getting into anyone
to find these…there is three bottles of this else’s hands. I explain a little more of the plot,
green water, or something…green liquid…i and concept check vaccine and antidote with a
don’t know what’s it for but anyway I found dictionary. Zoe makes the association with Bird
this…these three bottles. Flu and then corrects herself to mean the cure,
413: Kim: can I tell you what they are? not the disease. She realizes that Ambrosia is a
positive thing, so must have thought that it was
I started to go into an explanation of the plot for negative uses, such as poison. I cannot see
instead of ‘concept checking’. I was starting to why she made this assumption at the beginning
feel tired after nearly three hours of interview. Zoe of the game, but decided not to ask her so as not
stopped me and wanted to explain her understand- to embarrass her. I refer to a bilingual dictionary
ing, which seemed a better idea. She seems to be to define ‘vaccine’.
very alert still—perhaps because she can sense that
solutions to her game-play will be provided soon. 426. Zoe: its like this…(shows dictionary).
Kim: like an antidote…okay…is there another
414: Zoe: no…before you tell me I tell you…and word that you know? What does a doctor
then when they said ‘good you’ve found out give you to stop you getting the disease?
these three bottles and then we will send a 428. Zoe: cure? Medicine.
group of military to cover up…to find out…

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

Kim: yeah what sort of medicine…I’ll give 442. Zoe: they want to survive more people.
you another word…do you know the word Kim: exactly…they’re trying to protect their own
‘vaccine’? people…so when you realize that that’s why
430. Zoe: hmm…oh yes…like bird flu!4 you join NSF…because you realize they’re
Kim: yes okay. trying to protect the ordinary people.
432. Zoe: or another normal flus…so…hmm…to 444. Zoe: the government want to abandon use-
protect you before you get this thing. less people.
Kim: so those green bottles you were looking for
in Deus Ex…they are a vaccine. In 442 (they want to survive more people), Zoe
434. Zoe: ahhh??? But it’s a positive thing…i now sees the reason the NSF wanted to capture
thought they are…. the Ambrosia shipments from UNATCO—in order
Kim: they’re a positive thing, no, they’re a good to save ordinary people. She may have a concept
thing…but there is a limited supply of the of the NSF as ‘freedom fighters’ now. Initially,
vaccine…just like with the bird flu…they Denton as a UNATCO agent is fighting the NSF,
can only make so much of it…so who do a supposedly terrorist organization. The plot of
they give it to? Deus Ex plays with the concept of “one man’s
436. Zoe: I think…of course…because the vaccine terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter”—a
is limited we can’t give every single person quote spoken by a character in the novel Harry’s
in the world so we… Game by Gerald Seymour, constantly making the
Kim: so who decides who gets the vaccine? player consider whose side he or she is on. Zoe’s
438. Zoe: government. provoked ZPD leads to her self-regulating her
Kim: hmmm…who does the government mission goals and purposes as Denton:
give the vaccine to?
440. Zoe: the most important people first…the 444: Zoe: the government want to abandon use-
wealthy people or like this country (Britain) less people.
it’s the Royal Family first and another fa- Kim: and let them die of this death…but it also
mous celebrity like…celebrity of sport…or turns out…the more you look at the story
singers…this kind of…businessmen…this you find out that the Grey Death was cre-
kind of people…poor people especially… ated by…
for example in America like black people Zoe:UNATCO…government!
like New Orleans…these5 people will be Kim: well by…some government agency…to
abandoned…because they are useless…they kill people so the government could take
are no valuable to the government. control…that’s what happens in the next
Kim: so that’s really what the story of Deus Ex is part…when you go into Versalife you’ll find
about…you start off working for UNATCO out a bit more information!
and you start off getting this…the first raid Zoe: so who I am!?
you do…when you go up into the Statue Kim: sorry…how do you end or who do you
of Liberty Island…you have to tell the become… well you’ll have to find out!
NSF boss…you arrest him at the top of the If you’re interested enough.
building (Zoe: yes yes) and he has one of the Zoe: I don’t understand! If my parent’s could
canisters…or you were trying to stop them die, which means they’re nat(ural?)…nor-
because they were taking the canisters…so mal person so why my brother and I we’re
really the NSF were stealing these vaccines half machine…we are half robots…we no
from UNATCO…or from the government. not natural people any more… (Kim: that’s

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

something you’ll need to discover) …our- Zoe: is it illegal thing? (Kim: Oh yes! Laughs.)
selves have been modified…why? … Something bloody ...something
and why chose me? darkness…or it’s something good for
Kim: these are questions that the game will an- people…good for residents…
swer (chuckles). Kim: ummmm…
Zoe: why they chose me…and no choose anybody
else? how special I am. Zoe’s final question still demands to know if
the Chinese government is being slandered in any
Zoe seems excited to discover the answers to way, but I assure her that it is only the American
these questions now. I need to check whether she government that receives criticism, but I play
still feels unable to use the augmentations. this down.

435: Kim: but I’d recommend that if you do want 463: Kim: no…there are no…there is no
to play on and find those answers you also criticism of any known government in this
will find you need to start using those un- game so as far as that game is concerned it’s
natural (Zoe: super powers) super powers in a politically correct game except for maybe
order to…well obviously progress through a connection between the American govern-
the game. ment and who they’re controlling.
Zoe: I think so because the first location is the
Zoe has used the word ‘super powers’, not in Liberous Island so…
the sense of great nations, but as a noun phrase Kim: but I think that is just because there…obvi-
to describe what being augmented is like. This ously the number of people who will play
may have resonances in fantasy figures like the game are probably Americans…that’s
Superman™, where god-like skills are used for probably they’re bigger.
good, not evil. Zoe: Yes, because George Bush everyday talking
about anti…
Zoe: I feel very slowly to update these skills... Kim: …terrorism.
because I need to find that bottle (upgrade
canister or augmentation canister). The tape ended at this point. Although we
Kim: yeah those…you will find once you get into started to have a discussion about terrorism and
Versalife…there’s four more upgrades that American and British policy, I cannot include
you do in Versalife...probably you have to this data as it was not recorded. Nevertheless,
go in there a second time. the interview process brought to mind many un-
answered questions Zoe had about international
Zoe asks about Versalife—she is interested in terrorism and police states.
finding out about this company as it is the next
stage of the game.
CONCLUSION
456: Zoe: What does Versalife mean?
Kim:Versalife is a company in Hong Kong…and Despite not having grasped the global pandemic
obviously you’re going to go in there and storyline initially, my attempts at provoking devel-
find out what they’re doing but you’ll soon opment of her ZPD provided Zoe with increased
find out they’re doing a lot more than what determinism to continue with the game from a
you think they’re doing…(laughs). more informed position.

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

Zoe was able to complete 12 missions, albeit The strongest evidence is the emotional upset
using cheats, up to the interview. This is quite an she displayed when describing her capture and
achievement in itself, as Zoe did not demonstrate imprisonment by UNATCO. Her ability to make
the skills of a seasoned first-person shooter gamer, the domain shift from the in-game conspiracy of
and the game’s virtual character, being male, a government destroying its own people in order
may have been difficult for Zoe to relate to. Self- to gain control over the population, to the reported
regulation to such a degree in an L1 environment, appalling lack of government response given to the
without L2 dialogic support—that is, relying on victims of Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, al-
her own study skills to mediate for her without legedly based on the victim’s social class and race,
reference to communities of enquiry exterior to the demonstrates Zoe’s understanding of real-world
game—clearly demonstrates the effectiveness of parallels within the semiotic devices of the game.
the gaming environment to supply this dialogue. Understanding the processes that lie behind
Given that the project ran over a number of months, the metacognitive shifting of domains is under-
Zoe must have engaged in many hours of play researched partly because the processes are so
to reach this level as an intermediate learner of immediate and therefore difficult to measure
English. This seems to indicate that she had fully when they occur, and partly because they remain
identified with the virtual character JC Denton, for the most part invisible and unconscious to the
and until the cultural issues arose about playing in learner. I would argue that Zoe has made strong
Hong Kong, she was making good progress. This virtual identities within the video games that
disturbance to her play/learning is indicative of have demanded her to utilize the target language
her feelings towards the game’s cultural stereo- in order to reach a certain stage in the games she
typing of Chinese and may have been sufficient has been playing. She has not had opportunities to
to cause her to withdraw from the game. There develop her “gaming skills” through communities
is also the possibility that the complexity of the of enquiry, but has provided evidence of her deep
storyline was overreaching her ZPD so flow was learning of real-world issues through exposure to
disturbed and only sporadic learning was occur- the game and has demonstrated competence at
ring. It would be interesting to discover how she shifting domains within her inter-language com-
acquired the cheat codes for the games, whether petences, which constitutes a higher-order skill.
off the Internet or by asking friends at college. The Zoe has certainly been provided with new ways of
study could not ascertain whether any external viewing such topics as conspiracy, terrorism, and
help was given to Zoe throughout the period of allegiance, and it would be interesting to follow
play and is a weakness of the study. I base my as- up the research to see if, one year later, she is able
sumption of minimum peer/expert support based to recall any of the issues she discussed in detail
on reports from the host mother who commented as that would certainly demonstrate long-term
that Zoe rarely left her bedroom after returning retention of information, and more significantly,
home from college (implying she did not have an whether her ZPD had expanded in these topic
active ‘social life’ with other students), and also areas. She could certainly recall in minute detail
my personal observations of her in the learning after her three-week abstention from playing the
resources center at the college and seeing her game, which supports the argument that video
walking home from college where she was always games can provide effective situated learning
alone. She would have had to engage with the environments. What COTS video games often
plot in Deus Ex to be able to give such detailed do not do is provide the pedagogic intervention
descriptions during the interview, and there are required. As the researcher, and as a member of a
indications of deep learning with regard to this. community of enquiry, I had to engage in provok-

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

ing Zoe’s ZPD in order for her to understand the element is boring and the learning is just “drill
detailed plot of Deus Ex. Whether this was due and kill.” He argues that we must ensure we do
to her need for more refined study skills or more not put too much emphasis in the other direction
likely her need to be part of a real-world community either, where games are fun to play but “hit and
of enquiry would be worth researching further. miss when it comes to educational goals and
The question is, do COTS video games teach outcomes” (van Eck, 2006, p. 18). By finding the
language as a standalone product, or does there synergy between effective game-like engagement
need to be intervention and dialogic intercourse with the software and effective pedagogy, van Eck
with an expert from a community of enquiry? claims that COTS digital game-based learning is
There were sufficient affinity groups within the possible in the classroom.
communities of practice in Deus Ex to enable There are a number of organizations that clas-
Zoe to feel part of the game and to contribute to sify games according to guidelines agreed upon
its ‘development’. Further research will need to within the video games industry to inform parents
be carried out to ascertain how effective these and teachers of game content and suitability for
communities are in providing the learner with young players. The Entertainment Software Rat-
language skills in the L2. ing Board (2007) and the Pan-European Game
There is little doubt that good COTS video Information (n.d.) age rating system established in
games are engaging and provide dynamic and 2003 provide an informative censorship of game
compelling entertainment. What cutting-edge content by giving a range of suggested ages the
educators desire is for the rich virtual worlds within games are suitable for, as well as iconic representa-
video games to be harnessed for the presentation tions of game content, such as bad language, sex,
of learning material. drug use, violence, gambling, and fear, as well
as racial and other forms of discrimination. This
Video Games in Educational Use rating system is similar to that used by the film
industry, but has a much lower threshold for age
van Eck (2006) is clearly optimistic about “serious suitability, starting its ratings at 3+, then advancing
games” that are in development,6 where the lessons to 7+, 12+, 16+, and 18+ for adult games. These
learned from manufacturers of COTS games have ratings are a useful tool for teachers and educators
been applied to “edutainment” products so that the when selecting material suitable for certain age
game-play element has not been overshadowed or groups and cultural backgrounds.
lost through overzealous pedagogy. This particu- The data provided by this study for the use
lar process of production of digital game-based of COTS video games to teach second or other
learning (DGBL) as “one-off edutainment” is languages can be considered inconclusive. Never-
expensive, as it is time consuming and requires a theless, further research into COTS video games
great deal of input in terms of man-hours, which should attempt to assess how much change is
companies are reluctant to invest in for fear of occurring within a learner’s ZPD while accessing
“revisiting their unprofitable past” (van Eck, the L2 environment. Studies that assess all four
2006, p. 20). van Eck (2006, p. 18) reminds us of skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing)
the dangers of “academizing” games and quotes through provoking the individual learner’s ZPD
Papert (1998) who refers to edutainment software would provide valuable data as to how rapidly the
of the last decade, which instead of harnessing the L2 was being acquired. Access to diagnostic equip-
power of games for learning resulted in “shavian ment used by games manufacturers on subjects
reversals”—the offspring that inherits the worst for beta testing new games would provide a richer
characteristics of both parents—where the game source of data about how the player accesses the

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A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

L2 within the game environment. Attention could where simulation is an effective substitute during
be given to where the game needs to supply the training where equipment used has a high replace-
dialogic interaction, which would otherwise have ment cost such as fighter jets or oil rigs and where
been supplied by a teacher or more knowledgeable novices require specialized training before being
peer within a community of enquiry. presented with the real-world scenario.

Video Games in Employment Video Games in Life

Just as Zoe felt comfortable in the UNATCO When a player identifies with a character in a video
headquarters, I suggest that video games them- game, he or she is projecting his or her own self
selves can create communities of enquiry within into the game and giving birth to a new identity
the game world where the domain knowledge of that they will eventually accept as a real-world
a field of enquiry is accessible, in stages appropri- identity. This may sound like fantastical science
ate for the learner on the periphery of his or her fiction, but the evidence is already available, as
chosen subject. I do not envisage this as a static this powerful communication and learning device
“body of knowledge,” but as an organic database is being used for both good and evil. Gee (2003,
of simulated experiences that accurately reflect the p. 151) highlights the fact that racist organizations
real-world domain as it is updated and renewed. have produced their own video games in order to
“In communities of practice, knowledge, skills, teach their perspectives on reality. He argues that
identities, and values are shaped by a particular video games are no more powerful than books or
way of thinking into a coherent epistemic frame” films in that we take from them what we choose to,
(Shaffer, Squire, Halverson, & Gee, 2004). This but also suggests that playing such a game would
concept of providing epistemic frames is based inform the player of why such an organization
on the epistemology of that domain, the working hates the way that it does and makes the player
knowledge of how certain professional groups want to “redouble their efforts to work for world
think. Doctors speak about medical issues in the peace, diversity and tolerance” (Gee, 2003, p.
language they all know, as do teachers, scientists, 199). I would argue that minds can be changed by
lawyers, and childminders. Within those frames dialogue, and that learning is dependent on what
lie the language and concepts of that domain’s you bring to the video game as your real-world
culture and practice. Video games would be able identity. There are a myriad of facets that make
to act as examples of good practice within these up each and every life. The games design for the
epistemic frames and provide that group with language learner to experience deep learning of
learning environments for future employees. the target language includes the learning of that
I am not suggesting either that all forms of language’s culture and what binds it together as
learning should be accessible only as a video game. a society. Video games used as powerful learning
What video games do, and do well, is provide a devices would make it possible to create virtual
rich immersive environment containing virtual identities that enable learners to share in the effec-
identities that act as powerful learning tools, and tive social practices, powerful identities, shared
this could be integrated into current e-learning values, and ways of thinking of important com-
programs where scenario-like engagement is munities of practice. Shaffer et al. (2005) direct us
required by the learner, for assessment purposes to the provision of epistemic frames for learners,
for example. This is already practiced in jobs where finding out about the ways of thinking, do-
where there is a high risk factor such as air-traffic ing, and knowing within different communities of
control or training tactical military operations, or

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 A Video Game, a Chinese Otaku, and Her Deep Learning of a Language

practice, such as different professions, leads to a Diego series (Brøderbund) launched over a decade
“thickly authentic” context in which to learn where ago were brave pioneering examples of what was
then considered cutting-edge language learning
activities are simultaneously aligned with the products. Perhaps the video game industry could
interests of the learners, the structure of a domain take the “moral high ground” by spearheading
of knowledge, valued practices in the world, and the development of video games for learning
the modes of assessment used (Shaffer, 2005). in all communities of practice. Our schools and
universities would greatly benefit from being able
By engaging the language learner in virtual to provide our students with rich, deep learning
communities of practice that they desire to be environments. And as regards examining learners,
part of, they are more able to acquire the target just sit the examinee in front of the video game
language while developing their projected identity of their chosen domain and see how well they
as a member of that community. Video games survive in it!
are fun too:

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KEY TERMS AND in and on this action and, on this basis, forming
DEFINITIONS(FROM THE a hypothesis; reprobing the world to test this
36 LEARNING PRINCIPLES hypothesis; and then accepting or rethinking the
PROPOSED BY GEE, 2003) hypothesis.
Psychosocial Moratorium Principle: Learn-
Committed Learning Principle: Learners ers can take risks in a space where real-world
participate in an extended engagement (a lot of consequences are lowered.
effort and practice) as extensions of their real- Regime of Competence Principle: The
world identities in relation to a virtual identity to learner gets ample opportunity to operate within,
which they feel some commitment and a virtual but at the outer edge of, his or her resources, so
world that they find compelling. that at those points things are felt as challenging
Design Principle: Learning about and coming but not “undoable.”
to appreciate design and design principles is core Self-Knowledge Principle: The virtual world
to the learning experience. is constructed in such a way that learners learn
Identity Principle: Learning involves taking not only about the domain, but about themselves
on and playing with identities in such a way that and their current and potential capacities.
the learner has real choices (in developing the Semiotic Domains Principle: Learning
virtual identity) and ample opportunity to meditate involves active and critical thinking about the
on the relationship between new identities and relationships of the semiotic domain being learned
old ones. There is a tripartite play of identities to other semiotic domains.
as learners relate and reflect on their multiple Semiotic Principle: Learning about and com-
real-world identities, a virtual identity, and a ing to appreciate interrelations within and across
projective identity. multiple sign systems (images, words, actions,
Intertextual Principle: The learner under- symbols, artifacts, etc.), as a complex system is
stands texts as a family (genre) of related texts core to the learning experience.
and understands any one such text in relation to Situated Meaning Principle: The meaning of
others in the family, but only after having achieved signs (images, words, actions, symbols, artifacts,
embodied understandings of some texts. Under- etc.) are situated in embodied experience. Mean-
standing a group of texts as a family (genre) of ings are not general or decontextualized. Whatever
texts is a large part of what helps the learner make generality meanings come to have is discovered
sense of such texts. bottom up via embodied experiences.
Multiple Routes Principle: There are multiple Text Principle: Texts are not understood purely
ways to make progress or move ahead. This al- verbally (i.e., only in terms of the definitions of
lows learners to make choices, rely on their own the words in the text and their text-internal re-
strengths and styles of learning and problem lationships to each other), but are understood in
solving, while also exploring alternative styles. terms of embodied experiences. Learners move
Practice Principle: Learners get a lot of back and forth between texts and embodied
practice in a context where the practice is not experiences. More purely verbal understanding
boring (i.e., in a virtual world that is compelling (reading texts apart from embodied action) comes
to learners on their own terms and where the only when learners have had enough embodied
learners experience ongoing success). They spend experience in the domain and ample experiences
a lot of time on task. with similar texts.
Probing Principle: Learning is a cycle of
probing the world (doing something); reflecting

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ENDNOTES 3
Full © script for Deus Ex prepared by Luke
Kowalski: http://db.gamefaqs.com/comput-
1
The excerpts have been transcribed from er/doswin/file/deus_ex_script.txt. Descrip-
audiotape recordings between Zoe and the tion of the game DeusEx with hyperlinks
researcher. Pronunciation, grammar, and are from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/
syntax errors have been left unaltered and wiki/Deus_Ex
an indication of intonation direction given 4
A topical subject for China—SARS and now
by arrows at the end of a line. Italics indicate Bird Flu (H5N1 avian influenza).
characters, locations, or fictional places 5
Zoe refers to the almost complete lack of
within the game environments, so Hong response by the Federal Emergency Manage-
Kong indicates the city as represented in ment Agency (FEMA) in the United States
the game environment, not the real-world before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina
city. Where discussion involves real-world hit New Orleans (taken from Wikipedia,
locations, these have been left in normal font. September 5, 2005; available at http://
Where Zoe uses the first person singular to en.wikinews.org/wiki/Federal_response_
refer to herself as a character in the game, to_Katrina_a_%27National_Disgrace%27).
‘I’ remains in normal font. 6
Environmental Detectives developed by
2
Gee’s excellent book on What Video Games Education Arcade, Hazmat Hotzone from
Have to Teach Us About Learning and Lit- Entertainment Technology Centre, Virtual
eracy has been referenced throughout Zoe’s U developed by Professor W.F. Massey, and
interview to highlight the key principles built River City by Professor C. Dede.
into good COTS video games.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education, edited by Richard
E. Ferdig, pp. 451-477, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

1068
 1069

Chapter 4.20
Narrative Development
and Instructional Design
Douglas Williams
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Yuxin Ma
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Charles Richard
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Louise Prejean
University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION

This chapter explores the challenge of balancing With annual proceeds that exceed the movie indus-
narrative development and instructional design in try, the popularity of entertainment video games
the creation of an electronic game-based learning is stunning. In January 2007, Blizzard Entertain-
environment. Narrative is a key factor in suc- ment announced that their massively multi-player
cessful commercial games. The hero’s journey online role-playing game (MMORPG), World of
is explained and proposed as a model narrative Warcraft, had more than 8 million subscribers
structure for developing educational role-playing (Blizzard Entertainment, 2007). The result has
games and informing instructional design. Oppor- been a call by many, including the Federation
tunities to embed various instructional strategies of American Scientists (2006), to explore digital
within the hero’s journey structure are presented. games as a viable approach for teaching in K-12
and higher education.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch420

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Narrative Development and Instructional Design

An increasing number of game-based learning implications for design outlined in this chapter
environments are currently under development or will likely inform instructional designers of how
have recently been released in which the learner narrative can be effectively utilized in educational
is placed in virtual worlds and asked to engage in game-based learning environments.
various tasks. For example, River City, for children
ages 11-14, is a multi-player virtual environment LITERATURE REVIEW
emphasizing player tasks designed to develop
higher order thinking skills and content knowledge The Art of Narrative
in biology and ecology (Ketelhut, Dede, Clarke,
& Nelson, 2006). Quest Atlantis, for children ages One only has to look into the face of a child as she
9-12, immerses children in a virtual world with listens to a story to realize the power of this medium
an emphasis on developing social responsibility to entertain and to educate. On a daily basis, we
(Barab, Thomas, Dodge, Carteaux, & Tuzun, engage in storytelling with those around us. The
2005). PeaceMaker provides opportunities for a use of stories to pass on knowledge is common in
player to develop an understanding of the Israeli- all cultures. Storytellers seek to expand one’s con-
Palestinian conflict through an engaging simula- ceptual understanding of a topic or share relevant
tion (Impact Games, 2007). With this heightened experiences that others have had (Burke, 1993).
interest in digital game-based learning, comes a Parents often share stories with their children in
need to explore methods and models for designing order to teach some lesson. Grandparents may
effective educational games. pass on family knowledge in the form of stories.
One of the key issues in the design of electronic Stories, in some form, are an essential part of
game-based learning environment involves align- everyday life. Stories can provide a meaningful
ing the requirements of multiple components of a context for learning through the description in
game, such as narrative, gameplay, and instruction, rich detail, engaging characters, and illustration
to create a game that is both engaging from the of knowledge in context. In contrast with typical
narrative and gameplay perspectives and effec- methods of knowledge representation, stories
tive from the instructional design perspective. provide a rich description of situations which are
For many game genres, a compelling narrative more meaningful to students.
context is essential to engage players fully and By and large, the conventions of Western
provide them with an appealing range of op- narrative are founded on aesthetic principles ad-
tions and outcomes in creating their own stories. vanced by Aristotle, who argued that, at its best,
In developing electronic game-based learning narrative has the capacity to be both entertaining
environments, balancing the development of a and edifying. The most lasting influences of Ar-
compelling game narrative with instructional istotle’s Poetics on Western narrative are found
design needs can be challenging. There is little in the conventions of character and plot (Aris-
guidance in the literature on how to create stories totle, trans. 1997). Character may be understood
that meet instructional goals and how to develop broadly to refer to the personal forces at work in
educational content in the context of stories. a story, shaping—and shaped by—the plot. Plot
The purpose of this chapter is to share our own is the unfolding of action and the arrangement
experience in aligning the demands of good in- of incident in the story. For the reader or audi-
teractive storytelling on the one hand with sound ence, characters provide the point of access, so
instructional design on the other, in the creation to speak, for understanding and appreciating that
of a role-playing game for teaching life science unfolding action.
and scientific inquiry for children ages 11-13. The

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Reduced to its most basic components, the he devises a series of tests to determine whether
Aristotelian model of narrative operates such that: his uncle is genuinely guilty of the crime. With
characters have a given motivation or desire; char- each successive test comes renewed motivation as
acters pursue the object of their desire (i.e., often well as new doubts and new obstacles for Hamlet
presented as a quest); they encounter antagonists to overcome in his pursuit of the truth and of jus-
or obstacles that interfere with attaining their tice for his father’s murder. So it is that Hamlet is
goal, resulting in a source of conflict; characters loved by audiences as a great detective drama as
seek solutions and take action to overcome these well as a probing psychological study.
problems, resulting in a progress toward the From its most primitive beginnings, narrative
object of desire or motivation. Ordinarily, these dramas have served ritual and didactic roles in the
struggles create a sense of rising action, described societies that produce them. Plays were meant, in
as narrative tension, which leads to a climax or part at least, to instruct audiences and to edify them.
series of climaxes, resolving that tension. As Aristotle described the most desirable outcome
much for us today as for Aristotle and the Greek for the dramas of his time as catharsis. Aristotle
dramas he analyzed, the appeal of any narrative also observed that the instructive value of plays
is rooted in observing the relationship between was organically bound to their capacity to enter-
the actions a character chooses and the problem tain: Audiences sitting in the amphitheatre must
he or she confronts. be made to sympathize with King Oedipus and
Therefore, in one sense, narrative can be his motives, for example, in order to invest emo-
defined as a record of the choices and problem- tionally and cognitively in the problem-solving
solving efforts of characters in pursuit of their exercises of the characters on the stage below.
goals. The dynamic described previously can be This touches the central problem for conven-
easily identified at work in virtually any West- tional narrative: audiences are simply spectators
ern narrative, from the simplest of stories, like to the drama, passively observing the motives,
“Cinderella”, to the most complex of dramas, like decision-making, and actions of characters on-
Hamlet (Shakespeare, 2003). stage. Spectators are distinct from the characters
The latter provides us with a familiar illustra- they are observing. So, traditionally, the chief
tion. Hamlet’s moral code pre-disposes him to challenge for narrative artists has been to find
seek revenge when he was told that his father ways to distract the spectator from that distinc-
was murdered by his uncle. Thus the motivated tion; to immerse their audiences ever more deeply
Hamlet sets about to take action against his in thecharactersthey create and to engage them
uncle. However, in the course of that pursuit, he more fully in the action of the plot. Addressing
is confronted by a series obstacles—specifically, this challenge is the primary objective of interac-
doubts about whether his uncle is actually guilty tive narrative.
of the crime. Hamlet’s moral code also requires
that, before he can act and carry out his plan, he Role of Interactive Drama
must be absolutely certain that his uncle did indeed in Electronic Games
murder his father. Hamlet is therefore faced with
difficult choices: Should he obey the commands For the most part, interactive drama emerges
of his father’s ghost and kill his uncle, despite his from the very same traditions as conventional
uncertainties? Or should he allow his uncle to live drama and operates according to the same root
and therefore continue to suffer the haunting of the principles. Interactive drama relies on fundamental
ghost? Hamlet chooses to investigate his father’s assumptions about character, motivation, and plot;
murder further and seek answers to his doubts, so about characters’ will and capacity to act; about

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obstacles, conflict, and the role of choice-making The plot then moves in linear fashion to trace the
in pursuit of desired ends. What distinguishes inter- cause-and-effect outcomes of the single option that
active drama from conventional drama is erasing the character selects from that array. This can be
the distinction between spectator and character. termed a “fixed-structure” drama. In interactive
In effective drama, the spectator will understand drama or game, to enable player agency and to
and even empathize with a character. But when allow for the player’s free choice in pursuing his
the spectator identifies fully with a character, the motives, all of the cause-and-effect outcomes
narrative ceases to be a traditional drama and for all of the options must be calculated to pro-
instead becomes an interactive drama (Crawford, vide transformation as variety, that is, variations
2004; Mates, 2004; Murray, 1997) or a game. of experience on a theme. Therefore, unlike
Murray (1997) suggests that interactive drama a conventional drama which follows a single,
can be analyzed from three aspects: immersion, fixed-structure plot-line, an interactive drama or
agency, and transformation. Immersion is the game must be structured for a large (but limited)
feeling of identification with the protagonist and number of possible plot-lines; that is, a “flexible-
being present in the place depicted in the drama. structure” story.
It is the goal of both traditional drama and inter- Although “flexible-structure” stories may al-
active drama to provide the audience or player a low player choices and provide a sense of agency,
willing suspension of disbelief. Agency is a sense there has been a debate among two camps of
of control and empowerment experienced by the players, developers, and scholars: those who favor
players when they take actions based on their own narrative and those who focus on player agency
intention and when their actions have an effect and game interactivity. To the root of the debate
on the world where the interactive drama takes is the conflict between player agency and narra-
place. Transformation has three meanings. The tive. Narrative is driven by the direction planned
first involves having the audience and the player by the writer; whereas interactivity and learner
take on the role of someone else. The second agency depend on the motives of the players. In
refers to transformation as variety, meaning that an effort to reconcile the conflict, Henry Jenkins
the interactive drama provides variations of game develops a persuasive argument for viewing games
experiences to the player depending on the choices “less as stories than as spaces ripe with narrative
made and actions taken by the player. The third possibilities” (2004, p. 119). Game developers
meaning is the personal transformation of the such as Will Wright strive to create a compelling
player in the game. Immersion and some aspects space of narrative possibilities in which players
of transformation already exist in the traditional can “define their own story arc” (Perlin, 2004, p.
drama (Mates, 2004). 13). For example, in his strategy games such as
We argue that what distinguish the interactive SimCity and The Sims, there are no specific goals
drama from Aristotelian drama are two related or objectives. The players make decisions as to
elements identified by Murray (1997): agency and which cities or characters they wich to create and
transformation as variety. In a conventional nar- what goals they want to achieve.
rative drama, the audience passively observes the Clearly, by allowing the spectator to become
characters without the opportunity to act on their a participant in the fiction, computer games have
own motives. In interactive drama, however, the the potential to engage audiences in the conven-
players have a sense of agency. They take action tions of character and plot in much richer, deeper
based on their own intentions. In conventional ways than conventional dramas. Aristotle would
narrative drama, characters face a limited array remind us, however, that there may be much
of possible options when confronting a problem. more to this than just increased exhilaration for

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audiences. If we attend to the Aristotelian premise cautiously in shooters, never allowing narrative
that drama has the capacity to be both entertain- to get in the way of game play and its immediacy.
ing and edifying, then we must acknowledge that In adventure games (e.g., Myst) and action-
the interactive form of this medium has special adventure games (e.g., Tomb Raider), narrative
virtues over its conventional antecedents. It is in is important in order to create a rich space for
the design of the narrative possibilities of the game the player to explore. Often these games rely on
space that one must also integrate the “educational intriguing story to propel the player to explore the
possibilities”. The design of the narrative must world. Both of these genres provide rich worlds
be such to support player quests and tasks that for exploration, conundrums, and obstacles that
provide opportunities for construction of desired integrate with a compelling storyline.
knowledge and understanding. Role-playing games (e.g., World of Warcraft,
Guild Wars) provide rich worlds in which play-
Importance of Narrative ers can experience their own characters’ growth
in Game Genres in ability and strength as they seek to complete
tasks. A richly developed narrative is essential
Narrative plays a role in most game genres, to role-playing games because they are slower
though its importance varies. Action games, such paced, providing more time for the player to
as platformers, shooters, and racing games, often experience and reflect on the story. Extensive
have story elements, though story is less impor- back-story, varied non-player character types with
tant than the play experience (Dickey, 2006). In complex motivations, and plot twists are critical to
platformers, such as Super Mario Brothers, the compelling role-playing games. The importance
story is simplistic. The player takes on the role and complexity of narrative grows greater as we
of Mario (or Luigi) avoiding obstacles, or King move through platformers, shooters, adventure,
Bowser (the villain) and his henchmen in order to and role-playing games (see Figure 1).
rescue Princess Peach. Story, in the form of text, Role-playing games (RPG) are a genre that
is displayed at the beginning of each level. The may be well suited for the development of edu-
story creates valuable context for the game, but, cational games that target higher order educa-
in of itself, is less important than other factors tional goals such as those that fall into the follow-
such as game play to the overall game experi- ing categories in Bloom’s cognitive learning
ence. First-person shooters (FPS) and third-person domain: application, analysis, synthesis, and
shooters (TPS), such as Halo and Doom, often evaluation. Rich virtual worlds found in RPGs
utilize brief cinematics to provide some measure provide opportunities for students to be immersed
of background information on the player character, in contexts that allow them to satisfy their curios-
setting, and overall goal. In these types of games, ity and need to explore. Woven from narrative,
narrative plays a greater role than in platformers. audio, 3D graphics, and interactivity, these rich
But designers must approach this greater role contexts are rife with educational possibilities.

Figure 1. Importance and complexity of narrative in game genres

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Player characters are able to follow their own Narrative Structure

interests as they learn more of the world through
experience. Many contemporary theories on learn- In its simplest form, stories have three acts: begin-
ing environments emphasize the role of experience ning, middle, and end. At the beginning of the story
in a rich context (e.g., Barrows, 1996; Jonassen, we try to capture the attention of the audience and
1999; Schank, Fano, Bell, & Jona, 1994; Spiro & place the protagonist in a situation where they are
Jehng, 1990). A second beneficial characteristic faced with some challenge or problem. This creates
of RPGs is that they tend to be slower paced than an imbalance that compels the protagonist to take
platformers or FPSs. The emphasis in RPGs is action in order to restore equilibrium. During the
not placed on high intensity action (e.g., killing “middle” of the story, the protagonist continues to
and destroying as in FPS) but on reflective action face obstacles, make choices, and experience the
driven by intellectual deliberation. The gradual consequences of those choices. It is these experi-
uncovering of the story, the unfolding of a mystery, ences that result in the character growth needed
the increasing grasp of a problem—these complex to ultimately overcome the overarching problem.
narrative features of RPGs create fertile conditions The story ends when the character’s “world” has
for motivating students. been restored to balance by solving the problem
Another compelling characteristic of RPGs is and achieving the goal.
the chance for players to experience the growth In his work, Joseph Campbell explored the
of their character over time. An educational RPG power of myth through comparative analysis,
provides a means for students to experience their drawing out certain universal truths that transcend
own intellectual growth, directly represented in culture and history. His work, The Hero with a
their player character. The characteristics made Thousand Faces, draws forth a common story
explicit and emphasized in the player and non- structure, which he calls a monomyth, which
player characters provide opportunities to model underlies many of the world’s most compelling
those characteristics we desire in our students. myths and legends (Campbell, 1949). This “hero’s
Finally, the structure of role-playing games, journey” is a model story structure that fits well
a sequence of progressively more difficult chal- with the development of role-playing games and
lenges, is consistent with how instructional has been used in cinema and commercial game
experiences are organized as a progression of development. For example, the structure of
increasingly difficult educational experiences movies such as Star Wars (Burns, 2007) and the
(van Merrienboer, 1997). Table 1 summarizes Lion King were openly derived from the hero’s
role-playing game characteristics that may lend journey structure outlined by Campbell. Indeed,
themselves to educational games. with books like Christopher Vogler’s (1998) The
Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, the

Table 1. Role-playing game characteristics that lend themselves to educational games

Role-Playing Game Characteristic Benefit for Educational Game

Rich Worlds for Exploration Compelling learning contexts
Slower Pace for Experiencing Story and Reflection Facilitates reflective action driven by intellectual deliberation
Character Growth in Ability and Strength Players can experience their own intellectual growth explicitly represented in their
player character; game characters can model desirable characteristics
Series of Challenges Supports progression of educational

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monomyth has now become a virtual normative for • Return:

writers working in popular entertainment media. ° The Journey Home: The hero may initially
The hero’s journey has three main stages that refuse to return home having grown to
correspond with the three-act story structure: love the new world and abilities. But
departure, initiation, and return (Campbell, 1949). eventually he is compelled to return
home in order to help those that he
• Departure: left behind.
° Call to Adventure: The story begins with ° Bestows the Prize: At the conclusion of
the hero in their “ordinary” world. The the journey, the hero arrives home with
hero receives a call to adventure; a the object that was sought. The object
call to leave the comfort of his or her or knowledge restores equilibrium to
everyday existence. the world.
° Refusal of the Call: Often times the hero
refuses the call hoping the problem will In addition to effective story structure, a num-
go away or that another “more worthy” ber of storytelling devices can enhance the quality
will take up the call. The resistance of a narrative. Noteworthy are character design,
to accept the call is often based on a creation of conflict, and plot twists.
sentiment we all share in common; a Character development is a crucial part of good
fear of the unknown. Eventually the story design. Compelling game-based narratives
hero accepts the call, though with are often written from the player character’s point
trepidation. of view. Action in the game narrative is driven by
° Mentor: A wise mentor provides encour- player character decisions as she faces obstacles
agement, guidance and support to the and choices in pursuing a goal. The conflict the
hero as she prepares for the journey. character experiences results in growth. Designers
° Crossing the Threshold: The hero em- can bring to bear various character types com-
barks on the journey, crossing from monly found in conventional storytelling. Vogler
the familiar to the unknown. (1998) defined seven archetypes in his populariza-
• Initiation: tion of the hero’s journey. The hero (protagonist)
° Road of Trials: The hero is confronted by is the main character typically promoting the ac-
a series of obstacles; help is provided. tion in the story. The shadow is usually the main
These trials prepare the hero for the opponent often the cause of the hero’s problems.
ultimate battle to come. Mentor characters play a larger role in helping
° Ultimate Trial: The hero must face and the player along their journey. Shapeshifters are
defeat the ultimate evil. In myths characters whose real intentions are hidden from
highlighted by Campbell, these trials the main character. Guardian characters are those
often involve reconciling a disconnect that block the path of the hero. Some games employ
between truth and ones’ own beliefs, guardian characters which the player must defeat
or reconciling the good and bad char- to move to the next level. The trickster distracts
acteristics of a father figure in order to the hero from his quest. The herald brings news
better understand oneself. to the hero.
° The Prize: After passing through the trial, Conflict is an essential ingredient to a com-
the hero is able to obtain the prize he pelling narrative. Conflict propels the narrative
sought; the object or understanding that forward and facilitates effective game play. As in
will benefit the place she left behind. narrative development, we must infuse conflict

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into the game in order to cause the character to The game takes place amid an ancient conflict
act thereby propelling the story forward. One can between two sentient species and their struggle for
create conflict through a unity of opposites: two dominance on a planet called Mertis in another
characters desire to posses the same object. A solar system. It is a warm, wet world of stormy
ticking clock, or “time-lock,” is another example oceans, dotted with countless islands and a single
of a conventional narrative mechanism that can small continental landmass. While not technologi-
facilitate conflict. cally sophisticated, the planet’s two rival sentient
Plot twists are yet another device that designers species have reached a turning point in their evo-
can employ to enhance the narrative. Plots twists lutionary history where it is likely that one—the
include “red herrings” (i.e., providing clues in Mruk-ma—will likely drive the other—the Sheft-
order to mislead the player character) and rever- ma—into extinction.
sals (i.e., a story that moves predictably down a The Mruk-ma are an aggressive, sea-faring
path suddenly turns in an unexpected direction). species, while the Sheft-ma are city-builders who
make their home in “The Coastlands,” along the
CONQUEST OF THE COASTLANDS marshy seashores and river valleys of Mertis’
lone continent. For the vulnerable Sheft-ma, the
Our team is currently developing a role-playing strategic key to their self-defense is a deteriorating
game that features intriguing storylines, immer- system of fortifications built in the coastal wetlands
sive 3-D representation of context and quests surrounding their cities. But these wetlands are
(problems), simulations, tools and resources that mysteriously disappearing at an alarming rate,
support quest completion, choice of roles and tasks, and the threat of invasion by Mruk-ma fleets is
levels of play, record keeping, as well as real time growing.
interaction and feedback. Quests in the virtual en- A decisive change comes when the survey ship
vironment are supplemented by classroom-based of an advanced alien race crash-lands in the oceans
activities, which address students’ knowledge gaps of Mertis. Arriving in escape pods from their
revealed during game play and extend problem doomed spaceship, the strangers, called Cilati,
solving from the virtual and fictitious world to are scattered around the planet. Now hopelessly
similar problems in the local community. stranded on Mertis, some of the alien crew man-
Styled after highly successful commercial age to make their way to The Coastlands, where
products like World of Warcraft and Everquest, the they are warmly welcomed by the Sheft-ma. The
role-playing game features a science fiction/fan- Cilati survey team brings with them precious
tasy setting. Pursuing larger strategic objectives, scientific knowledge, technology, and methods
the player character is challenged with a variety that could dramatically shift the balance of power
of “quests” that is, player-characters must pose in the conflict between the two rival species. The
questions and seek answers, investigate myster- survival of the Sheft-ma will depend on whether
ies, formulate hypotheses, gather evidence and they can effectively utilize the science and tools
information, use appropriate tools and techniques, of the Cilati to rebuild their crumbling forts and
and ultimately take action to solve problems pre- defend their disappearing coastlines.
sented within quests. These quests form the main The Cilati are a highly advanced race of
plotlines of the interactive narrative and provide space-faring explorers. Extremely long-lived,
the immediate motivations for player-character they traverse the galaxy in pursuit of knowledge
activities in the game. Each quest is designed to about other planets and other life forms. Cilati
achieve specific learning goals. ships have visited countless worlds, quietly ob-
serving the species that inhabit them. Generally,

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they never interfere in the cultures they study, and quests have their own plot, usually utilizing the
they seldom even make their presence known. hero’s journey, which contributes to an overarching
It quickly becomes apparent that the Mruk-ma story for the entire game. In each quest the player
have adopted a radically new strategy in their completes some learning tasks. For example, in
struggle with the Sheft-ma: ecological warfare. one Coastlands quest, the glim quest, the player
By attacking the delicate environment on which character, the hero, is called upon to research a
their peaceful rivals depend, the Mruk-ma hope devastating threat to the Sheft-ma’s food supply:
to wreck the Sheft-ma civilization and eliminate a more than 70% reduction in harvests of a fish,
their species. called the glim, which is a primary food source for
The future of their civilization now depends on the Sheft-ma. This quest begins with the player
whether the Sheft-ma will be able to master the character being called to appear before the council
mysterious science of their alien allies, the Cilati. and tasked with learning all they can. As the quest
To put it in the epic terms that are conventional story unfolds, the player learns the cause of the
to RPGs of this genre, it is only amid desperate fish depletion, but also gains valuable information
circumstances like these that heroes emerge… about the overall plotline. That is, what are the
Heroes who know that understanding the world root causes of the devastating deterioration of The
around them is the first step in controlling it… Coastlands. The glim quest has a clear story arc
Heroes who recognize that well-armed fleets and with outcomes that not only satisfy its own story
fortresses alone will not be enough…Heroes who but also contribute important information to the
foresee that the secrets of science will be the key overall story of the game.
to Conquest of the Coastlands.
Hero’s Journey: Call to
INTEGRATION OF NARRATIVE Adventure/Refusal of the Call
DEVELOPMENT AND
INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN The hero’s journey begins with a call to adventure.
Just as the hero desires to escape the ordinary
In our development process we view story de- but often fears the unknown of the quest, we
velopment and instructional design as intricately often desire to embark on adventure yet fear that
interdependent. We began our process by de- we may not be up to the task. This theme is an
veloping a story concept. Effective storytelling integral part of human nature and one to which
often relies on conventional story structure. We many students can relate. Students are naturally
adopted the traditional three-act story structure and curious and desire to learn yet must be drawn
the “hero’s journey” as frameworks to guide our into the adventure of learning. This aspect of the
story development. The hero’s journey is a model hero’s journey provides a way to dispel some of
framework for not only guiding the development the inertia that may hold a student back from fully
of a compelling story, but an equally effective engaging in the learning process.
framework for thinking about instructional design. Gaining students attention and engaging
them in an intellectually challenging task is a
Employing Episodes key aspect of many instructional models. For
example, Robert Gagne’s “events of instruc-
In the development of Conquest we found it use- tion” begins with gaining the learner’s attention
ful to think of the game narrative as a series of (Gagne, 1985). Madeline Hunter (1982) argued
episodes (i.e., quests) with each having its own for the anticipatory set in order to “hook” the
story with a beginning, middle, and end. These learner. Keller (1983) advocated gaining attention

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through perceptual arousal and inquiry arousal. In with the Cilati, the other mentor, who having
Conquest of the Coastlands we utilize an open- unique expertise as an accomplished scientist,
ing cinematic to gain the student’s interest in the facilitates the recasting of the folk hypotheses into
overarching game storyline in a call for the player viable scientific hypotheses thereby scaffolding
to engage in the adventure. The game cinematic the player. The Cilati also provides technology, a
provides the player important back-story that will personal digital assistant (PDA) that has tools and
serve them later in the adventure. Similarly, as resources to aid the player in the investigation.
we present each quest, we utilize interactive cut
scenes in order to set up the problem and gain the Hero’s Journey: Crossing
student’s interest in accomplishing the goal. For the Threshold
example, in the glim quest, the cut scene opens
with the player character being called before the As in a hero’s journey, we strive to create learning
High Council. As the scene unfolds, the player environments where the student is truly com-
character expresses eagerness to help her species mitted to the quest of “making the material their
and an innate curiosity to know and understand. own”. Just as the hero fears to accept the call to
Yet she also shows fear in accepting the task. adventure, students have fears that prevent them
Ultimately, she overcomes the reluctance to take from fully engaging in an activity. If we have
on the quest and commits fully to the adventure. done well in gaining their attention with a com-
pelling adventure, we hope to see engagement. In
Hero’s Journey: Mentor Conquest of the Coastlands, the player character
Provides Support shows hesitancy to accept the call to explore the
glim quest yet ultimately confronts her fears and
In the hero’s journey, the mentor often motivates commits to the task.
the character to accept the call and provides needed
support for the journey. The development of the Hero’s Journey: Road of Trials
mentor concept in our game was not only informed
by the hero’s journey, but also the cognitive ap- In the hero’s journey, the road of trials is a series
prenticeship model, an instructional design model of challenges, often placed by the antagonist, that
that emphasizes the role of mentors in supporting help prepare the hero for the ultimate test to fol-
learning (Collins, Brown, & Holum, 1991). In low. These increasingly difficult challenges help
our game, we provide mentors to aid the player the hero grow in strength and wisdom. Similarly,
character. The first mentor is Ikiru, the player instructional models advocate a sequence of in-
character’s elderly uncle, who is learned in many creasingly challenging problems and content. For
disciplines, possessing a folk understanding of the example, the instructional design model adopted
forces at play in the natural world. The player is by our team, the four-component instructional de-
first introduced to Ikiru in the opening cinematic sign (4C/ID)model, advocates a sequencing of task
where learned that Ikiru has a growing concern classes from simple-to-complex (van Merrienboer,
about the changes he sees in The Coastlands. As 1997). The 4C/ID model consists of four inter-
the player character prepares for the journey, Ikiru related components: learning tasks, supportive
provides encouragement and help. For example, information, part-task practice, and just-in-time
in the glim quest, Ikiru provides the player a list (JIT) information. Learning tasks, most relevant to
of potential hypothesis, based on his folk under- this discussion, are the concrete, authentic whole-
standing, as to what may be causing the reduced task experiences similar to complex real-world
catches. As the quest unfolds, the player meets problems. These learning tasks are categorized

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into simple-to-complex classes. The order of the player character engages in independent scientific
task classes and the specific instances of the tasks inquiry; demonstrating, we hope, a new found
define the overall sequencing of the instructional depth and breadth of knowledge. Similarly, within
content. In Conquest of the Coastlands, we follow a a quest, the sequence of tasks can progress toward
progression from simple-to-complex for the game an ultimate trial.
(i.e., quests are progressively more challenging)
and within each quest (i.e., tasks within each quest Hero’s Journey: The Prize
are progressively more challenging). For example,
earlier quests in the game have the player engage In this stage of the hero’s journey, the hero is re-
in partial scientific inquiry whereby some of the warded by gaining the object of their desire. This
inquiry task are already completed (e.g., problem sort of narrative device provides a clear motivation
statement defined, hypothesis developed). Later for the character thereby driving the story forward.
quests in the game will have students engaging in In the framework of the hero’s journey, the prize
full inquiry and open inquiry. Similarly, a quest is the object or elixir that initially propelled the
such as the glim quest begins with simple tasks hero to begin his or her journey. This plot device
(e.g., summarizing data provided by non-player) helps focus the player character on a clear goal.
shifting to more complex tasks (e.g., analyzing Similarly, from an educational perspective, the
and interpreting water quality data). goal or prize should drive the educational ac-
tivities. Wiggins and McTighe (2001) suggest
Hero’s Journey: Ultimate Trial we begin with the end in mind. In instructional
approaches such as goal-based scenarios (Schank,
The ultimate trial of the hero’s journey is a climac- Fano, Bell, & Jona, 1994) and problem-based
tic moment where the hero, after much personal learning (Barrows, 1996), the goal or problem
growth as a result of confronting obstacles, faces, becomes the organizing focus of the activity. The
and overcomes a great challenge. In this stage of goal should be interesting and motivating to the
the journey, the emphasis is on the hero’s trans- player and should result in the development of
formation. Similarly, we strive for the design of knowledge and skills desired. In the development
educational experiences that are transformative. of Conquest of the Coastlands, we strived to cre-
Many of us have experienced a master teacher or ate clear story goals in the game (e.g., learn why
mentor who provided us a challenging task that the glim are dying in order to avert famine) that
truly transformed our thinking about a concept corresponded to clear learning goals (e.g., with
or topic resulting in a new found understanding. guidance, learners are able to articulate the ques-
As in a story where the hero “faces death” in the tion or problem at hand, design an investigation,
ultimate trial and survives, the learner works at gather data, draw conclusions, and communicate
the edge of their ability to accomplish a chal- the results and research process, National Science
lenging task and thereby is transformed. So too Content Standard A).
should this ultimate learning experience be for the
player character. In our game, we are striving to Hero’s Journey: The Journey Home
provide a sequence of quests that culminates in an
ultimate trial. For example, in earlier quests the As the hero begins the journey home, there are still
player character engages in supported inquiry. As challenges to overcome. These challenges further
the player progresses, we increase the difficulty motivate the player as they continue their quest.
of the challenges presented and fade the scaffold-
ing provided. At the conclusion of the game, the

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Hero’s Journey: Bestowing the Prize of a narrative and facilitate instructional design.
Noteworthy are character design, creation of
At the conclusion of the hero’s journey, the pro- conflict, and plot twists.
tagonist returns home triumphantly, and bestows Character development is a crucial part of good
the prize, elixir, or wisdom upon those that she left story design. Compelling game-based narratives
behind. This mechanism provides a way for the are often written from the player character’s point
learner to synthesize the key aspects of what was of view. Action in the game narrative is driven by
accomplished and learned in the quest providing player character decisions as she faces obstacles
a beneficial learning activity for the player and and choices in pursuing a goal. The conflict the
a valuable artifact for evaluation. Two strategies character experiences results in growth. Designers
from the cognitive apprenticeship model (Collins, can bring to bear various character types com-
Brown, & Holum, 1991), reflection and articula- monly found in conventional storytelling. The
tion, provide insight into the benefits of this final hero (protagonist) is the main character typically
stage of the journey. Articulation refers to requiring promoting the action in the story. The shadow is
students to articulate their knowledge, reasoning, usually the main opponent often the cause of the
and problem-solving processes. These explana- hero’s problems. Mentor characters play a larger
tions and elaborations require the student to make role in helping the player along their journey.
their thinking explicit providing opportunities for Helpers are characters that provide other types
feedback from others and serving as a source for of support to the main character. Guardian char-
their own reflection. Reflection involves help- acters are those that block the path of the hero.
ing students compare their own problem-solving Some games employ guardian type characters
processes with those of experts, thus making it the player must defeat to move to the next level.
possible for them to modify their processes. This The trickster distracts the hero from his quest.
final stage of the journey provides an opportunity The herald brings news to the hero. In our own
for players to articulate their thinking and then development, we utilize various character types
reflect upon it. In Conquest of the Coastlands, a such as player character as hero, Murak-ma as
key element of Sheft-ma culture is the manner in shadow or antagonist, and mentor characters in
which the Sheft-ma preserves and communicates the form of Uncle Ikiru and the Cilati.
knowledge. At the conclusion of each quest, the Conflict is an essential ingredient to a com-
player character returns to the Chief Cantor, a pelling narrative. Conflict propels the narrative
key figure whose role in this fictional society is forward and facilitates effective gameplay. As in
to document what is learned in the hero’s various narrative development, we must infuse conflict
adventures and provide a synthesis of the learning. into the game in order to cause the character to
These quest summaries are noted in scrolls, and act thereby propelling the story forward. One can
the learning acquired through heroic questing is create conflict through a unity of opposites: two
then shared with the rest of the society, delivered characters desire to posses the same object. For
in song by the Chief Cantor in order to entertain example, in Conquest of the Coastlands, a unity
and educate the populace. The hero’s journey is of opposites is created whereby the Sheft-ma
thus completed with the bestowal of the prize. (i.e., player character species) are directly com-
peting with the Murak-ma non-player character
Story Devices species to locate and retrieve Cilati escape pods
scattered about the planet. The escape pods have
In addition to effective story structure, a number important technology that may help one species
of storytelling devices can enhance the quality overcome the other. In this example, the task of

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Narrative Development and Instructional Design

finding escape pods provides a clear goal for the middle, and end. These quests have their own plot,
player (facilitates gameplay) and creates conflict utilizing the hero’s journey, which contributes to
that is motivational. The escape pods provide a an overarching story for the entire game. Addition-
fun way to introduce technology that is needed ally, each quest consists of a series of tasks that
for the student to achieve the curricular goals. A support quest learning goals and contribute to the
ticking clock, or “time-lock,” is another example overarching learning goals for the entire game.
of a conventional narrative mechanism that can
facilitate conflict. In Conquest of the Coastlands Begin Quests with a
the player character learns that the escape pods Call to Adventure
are made of a material that causes them to dis-
integrate within a limited time when exposed to The hero’s journey call to adventure provides a
the elements. mechanism for gaining the students attention and
Plot twists are yet another device that designers engaging them in an intellectually challenging
can employ to enhance the narrative. Plots twists task. Children can relate to a character that has
include “red herrings” (i.e., providing clues in or- fear of embarking on an adventure, but ultimately
der to mislead the player character) and reversals commits to the task at hand. An opening cinematic
(i.e., a story that moves predictably down a path or an in-game cut scene can facilitate gaining the
suddenly turns in an unexpected direction). For students attention and facilitating full engagement
example, in our game, there is a rumor that fish in the learning task.
depletion is caused by an alien monster, a fero-
cious predator that eats both fish and fishermen. Develop Non-Player Characters
In reality, the monster is an invasive herbivore. that Act as Mentors
It disrupts the coastal environment by consuming
a large amount of marsh grass. Fish depletion is A common element of narratives that employ the
caused by the environmental change triggered hero’s journey is the mentor who motivates and
by the monster. The rumor serves as a “red her- supports the hero throughout the quest. Non-player
ring” that not only enriches the story and but also characters can be modeled after the mentor figure
provides an opportunity to challenge the player in the hero’s journey and can also be informed by
to think critically and to distinguish superstition the cognitive apprenticeship model. These non-
from science. player characters can assist by assigning quests,
providing needed clues, and implementing cog-
IMPLICATIONS nitive apprenticeship strategies (e.g., modeling,
coaching, articulation, reflection).
The literature review and our experience in de-
signing an educational role-playing game has Provide for a Series of Challenges/
led to the identification of several principles that Ultimate Challenge
may provide instructional designers guidance in
the creation of educational role-playing games. The hero’s journey and instructional design models
advocate for a series of challenges that prepare
Conceptualize Game the hero/learner for the ultimate test to follow.
Narrative in Quests Provision of concrete authentic experiences of
increasing difficulty provides for compelling
Design the game narrative as a series of quests learning opportunities. As the series of challenges
with each having its own story with a beginning,

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increase in difficulty and the player gains skill and narrative structure for developing interactive
confidence, scaffolding can be faded. narrative and informing instructional design. It
provides opportunities to embed various instruc-
Utilize Plot Device to Drive tional strategies, such as gaining attention at the
Narrative Forward and Focus beginning of instruction, mentoring, sequencing
Player on Clear Goals learning tasks from simple to complex, clarifying
the learning goal, and articulation and reflection
In the hero’s journey, the protagonist’s desire or of learning.
need for an object provides a clear motivation for The hero’s journal may serve as a narrative
the character thereby driving the story forward. structure for game developers to align narrative
Utilizing this plot device helps focus the player development and instructional development in
character on a clear goal. Similarly, from an edu- the process of creating effective electronic game-
cational perspective, the goal or prize should drive based learning environments. It is our hope that
the educational activities. The goal or problem this chapter may guide developers of electronic
becomes the organizing focus of the activity. game-based learning environments and will begin
a dialog as to the importance and strategies for
Design Narrative to Provide aligning interactive narrative development with
Opportunities for Reflection educational game development.
and Articulation

At the conclusion of the hero’s journey, the pro- REFERENCES

tagonist returns home triumphantly, and bestows
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Burns, K. (Producer & Director). (2007). Star Keller, J. (1983). Motivation design of instruction.
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Spiro, R. J., & Jehng, J. C. (1990). Cognitive
Jenkins, H. (2004). Game design as narrative archi- flexibility theory: Theory and technology for
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First person: New media as story, performance, complex subject matter. In D. Nix & R. Sprio
and game (1st ed., pp. 199-130). Cambridge, (Eds.), Cognition, education, and multimedia
MA: MIT Press. (pp. 163-205). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates.
Jonassen, D. H. (1999). Design constructivist
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Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (2001). Understand- Monomyth: A common story structure which
ing by design. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice- underlies many of the world’s most compelling
Hall, Inc. myths and legends.
Platformer: A genre of computer game where
the player navigates among platforms while avoid-
ing obstacles.
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Role-Playing Game: A game where the player
Backstory: The history of events that preceeds takes on the role of a character.
the start of a narrative. Unity of Opposites: A narrative devise
First-Person Shooter: A computer game whereby two characters desire to possess the
genre where the player character has a first-person same object.
perspective.
Interactive Narrative: Narrative in which
the spectator is able to make choices that guide
the outcomes.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education, edited by Richard
E. Ferdig, pp. 1218-1233, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 4.21
Teacher Gamers vs.
Teacher Non-Gamers
Christopher L. James
Russellville City Schools, USA

Vivian H. Wright
University of Alabama, USA

ABSTRACT ing the Internet for instructional purposes, and

presenting information using various delivery
The purpose of this study was to identify second- modes. In comparison to gamers, non-gamers
ary teachers with video game-play experience indicated a tendency to communicate electroni-
and determine if perceived levels of comfort cally with parents more often, encourage students
in regard to completing job-related technology to use electronic tutorials outside of class more
tasks, amounts of instructional technology us- often, and allow students to use word processors
age, and amounts of participation in innovative to complete assignments more frequently. This
teaching strategies are affected by experience or study can be used as a reference point for future
lack of experience with video games. Although research into teachers and video game-play in
significant differences were not found between regard to teaching practices and job-related tasks.
teachers identified as gamers and those identi-
fied as non-gamers, researchers may choose to
investigate specific areas where mean differ- INTRODUCTION
ences were found. For example, gamers were
more comfortable using presentation software for Video games have become a part of the daily lives
demonstrating concepts in class, communicating of many individuals, regardless of age or gender.
electronically with colleagues and students, us- In fact, the video game industry has grown to
rival the motion picture industry and each of the
major television networks in terms of revenues
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch421

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

and profits. Despite the size of the industry, more perceptions of teachers and their comfort levels
research is needed on the potential benefits of when completing job-related computing tasks,
video game-play and learning (Shaffer, Squire, amount of instructional technology usage, and
Halverson, & Gee, 2004). participation in innovative teaching practices.
In an exert entitled, “From Video Games, If video game experience allows individuals to
Learning About Learning,” from his book, What gain certain knowledge and skills applicable to
Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning basic computing skills and instructional technol-
and Literacy,Gee (2003) describes video games as ogy, teachers may have higher comfort and par-
being long, hard, and challenging. Gee indicates if ticipation levels in each area. Also, many of the
a game has good learning principles in its design, characteristics of game players reflect the same
the learning can be translated in positive ways. In qualities found in innovative teachers.
his opinion, the theory of learning behind good This study is important to the field of education
video games closely resembles learning theories and gaming because certain aspects of gaming such
from the cognitive sciences. as problem solving, teamwork, communication,
Cognitive science is the study of the mind and and knowledge of technology may be increased
includes processes such as thinking, reasoning, by the playing of video games. Intuitively, if
language, perception, learning, and remembering. knowledge of technology is increased, comfort
Cognitive science crosses several disciplines in- levels with various technologies may also be
cluding computer science, linguistics, philosophy, increased. Also, motivation (Rosas et al., 2003)
and psychology (Rapaport, 1996). Research within and self-confidence (Carstens & Beck, 2005) have
this area suggests human interaction within an both been enhanced by video game-play. Each of
environment and perception are related in creating these aspects or traits are important to the field of
memory (Glenberg, 1997). education as teachers are facing ever-increasing
Video games create environments and allow pressure to raise scores on various standardized
interaction within these environments. According tests and teachers are expected to perform at high
to cognitive science principles, this should cre- levels in the classroom.
ate memory. Good games are challenging, give
information in context, allow players to create,
build problem-solving skills, are motivating, BACKGROUND
and offer opportunities for individuals to work
together (Gee, 2003). Computer games and video games are two terms
Characteristics of gamers, such as willing- that are often used synonymously to describe
ness to volunteer, creativity, and reading to gain games played on personal computers, handheld
knowledge, have been used to describe innova- systems, consoles, or arcade machines (Wikipedia,
tive teachers (Cumming & Owen, 2001; Thomas, 2005). A game is a form of art that requires decision
1993). Also, similar to video games, innovation making, opposition, the management of resources,
requires creating, persistence, action, teamwork, the attainment of tokens, and a sufficient amount
and risk taking (Ballantyne, McLean, & Macpher- of information. Games are often strengthened by
son, 2003). diplomacy, simulation, variety, character identifi-
Based on the premise that learning takes place cation, role-playing, and socialization (Costikyan,
in video games and many characteristics of game 1994).Games are complete systems with explicit
players and innovators are similar, the research- rules, with fantasy playing a major role in various
ers designed this study to determine the effects situations (Crawford, 1982). Gee described a game
video game experience may or may not have on as a world in a box allowing a player to create an

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

identity they really want and the ability to gain click of a button, but classrooms have not adapted.
experiences that were not available before (cited While games are often complex and difficult,
in Foreman, 2004). people work through them and the difficulty often
Most people consider games to be for younger provides motivation. Further, Shaffer et al. (2004)
members of society or for males only, but the indicated that video games allow players to par-
statistics within the industry tell a different story. ticipate in communities and develop thinking and
In May 2005, the Entertainment Software Asso- organization skills, but they also noted the field is
ciation released the results of a consumer survey absent of sufficient research concerning learning
that indicated game players were an average age theory. One sign this may be changing occurred in
of 30, with 35% under the age of 18 and 43% March 2004, when the first Serious Games Summit
between the ages of 18 and 49. Nineteen percent was held at the Game Developers Conference. The
of game players were over the age of 50, and summit brought together educational researchers,
55% were male. game developers, and trainers to share experi-
Previous research has shown gamers to enjoy ences in hopes of developing new markets and
such activities as exercising, sports, volunteer- better products (Corbit, 2005). Another positive
ing, religious activities, creative undertakings, sign for the industry is the fact that more colleges
and reading. In fact, the Entertainment Software and universities are offering courses, and in some
Association (2005) reported that gamers spend instances, degrees related to video game design.
over three times the amount of time on activities Prestigious universities, such as The Massachu-
such as these when compared to playing video setts Institute of Technology, Stanford, Carnegie
games. Also, characteristics of gamers, such as Mellon, and Southern California, are leading the
being risk takers (Beck & Wade, 2004), showing way in this area (Mangan, 2005).
a willingness to volunteer, having creativity, and Until recently, little research existed concern-
reading to gain knowledge, have been used to ing the potential benefits of video game-play
describe innovative teachers (Cumming & Owen, even though many children and adults spent a
2001; Thomas, 1993). large amount of time playing games. Now, more
Research indicates girls prefer games that allow researchers are looking at possible benefits of
them to play with other players, have high-quality game-play and have found that they may im-
graphics and multimedia components, and allow prove social skills, encourage teamwork, increase
for communication between participants during knowledge pertaining to technology, develop math
game-play (Agosto, 2004). Males tend to enjoy and reading skills, and improve problem solving
games with a lot of action and fighting with (Media Awareness Network, n.d.).
weapons, but both genders believe realism is an It is evident from the literature that video games
important aspect in game design (Media Analysis have become a part of our culture and have gained
Laboratory, 1998). a tremendous amount of popularity. For several
Many educators and parents do not believe vid- years, the majority of research on video game-play
eo games are a viable component of a curriculum focused solely on negative aspects, but the trend
and have issues with the educational software that is beginning to change. Pillay, Brownlee, and
is available (Virvou, Katsionis, & Manos, 2005). Wilss (2003) indicated recreational game players
Leaders within the area of gaming and learning engage in cognitive processing while playing,
argue that video games may change the way we and many of these processes are very valuable in
learn and can effectively engage learners (Squire educational settings. Gamers display the ability
& Jenkins, 2003). A vast amount of information to digest explicit and implicit information, reason
and resources are available to individuals at the inductively and deductively, make inferences,

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 Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

and solve problems. Whether it be in the role of Merriam-Webster Online (2006) defines
teacher or student, each of these processes lend experience as “the fact or state of having been
themselves well to an environment implementing affected by or gained knowledge through direct
instructional technology. observation or participation.” If experience play-
Instructional technology is changing the way ing video games allows teachers to become more
we learn. Exposure to different types of video comfortable with job-related technology, more
games aids in developing schema that may be used readily accept instructional technology, and more
in completing future tasks and solving problems in readily participate in innovative teaching practices,
technology-rich settings (Pillay, 2003). Structural perhaps the educational community will adopt
knowledge may be gained from games, allowing gaming as a viable component of effective teach-
individuals to function in similar environments ing practices at both the postsecondary and K-12
with instructional technology. According to Gros levels. College education departments may add
(2003), video games are often the first access gaming to their pre-service teaching programs,
young people have to the world of technology, and and professional development content for teach-
they help create a positive outlook towards tech- ers and administrators may be delivered through
nology. It is the hypothesis of Gros that children similar means.
acquire digital literacy through play, and video The following research questions guided this
games are the most interactive multimedia avail- study:
able today. Many games require players to reach
some type of goal, and innovative teachers have 1. Who are the teachers with experience play-
been described as having a vision for the future ing video games?
and strategies for reaching this vision (Cumming 2. Are teachers with experience playing video
& Owen, 2001). games more comfortable completing job-
Innovation is the introduction of something related technology tasks?
new—a new idea, method, or device (Merriam- 3. Do teachers with experience playing video
Webster Online, 2005). While the formal definition games use instructional technology more
of innovation is rather straightforward, defining often than those without experience playing
innovative teaching practices is much more dif- video games?
ficult. Several of the skills learned from video 4. Do teachers with experience playing video
games mirror characteristics of innovative teach- games participate in more innovative teach-
ers identified by Cumming and Owen (2001), ing strategies?
Thomas (1993), and Ballantyne et al. (2003).
Each of these studies acknowledged innovative
teachers as having the ability to work with others, METHODOLOGY
possessing strong social skills, a sound knowledge
base, and a desire to succeed. Population
After an exhaustive search, the researchers
were unable to locate any previous research on The researchers designed this study to determine
teachers who play or once played video games. the effects video game experience may or may not
Rather, most studies focused on such areas as have on perceptions of teachers and their comfort
increased motivation, problem-solving skills, ag- levels when completing job-related computing
gression, and addiction (Amory, Naicker, Vincent, tasks, amount of instructional technology usage,
& Adams, 1999; Bensley & van Eenwyk, 2001; and participation in innovative teaching practices.
Hauge & Gentile, 2003; Rosas et al., 2002). In determining the sample for this study, the

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

researchers had specific criteria for selecting the schools chose to have the surveys placed in teacher
schools. Specifically, each school needed to be at mailboxes and returned in a sealed envelope to
a secondary level to obtain a better ratio of male a designated location, resulting in return rates of
to female teachers. The researchers also wanted 70% and 78%. Overall, 258 faculty members were
the schools to include various socioeconomic given the opportunity to complete the surveys and
levels, which were determined by the free or re- 184 surveys were submitted for analysis, resulting
duced lunch percentage. Based on these criteria, in a return rate of 71%.
seven secondary schools in North Alabama were
selected. For this study, all classroom teachers Survey Design
serving grades 6 through 12 were given the op-
portunity to complete the survey instrument. By The survey instrument (see Appendix) was de-
including each classroom teacher, the researchers veloped by reviewing several instructional tech-
hoped to reduce the amount of bias when general- nology surveys administered in higher education
izing to the population. and a video game survey administered by the
The population was divided into two groups: Beckman Institute (n.d.), reviewing the National
those with video game-play experience and those Education Technology Standards for Teachers
without. For this study, a teacher is considered to (ISTE, 2000), focusing on the best practices for
have video game-play experience if he or she has using instructional technology established by the
enjoyed playing video games weekly as a hobby University of Texas at Austin (n.d.), and research-
anytime in the past or present. Each respondent was ing a study on innovative teaching (Cumming
questioned regarding their perceptions of comfort & Owen, 2001). Questions related to gaming
using technology to complete basic job-related practices were developed by the researchers to
tasks, amounts of instructional technology usage garner specific statistics from the participants. The
in the classroom, and amounts of participation in survey contained five sections to gather informa-
innovative instructional practices. The researchers tion regarding and to assess:
then determined if a significant difference existed
in comfort levels and amounts of usage between 1. Demographic information from questions
each group in relation to basic job-related comput- 1-6
ing tasks, instructional technology, and participa- 2. Game-play experience from questions 7-11
tive levels in innovative teaching methods. 3. Perceptions of teacher comfort levels when
A survey was designed by the researchers to completing job-related computing tasks from
collect information from respondents through a questions 12-17
traditional paper option. Each classroom teacher 4. Amounts of instructional technology use by
received the paper survey, along with a cover the teachers from questions 18-30
letter, explaining the purpose of the study and 5. Amounts of implementation of innovative
directions for completing the survey. teaching practices from questions 31-41
Administrators at four schools chose to have
the surveys completed in a faculty meeting and A four-point Likert scale was used to rate each
returned at the conclusion of the meeting result- item from section three (‘strongly agree’, ‘agree’,
ing in return rates of 75%, 75%, 100%, and 94%, ‘disagree’, ‘strongly disagree’), section four
respectively. One school chose to distribute the (‘frequently’, ‘sometimes’, ‘rarely’, ‘never’), and
surveys at a faculty meeting and have the surveys section five (‘frequently’, ‘sometimes’, ‘rarely’,
returned in a sealed envelope to a designated ‘never’). Validation of the survey was obtained by
location, resulting in a return rate of 25.7%. Two having the survey reviewed by a panel of experts.

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 Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

Reliability was tested through a pilot application Question 3 asked the participants to specify
of the survey and testing the internal consistency their highest level of education. Of the total
of the questions using Cronbach’s alpha. One population, 30% indicated a bachelor’s degree as
question was removed from the original survey to the highest degree earned, while 60% revealed
reach an acceptable level of .894 for section three, having a master’s degree. Also, 9% were identi-
.839 for section four, and .863 for section five. fied as having an education specialist degree, and
1% had earned a doctoral degree. Table 3 displays
Data Analysis the frequencies and percentages for this item.
Question 4 attempted to gather information
Descriptive statistics were used to analyze items regarding the years of teaching for each indi-
on the survey. Three separate independent samples vidual in the study. Frequencies and percents from
t-tests were conducted to determine if a significant each range of years are listed in Table 4. Out of
difference existed between each group regarding the population, 23% identified themselves as
comfort levels with job-related technology tasks, having 6-10 years of teaching experience, followed
amounts of instructional technology usage, and closely by the 0-5 years experience group at 21%.
implementations of innovative teaching practices. Next was the 11-15 years group at 19%, followed
by the group with 25 or more years at 16%. The
Demographics smallest groups represented included the 16-20
years experience and the 20-25 years experience
The first section of the survey instrument included groups at 10%.
six questions that gathered demographic infor-
mation from the participants. Percentages were
Table 2. Gender of participants
rounded to the nearest whole number for discus-
sion. The first question asked the participants to Gender Frequency Percent
choose a range in which their age fell. Table 1 Male 58 32
displays the frequencies and percentages for this Female 126 68
item. The data revealed that 17% of the popula-
tion fell between the ages of 20 and 29, 26% fell
between the ages of 30 and 39, 22% fell between
Table 3. Highest level of education
the ages of 40, and 49 and the remaining 35% of
the population was 50 or older. Degree Frequency Percent
The second question identified the gender of Bachelor’s 55 30
the respondents. The data in Table 2 indicate the Master’s 111 60
Education 17 9
participation of 58 males and 126 females in the Specialist 1 1
study, resulting in percentage levels of 32 and 69 Doctoral
respectively.
Table 4. Years of teaching experience
Table 1. Age of participants Years Frequency Percent
0-5 39 21
Age Frequency Percent
6-10 43 23
20-29 32 17 11-15 34 19
30-39 48 26 16-20 19 10
40-49 40 22 20-25 19 10
50+ 64 35 25+ 30 16

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Question 5 gathered data concerning the sub- began playing video games. Almost 20% indicated
ject areas taught by the participants. The subject they began playing games at the age of 10, and
area of math was represented at the highest rate 17% indicated they began playing games at the
at 19%, followed by English at 17%, history at age of 12.
16%, science at 12%, special education at 10%,
other areas at 10%, vocational at 9%, and physi- Research Question 1
cal education at 7%. Frequencies and percents for
this question are found in Table 5. Who are the teachers with experience playing
video games? When looking at the game players,
Gaming Experience 32% of the population was from the 30-39 age
group. This percentage was followed closely by
The second section of the survey collected par- the 40-49 age group at 27%. While this study
ticipant data specific to video game experience. did not account for anyone under the age of 20,
Question 6 identified each participant as a game these percentages resembled statistics released
player or non-game player during the present or from the Entertainment Software Association in
any time in the past. Out of 184 respondents, 66 2005, where the mean age of game players was
(36%) identified themselves as a gamer (as hav- found to be around 30.
ing game playing experience) and 64% classified Among the total male population surveyed,
themselves as not having game playing experience. 52% were labeled as a gamer, while only 29% of
When asked about playing video games on the total female population carried the same label.
personal computers, only 18% chose ‘frequently’. Even though the female population had a lower
The majority, 41%, chose ‘seldom’. When asked percentage within their own gender, they made up
about playing video games on consoles, 59% 55% of the game-playing population due to their
chose ‘seldom’. Within the game-playing popu- higher total population in this study.
lation, 48% reported playing Web-based games Each of the groups with years of experience
‘sometimes’ or ‘frequently’. In an average week, from 0 to 5, 6 to 10, 11 to 15, and 16 to 20 had at
64% of game players reported playing games less least 35% of the group identified as gamers, with
than one hour per week, 27% played from one to the 6 to 10 years experience group leading the way
three hours per week, and 9% played from three at almost 50%. History teachers and teachers from
to seven hours per week. No respondents reported the group “other” classified themselves as gamers
playing more than seven hours per week. at a rate equal to or greater than 60%. Science,
Question 11 from the survey asked the par- math, and English followed at percentage levels
ticipants to list an approximate age at which they of 32%, 31%, and 41% respectively.

Research Question 2
Table 5. Subject area
Are teachers with experience playing video games
Subject Frequency Percent
more comfortable completing job-related technol-
Math 35 19
English 32 17 ogy tasks? Total scores for gamers and non-gamers
Science 22 12 were computed and analyzed by an independent
History 30 16
Physical Education 12 7 samples t-test to explore this research question.
Vocational 16 9
The effect of video game-play experience was
Special Education 19 10 not significant, t(182)=.983, p = .189, at an alpha
Other 18 10
level of .05. Sufficient evidence existed to con-

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 Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

clude that there is no significant difference among user friendly, but each group will need sufficient
teacher gamers and teacher non-gamers in regard professional development to see great improve-
to comfort levels with job-related technology. The ment. For example, blogs can replace the often
mean total score for game players in this section tedious and time-consuming class Web page, but
was 20.33 and the mean total score for non-game many educators are skeptical in regard to new
players was 19.99. types of technology.
This section of the survey contained six ques-
tions. Even though no significant difference was Research Question 3
found between the groups for total scores for these
questions, the gamers had higher mean scores on Do teachers with experience playing video games
five questions, and one question had equal means. use instructional technology more often than those
Of the five questions with differing means, the without experience playing video games? After
question regarding the use of basic computer total scores were computed for each group for the
applications had a very small difference of .01, survey questions related to this research question,
leaving four other questions with mean differences an independent samples t-test was conducted
of at least .10. to determine if a significant difference existed
The questions with mean differences of at between the gamers and non-gamers in regard to
least .10 between each group included perceived their amounts of instructional technology usage.
comfort levels of using software to demonstrate The effect of video game-play experience was not
concepts in class, communicating electronically significant, t(159.273)=-.318, p = .751, between
with colleagues and students, using the Internet the two groups at an alpha level of .05. The mean
for instructional purposes, and presenting informa- total score for game players in this section was
tion using a variety of delivery modes including 31.38 and the mean total score for non-game
audio, video, and text. These differences may players was 31.73.
be explained by studies such as Mitchell and There were 13 items answered by the respon-
Savill-Smith (2004), where computer games dents for this section. Six of the questions had more
were found being used to teach a variety of basic positive results for gamers, and six of the questions
and complex skills supporting several areas and had more positive responses for non-gamers. One
disciplines. Also, video games are often times question had equal means from each group. Even
the first access individuals have to technology though 12 questions had different means for each
and may create a more positive outlook towards group, several questions had similar means, and
technology (Gros, 2003). only three of the questions had differences greater
Each question reflected positive confidence than .10. Of these three, all had higher mean
levels for both groups, except in regard to com- scores for the non-gamers, indicating non-gamers
fort levels creating and updating Web pages. communicate electronically with parents more
On a four-point Likert scale, this question had a frequently, encourage students to use electronic
mean score of 2.58 for each group. In fact, 44% tutorials outside of class more frequently, and al-
of game players and 50% of non-game players low students to use word processors to complete
chose ‘strongly disagree’ or ‘disagree’ in response assignments more frequently. In relation to com-
to this item. In contrast, all of the other questions municating electronically with parents, gamers
in this section had mean scores above 3.23, with scoring at a slightly lower level resemble the results
most hovering around 3.50. Hopefully, each group from Lawry et. al. (1995), where no clear relation-
will become more comfortable working with Web ship was found between anti-social behavior and
pages as technology advances and becomes more gaming. Also, non-gamers allowing students to

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

use word processors and electronic tutorials more closer look is taken at each individual statement,
often may be attributed to computers becoming the means are extremely close for each item for
more prevalent in teacher education programs. both groups, with differences less than .08 for
Teacher education programs are offering more all questions except one. The only item with a
opportunities for students to learn with various greater difference was in regard to how often the
types of instructional technology, and many are individual takes risks with instruction by trying
requiring introductory computer courses (Betrus something new. The game players group reported
& Molinda, 2002). taking risks more often, but the difference between
A few of the items in this section had mean each group was only .10. The slight difference in
scores below 2.0 on a four-point Likert scale. The the amounts of risks taken could be explained by
choices on this section were ‘never’, ‘rarely’, Beck and Wade (2004) when they found gamers to
‘sometimes’, and ‘frequently’. This would indicate have the ability to implement bold but measured
an average result somewhere between ‘never’ and risk-taking strategies in the business world. Beck
‘rarely’ on these items. Neither group exhibited and Wade (2004) also described gaming as a pos-
positive results in regard to allowing students to sible training ground for critical business skills.
communicate with teachers, students, or experts Items reported with lower means from each
via blogs. The negative results associated with group included using alternative assessments such
blogs could be attributed to the new emergence of as digital rubrics and portfolios, and incorporat-
this type of communicative technology. Blogs are ing creative writing activities into daily lessons.
attractive because of their ease of use (Downes, Each of the other items in this section represented
2004), but many teachers may not be familiar with more positive results, with both groups reporting
them. Also, both groups reacted negatively to how very high means on reflecting upon and assessing
often they allow students to use spreadsheets to their own teaching and ensuring that all students
complete assignments. Game players also had an are experiencing some type of learning success
average below 2.0 in response to allowing students in their classroom.
to use databases to complete assignments.
IMPLICATIONS
Research Question 4
Implications of this research may prompt further
Do teachers with experience playing video games study and also an evaluation of one’s thoughts
participate in more innovative teaching strategies? concerning the potential benefits of gaming. It is
An independent samples t-test was conducted hoped that this study and other studies centered
to determine if a significant difference existed on gaming and education will further inform
between the gamers and non-gamers in regard to both policymakers and practitioners about the
their participation in innovative teaching strate- characteristics of game players and the potential
gies. The effect of video game-play experience benefits of gaming in education.
was not significant, t(182)=.336, p = .737, between
the two groups at an alpha level of .05. The mean Is Education Willing to Keep Pace?
total score for game players in this section was
35.71 and the mean total score for non-game Even though this study did not find any signifi-
players was 35.49. cant differences between gamers and non-gamers
There were 11 items on this section of the concerning specific teaching behaviors, there is
survey. The choices on this section were ‘never’, little doubt the field of education can learn from
‘rarely’, ‘sometimes’, and ‘frequently’. When a the gaming community (Gee, 2004). The youth

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of today are growing up in technology-rich en- CONCLUSION

vironments with almost daily advancements in
the Internet, video games, and computer games. This study was limited to public schools at the
Educators are facing a very tough challenge secondary level in North Alabama. With the in-
in keeping the attention of their students in a fast- crease in sales within the video game market and
paced, technology-rich society. Students have the continual growth of the video game player
entertainment at the touch of a button whether it population, a similar study may benefit from a
is via MP3 player, computer, cell phone, game larger and more dispersed population.
console, or remote control. Many students are Although significant differences were not
losing interest in the classroom because of the lack found between gamers and non-gamers when t-
of engagement in this setting. While entertainment tests were conducted for each research question,
should never take the place of quality informa- researchers may choose to investigate specific
tion within the classroom, student engagement areas where mean differences were found. For
should always be a high priority. Policymakers and example, gamers were more comfortable using
practitioners have often been slow to adapt or to presentation software for demonstrating concepts
accept change. A balance might be beneficial. For in class, communicating electronically with col-
example, most secondary students are familiar with leagues and students, using the Internet for instruc-
podcasting; podcasting has tremendous potential tional purposes, and presenting information using
in the classroom. Through a computer or a digital various delivery modes. In comparison to gamers,
audio device, students can download audio/video non-gamers indicated a tendency to communicate
broadcasts related to classroom topics, providing electronically with parents more often, encourage
another alternative to content presentation other students to use electronic tutorials outside of class
than the traditional classroom lecture and text. more often, and allow students to use word pro-
cessors to complete assignments more frequently.
Are College and Professional Future research may address issues of experience
Development Programs Making with technologies such as online banking, scrap-
Progress Preparing Teachers? booking, and online shopping. Some respondents
may have experience with items such as these,
When the data were analyzed, all of the questions but may not be gamers. This could be a clue why
and statements received favorable results for both significant differences were not found in relation
groups except for three questions. These three to job-related technology tasks. Also, researchers
questions were related to advanced computing may choose to explore a possible link between
skills including updating Web pages, implementing teachers’ private use of computer technology
blogs, and using databases. Since these were the and their willingness to implement instructional
only questions or statements receiving low scores, it technology into the classroom.
may suggest that college programs and professional In this study, teachers were identified as
development activities are making progress prepar- gamers or non-gamers by age, gender, educa-
ing teachers to complete job-related computing tion level, years of experience, and subject area.
tasks and implement instructional technology. Most Future studies could involve comparisons within
colleges and universities are requiring students in gaming teachers concerning teaching behaviors.
the field of education to complete at least one class Factors that may contribute to specific behaviors
related to computing skills, and more emphasis is include average hours of game-play per week,
being placed on meaningful professional develop- preferred types of game genre, and type of pre-
ment at the school level. ferred platform. Also, another study may benefit

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

by exploring the attitudes of each group towards Amory, A., Naicker, K., Vincent, J., & Adams,
technology and the reasons they use or do not use C. (1999). The use of computer games as an edu-
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Ballantyne, R., McLean, S. V., & Macpherson, I.
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there are multiple characteristics and criteria that gamer generation is reshaping business forever.
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would benefit by taking these characteristics into
Beckman Institute. (n.d.). Video game survey.
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The video game industry continues to grow
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Pillay, H., Brownlee, J., & Wilss, L. (2003). Wikipedia. (2005). Computer and video games.
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cs.Buffalo.edu/pub/WWW/faculty/rapaport/ Blog: Short for Weblog; considered to be an
online personal diary/journal that may be updated
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anov, V., Correa, M., & Flores, P. (2003). Beyond Innovative Teaching: Demonstrating char-
Nintendo: Design and assessment of educational acteristics that include, but is not limited to, cre-
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Computers & Education, 40, 71–94. doi:10.1016/ good social skills, using technology, and having a
S0360-1315(02)00099-4 desire to succeed in teaching and learning.
Shaffer, D. W., Squire, K. R., Halverson, R., & Instructional Technology: Any type of tech-
Gee, J. P. (2004). Video games and the future of nology implementation based on learning theories
learning. University of Wisconsin-Madison and and that takes a systems approach to helping
Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co- individuals solve problems.
Laboratory, USA. Podcasting: The delivery of digital content
over the Internet available for playback on a per-
Squire, K., & Jenkins, H. (2003). Harnessing sonal computer or portable media player.
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(American Society of Ophthalmic Registered nizational pattern created by an individual to aid
Nurses), 3, 6–33. in future understanding.
Thomas, J. (1993). Teachers of the year speak out: Teacher Gamer: A teacher is considered to
Key issues in teacher professionalization. SERVE have video game-play experience if he or she has
Policy Brief, University of North Carolina at enjoyed playing video games weekly as a hobby
Greensboro, USA. University of Texas at Austin. anytime in the past or present.
(n.d.). Best practices for using instructional tech- Video Games: The terms ‘computer games’
nology. Retrieved November 10, 2005, from http:// and ‘video games’ were used interchangeably
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resources/best_practices/index.php problem solving, teamwork, opposition, and
character identification in order to attain a goal.
Virvou, M., Katsionis, G., & Manos, K. (2005). These types of games are played on computers,
Combining software games and education: Valua- consoles, arcade machines, and handheld devices.
tion of its educational effectiveness. Educational
Technology & Society, 8(2), 54–65.

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APPENDIX

Survey

This instrument is designed to obtain information to aid in determining the impact playing video games
may have on the use of instructional technology and participation in innovative teaching practices.
Please use the following definition in considering your response: A video game is considered to be
any game that is played on a personal computer, handheld system, console, or in an arcade.

Directions: Please answer all items. There are no incorrect answers. Responses to the items will be
coded and used in a statistical analysis. All answers will be confidential.
1. Age: 20-29 30-39 40-49 50+

2. Gender: Male Female

3. Highest level of education:

Bachelor’s Degree Master’s Degree Education Specialist Degree Doctoral Degree

4. Years of teaching: 0-5 6-10 11-15 16-20 20-25 25+

5. Subject Area Taught (Majority of Day):

Math
English
Science
History
Physical Education
Vocational
Special Education
Other: Please Specify ________________

6. Do you consider yourself to be a full-time or part-time video game player now or any time in the past?
Yes
No
If you answered no to the previous question, skip to question #12. If you answered yes, proceed to the
next question.

7. How often have you played a video game on a personal computer?

Never Seldom Sometimes Frequently

8. How often have you played a video game on a console (e.g., PlayStation, X-Box, GameCube, etc.)?
Never Seldom Sometimes Frequently

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

9. How often have you played a Web-based game (e.g., cards, puzzles, role-playing, etc. on the Internet)?
Never Seldom Sometimes Frequently

10. In an average week, how many hours do you spend playing video games?
Less than 1 1-3 3-5 5-7 More than 7

11. At what approximate age did you begin playing video games? _____

For the following questions, rate how much you agree with each statement using the following scale:
1 – Strongly Disagree
2 – Disagree
3 – Agree
4 – Strongly Agree

12. I am comfortable using basic computer applications.

1 2 3 4

13. I am comfortable using presentation software for demonstrating concepts in class.

1 2 3 4

14. I am comfortable communicating electronically with colleagues and students.

1 2 3 4

15. I am comfortable using the Internet for instructional purposes.

1 2 3 4

16. I am comfortable creating and updating class Web pages.

1 2 3 4

17. I am comfortable presenting information using various delivery modes (e.g., audio, video, text).
1 2 3 4

18. How often do you use computer applications to present lesson content in class?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

19. How often do you use audio/visual equipment to display materials in class?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

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 Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

20. How often do you communicate electronically with parents?

Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

21. How often do you encourage or allow students to communicate electronically with you, other stu-
dents, or experts via discussion boards?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

22. How often do you encourage or allow students to communicate electronically with you, other stu-
dents, or experts via blogs?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

23. How often do you encourage students to use Web pages outside of class?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

24. How often do you encourage students to use Web pages in class?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

25. How often do you encourage students to use electronic tutorials outside of class?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

26. How often do you encourage students to use electronic tutorials in class?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

27. How often do your students use word processors to complete assignments?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

28. How often do your students use spreadsheets to complete assignments?

Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely(a few times per semester)
Never

29. How often do your students use databases to complete assignments?

Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

30. How often do your students use presentation software to complete assignments?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

31. How often do you take risks with your instruction by trying something new?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

32. How often do you search for new ideas or products to enhance your lessons?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

33. How often do you use alternative assessments such as digital rubrics and digital portfolios?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

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 Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

34. How often do you provide individual feedback to students promoting high standards and providing
motivation?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

35. How often do you reflect upon and assess you own teaching?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

36. How often do you coordinate activities within your classroom with out of classroom experiences?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

37. How often do you foster student learning by connecting difficult concepts from the curriculum with
real-world applications?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

38. How often do you incorporate creative writing activities into daily lessons?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

39. How often do you promote teamwork within the classroom and the school?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

40. How often do you share your knowledge, skills, expertise, and resources with colleagues?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

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Teacher Gamers vs. Teacher Non-Gamers

41. How often do you ensure that all students are experiencing some type of learning success in your
classroom?
Frequently (more than once a week)
Sometimes (more than once a month)
Rarely (a few times per semester)
Never

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education, edited by Richard
E. Ferdig, pp. 295-314, copyright 2009 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

1103
1104

Chapter 4.22
Dance Dance Education
and Rites of Passage
Brock Dubbels
Center for Cognitive Sciences, Literacy Education, University of Minnesota, Department of
Curriculum & Instruction, USA

ABSTRACT game over time. The difficulty of creating this

program was the risk that the students would
The experience of a successful adolescent learner not sustain engagement in the activity, and thus
will be described from the student’s perspective we would not have a viable sample for the bone
about learning the video game Dance Dance density adolescent obesity study. Implications
Revolution (DDR) through selected passages of this study include understanding the potential
from a phenomenological interview. The question construction of learning environments that moti-
driving this investigation is, “Why did she sustain vate and sustain engagement in learning and the
engagement in learning?” The importance of this importance of identity construction for teachers
question came out of the need for background on to motivate and engage their students. In addition
how to create an afterschool program that was to to the analysis of sustained engagement through
use DDR as an after school activity that might the four socio- and cultural-cognitive theories,
engage adolescents and tweens to become more four major principals were extracted from the
physically active and reduce the risk of adult operationalized themes into a framework for
obesity, and to increase bone density for these instructional design techniques and theory for
developing young people through playing the engaging learners for game design, training, and
in classroom learning.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch422

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

INTRODUCTION these relations can be mediated digitally through

portals like Facebook, Xbox Live, Second Life,
This article seeks to understand what engages and other social networking tools—as well as
young people in learning, and what sustains their expert systems that provide feedback based on
interest to continue. It explores the elements that performance, such as a video games like Dance
inform the lived experience of a chosen play Dance Revolution (DDR).
activity and the possible social learning theories The DDR game club might be represented
that might inform it. Four theories were chosen as a ritual rite of passage to understand how and
and operationalized for coding the transcript of why people build identities around their play, and
the phenomenological interview because of their sustain engagement to ultimately develop exper-
focus on motivation, social learning, and identity tise. Central to the rite of passage is the initiation
construction: Communities of Practice (Wenger, ritual (Van Gennep, 1960), where new roles and
1998), Affinity Groups (Gee, 2001), Social Inter- status are conferred through public performance
dependence (Johnson & Johnson, 1994, 2009), and where play (Geertz, 1973), the subjunctive mood
Self-Determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 2002). (Turner, 1969), situates the activity, so that rules,
All of these theories seek to explain the mo- roles, and consequences are suspended and par-
tivation behind learning as socially constructed ticipants can explore new identities, associated
and distributed phenomena; all seek to describe activities, and their semiotic domains and thus
the process of identity construction as an impe- develop new status.
tus for situated learning. The assumption in this With this in mind, well-designed video games
study was that it is through the process of identity and their fan bases may represent and express new
construction that engagement is sustained and forms of the rite of passage and initiation ritual.
supported through the process of group affilia- Like a rite of passage, games are structured activi-
tion and is distributed through apprenticeship, ties that are valued by certain cultural subgroups,
modeling, group interaction, interdependence, depend on play as a subjunctive mood, represent
and situated in space. expert systems that resemble apprenticeship ac-
tivities, and involve performance initiation. The
subjunctive mood observed in games and ritual
IDENTITY CONSTRUCTION RITUALS are said to decontextualize the action and provide
AND RITES OF PASSAGE a suspension of rules, roles, and consequences
found in ordinary life to allow for the exploration
Traditionally, communities gather to provide cer- of new identities, rules, roles, actions, and social
emony for initiation and status transition for such affiliations and status in a safe space. Games can
things as the celebration of status change, where do this well.
a child becomes an adult, and initiation, where The ritual and process of identity construction
single people become married couple. Although may be an organizing principle in understand-
there may be many more transitions and rituals ing motivation and engagement. The four social
in today’s society because of the great variety learning theories presented for discourse analysis
of cultural subgroups (i.e., churches, car clubs, seek to provide the impetus for motivation and
self-help groups like Alcoholic Anonymous, and engagement and how to structure it, and rely upon
hobby groups like The Peoples’ Revolutionary aspects of identity construction; these theories
Knitting Circle, etc.), many of these groups tradi- do not present themselves as descriptions of the
tionally necessitated face-to-face interaction. But identity construction process. Each theory has a
with the Internet and today’s computing power, different focus and seeks to describe aspects of

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

identity and focus on an element that informs important for optimizing bone health, as it has
identity construction: Community (Wenger, 1998), been shown to reduce the incidence of fractures
Activity (Gee, 2001), how individuals interact later in life.
with each other (Johnson & Johnson, 1994, 1999), Because it is difficult to motivate children to
and needs of the individual (Deci & Ryan, 2002). participate in the type of cardiovascular activities
For the purposes of this study, these theories were that adults engage in (running, cycling, aerobics),
operationalized to provide insight for designing new strategies must be developed, and these may
instructional environments that will motivate and demand elements that motivate the learner to
sustain the engagement of the learner. sustain engagement over a longer period of time
in order to promote and sustain life habits for
physical conditioning.
PURPOSE OF STUDY

This interview was to inform design features to DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION IS

develop a program for pre-adolescent exercise NOT YOUR TYPICAL VIDEO GAME
with DDR for the study of obesity reduction
and increasing bone density. The study was also DDR is a game that you set up with mats, a TV,
intended to get a sense of why a young woman a game console and a game disk, and up to four
sustained engagement with DDR over 3 years people can play simultaneously (Figure 1). To play
to develop expertise, and how educators might DDR, a participant responds to a series of direc-
replicate that kind of commitment to learning and tional arrows (see Figure 2), displayed on a video
practice. This study may be especially pertinent or TV screen to perform choreographed dance
to designing instructional contexts, exergaming, steps or hops synchronized to music. Song tempo
and structuring interaction and professional de- and degree of difficulty increase as the player
velopment. successfully progresses in the game. Because of
the game’s popularity and its cardiovascular exer-
cise and jumping (bone-building) components, it
BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY could represent an appealing model for reducing
physical inactivity in children.
Health care professionals have observed an in- DDR may be a possible solution to increasing
crease in levels of childhood obesity. This increase activity and mechanical load because of the amount
has been attributed in large part to physical inac- of jumping activity, but the young person must
tivity. Physical inactivity can lead to obesity and be motivated to start, and engagement must be
poor cardiovascular health, and it can also have sustained for the activity to produce valid and
negative effects on bone health. Bones function reliable measures of obesity and bone density.
to support a mechanical load (a force exerted by The issue under investigation was how to help
body weight, muscle, growth, or activity). Bone young people start an activity and sustain it; the
is constantly formed and reabsorbed throughout simple answer to this was, seemingly, to make
life in a generally balanced way. However, in a it fun—to make it a high-interest activity—but
three- to four-year window during puberty, bone many toys, games, and activities are often tried
formation is accelerated. In that period, as much once and then put aside. What came out of the
bone material is deposited as will be lost during interview was:
a person’s entire adult life. During these pivotal
years of bone development, physical activity is

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

Figure 1. Dance Dance Revolution set up

• the importance of group and environment
to the construction of status and identity
that makes belonging to a group desirable
along with the sustenance of a common
activity,
• the importance of status and relation for
reinforcement,
• the centrality of group performance,
• the role of play as a subjunctive mood and
portal to engagement,
• and again, the importance of identity con-
struction for transformation to instantiate
sustained engagement conveyed through
affiliation, apprenticeship, positive interde-
pendence, and expertise. The big idea here
is that perception leads to transformation.

INTERVIEW-EE/INFORMANT

To explore this, we recruited Ellen as a DDR ex-

pert and possible employee to lead an after-school
program at one of our sites at the Minneapolis
• the importance of aligning the outcomes Public Schools. We posted a hiring description for
with a desirable activity, DDR experts and had a number of responses. One
• autonomy-supporting environments, respondent, Charles, shared that he had a lot of

Figure 2. Screen shot and description of DDR

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

friends who were really good at DDR, and Ellen and positive attitudes related to the activity and
was listed as one of those people. Ellen came into subject matter.
the lab to show us her DDR play, and we were
impressed with her expertise. • Engagement is not just doing the work, it
What was interesting about Ellen was that she is a connection and an affinity to an activ-
was not from a subversive or reactionary subcul- ity supported from the affective domains
ture. Ellen is part of one of the least studied cultural (Chapman, 2003).
subgroup in schools (Buckingham, 2007)—an • Skinner and Belmont (1993, p. 572) report
urban, middle-class teen that is successful in that engaged learners show sustained be-
school, is respectful to teachers, has a part-time havioral involvement in learning activities
job, plays varsity soccer, in traveling band, is part accompanied by a positive emotional tone,
of the International Baccalaureate Program, and select tasks at the border of their compe-
has a satisfying home life. tencies, initiate action when given the
These elements of her identity were surprising. opportunity, and exert intense effort and
We usually assume that video game players are concentration.
a disenfranchised fringe group at school who do • Pintrich and De Groot (1990) see engage-
not engage with the typical academic fare. Ellen ment as having observable cognitive com-
was able to balance not only her academics and ponents that can be seen or elicited through
music instruction, work a part-time job, but also exploring the learner’s use of strategy,
play sports and have friendships. These elements metacognition, and self-regulatory be-
of balance were enticing and we wanted to know havior to monitor and guide the learning
how she was doing it so that we might try and processes.
replicate not only the physical health benefits
in our bone density study, but also some of the These attributes do not appear in an activity
psycho-social and affective elements necessary because a student is told that it is good for them,
for sustaining engagement (Chapman, 2003). and that they should commit to their betterment.
She seemed like a great role model for creating Least likely is that they do an activity because we
a curriculum that would rely heavily on identity threaten, or just because we want them to.
development and she was an intriguing informant A student must make a choice to commit to
to help us understand how play identities might an activity and have that commitment reaffirmed
lead to work habits that help form healthy minds over time to sustain engagement. True engagement
and bodies. in an activity is in some sense transformative
and resembles identity construction, in that it
changes who one is through cognitive, affective,
METHODOLOGY AND and behavioral elements. It seems likely that
REVIEW OF LITERATURE without positive reinforcement (Skinner, 1938)
the behavior may result in extinction and the
The question driving this investigation is, “Why game becomes another resident on the island of
did she sustain engagement in learning?” misfit toys. We look at social learning theories to
According to Chapman (2003), engagement is explore issues of sustaining engagement through
more than behavioral time on task. When looking socially distributed reinforcement.
to measure growth or change, or even to understand DDR is considered a high interest activity for
whether a learner has truly engaged, an educator many young people, and it does have a reward
should also look for evidence of commitment system that gives real-time feedback on perfor-

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

mance with rewards for successful play. But, metaphorical or literal portal to represent a change
without aligning those rewards and achievement in social status and position.
with social capital, they lack meaning and status, In the context of Liminality, the activity space
and the reinforcement system remains a token may be far removed from reality, and roles, rules,
economy (Ferster & Skinner, 1957) whose tokens tools, values, and status may be situated in the flux
are unredeemable except as social capital. of play as if a hybrid or interstitial space (Turner,
The work of Buckingham on identity develop- 1969). This concept of the threshold and liminality
ment may provide some insight for connecting seems to validate Geertz (1973) and his descrip-
identity with purpose, motivation, and sustained tion of the “Center Bet” in describing the ritual
engagement. Buckingham (2008, p. 3) states of Balinese Cockfighting and Benthams’ concept
that Identity is developed by the individual, but of Deep Play. According to Turner (1969), there
it has to be recognized and confirmed by others. may be many rites of passage in a person’s life
Adolescence is also a period in which young through sub-cultural affiliation (Cock Fighting,
people negotiate their separation from their fam- DDR, First Job) where identity and entitlement are
ily, and develop independent social competence inculcated through desire to become a respected
(for example, through participation in “cliques” and acknowledged group member, where the
and larger “crowds” of peers, who exert different individual can share in and contribute to group
kinds of influence). activity, participate in group spaces, and publicly
Identity and status were traditionally conferred renew and further their status.
through rites of passage, and there may have been For Wenger (1998), identity is central to hu-
many culturally-specific instances of these rites man learning; identity construction and learning
for different groups and related activities. Video are distributed through community and relations;
games may represent a new wrinkle in the way learning is socially constructed; and motivation
that we enact and view rites of passage. They is based on a desire for sharing and participatory
may offer a form of guided, ritualized behavior culture. The work of Wenger shares many attri-
for identity construction and group affiliation as butes with Gee’s work, but the focus for Wenger
an autonomy-supporting environment (Ryan & was on socially distributed cognition and learn-
Deci, 1999), Affinity Group (Gee, 2001), Social ing as social participation. Earlier work (Lave &
Interdependence (Johnson & Johnson, 1994, 1999) Wenger, 1991) explored the role of learning in
or Community of Practice (Wenger, 1998). apprenticeship, where newcomers would enter
A rite of passage does not need to resemble into a space where learning was situated and con-
the tribal practices that led to vision quests, ritual textualized, and goals and purpose were evident
markings, or exodus. A rite of passage may be or- due to entering the space. One entered the space
ganized in three forms: the process of separation, to gain apprenticeship and attempt to acquire and
transition, and integration, (Van Gennep, 1960), learn the sociocultural practices of the community.
but all three of these rites may also be presented Thus, the individual is drawn to the group and
as single rite (Barnard & Spencer, 1996). What begins to engage and learn by finding their role
was important for Van Gennep was the idea of in a distributed, networked, cultural-cognitive
Liminality, or the threshold. The threshold in an process with the purpose of the individual as an
initiation represents a portal—a representative active participant in the practices of a social com-
movement from the status of one social space to munity and become an acknowledged member
another, where ritualistically, the individual or with skills, knowledge, and the requisite values.
group makes a transition by passing through a This participation leads to the construction of his/
her identity through these communities. From

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

this understanding develops the concept of the of people share a set of practices, a set of com-
Community of Practice: a group of individuals mon goals or endeavors, and a set of values and
participating in communal activity, creating their norms, however much each of the individuals in
shared identity through engaging in and contribut- the group may also have their own individual
ing to the practices of their communities. styles and goals, as well as other affiliations.
The difficulty with this theory is that group ~Gee (2001, p. 2)
membership is hard to define. A person may want
to be part of group and claim group membership, This work allows for certain attributes of
but not have the identifiable characteristics that group membership to be observable rather than
define the membership. subjective. A young person may have grown up
Since identity is conferred from others, there participating in an activity with parents and young
are factors that can identify a person as a group friends, but during the puberty years, may reject
member and as having identity markings. For Gee that affiliation based upon new goals for group
(2001), the activity is primary and provides the membership and status. A new group may be more
motivation and engagement, the source of group desirable than a current group, and the young
membership and the identity markings; for Gee the person may cast off markings that identify them
community and relations are ancillary and stem with the old group such as a hat from a uniform,
from the interaction related to the activity. He ways of speaking, values, etc. This does not mean
states that these communities and spaces are hard that markings of prior group membership with
to identify without knowing exactly why people parents, family, and childhood affiliations are not
are there. Whether a person actually claims group still observable—an accent or mannerism may
membership or is acknowledged can be difficult. indicate origins or influence. For Gee (2001), it is
For Gee, whether group membership is ac- the activities and the group practices that provide
knowledged—claimed or not—attributes can still evidence of social learning and group membership
be observed. The role of Gee’s work is central to from semiotic domains, and it is activity that is
operationalizing identity and group membership central to identity construction.
through offering observable sociocultural markers For Deci and Ryan (2002), the focus comes
that come from semiotic domains central to the from work on motivation with a focus on Au-
activity as evidence of group membership. tonomy, possibly built from early work by White
(1959), where organisms have an innate need to
A semiotic domain recruits one or more modalities experience competence and agency and experience
(e.g., oral or written language, images, equations, joy and pleasure with the new behaviors when they
symbols, sounds, gestures, graphs, artifacts, and assert competence over the environment—what
so forth) to communicate distinctive types of White called effectance motivation.
messages. By the word “fluent” I mean that the For Deci and Ryan, motivation is based on the
learner achieves some degree of mastery, not degree that an activity or value has been internal-
just rote knowledge ... Semiotic domains are, of ized, and this is based upon the degree to which
course, human creations. As such, each and every the behavior has meaning within the context of
one of them is associated with a group of people the arena of performance.
who have differentially mastered the domain, In order to sustain engagement for Deci and
but who share norms, values, and knowledge Ryan, motivation must be internalized—the exter-
about what constitutes degrees of mastery in the nal contingency must be “swallowed whole.” The
domain and what sorts of people are, more or learner identifies the value of the new behavior
less, “insiders” or “outsiders.” Such a group with other values that are part of the self. This

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

process of engagement is the transformation of istic efforts. In contrast to cooperative situations,

an extrinsic motive, one that is reinforced from competitive situations are ones in which students
outside the learner’s values, into an activity that work against each other to achieve a goal that only
is assimilated and internalized by the learner as one or a few can attain. In competition there is a
an intrinsic value that becomes part of their per- negative interdependence among goal achieve-
sonal identity. This process involves constructing ments; students perceive that they can obtain their
values aligned with the group and environment, goals if, and only if, the other students in the class
and thus assimilates behavioral norms that were fail to obtain their goals
originally external as part of a new identity. Based In cooperative situations, students work with
on the degree of control exerted by external fac- Positive Interdependence, where group members
tors, levels of extrinsic motivation can be aligned perceive that they are linked with each other, and
along a continuum. (Figure 3) that the success of each member is linked to the
success of the others.
• External regulation: doing something for Twelve themes from these theories of identity
the sake of achieving a reward or avoiding construction, ritual and rites of passage, engage-
a punishment. ment, motivation, and social learning were taken
• Introjected regulation: partial internaliza- to code the interview transcript to inform analysis
tion of extrinsic motives. and make decisions on what factors might be
• Identified regulation: doing an activity be- important for the construction our after-school
cause the individual identifies with the val- program for tracking design efficacy and measure
ues and accepts it as his own. performance.

Identified regulation is autonomous and not

merely controlled by external factors. It is motiva- THEMES FOR CODING
tion for an activity that has been integrated as part
of the learner’s values, and refers to identification Of these twelve themes, there seemed to be four
with the values and meanings of the activity to major themes, and the rest seemed to be inter-
the extent that it becomes fully internalized and dependent sub-levels that were common across
autonomous (Ryan & Deci, 2000). all of the theories. With this in mind, the major
Social Interdependence describes what informs themes are:
students’ goal attainments (Johnson & Johnson,
1994, 1999). According to Johnson and Johnson • Play as Subjunctive Mood
(1999) • Activity Space
Students’ learning goals may be structured to • Desirable Social Grouping, and
promote cooperative, competitive, or individual- • Desirable Activity.

Figure 3.

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

Table 1. Themes for coding

Play
Activity Space Desirable Social Grouping
Subjunctive Mood
Ritual Rites of Passage
Positive Interdependence Belonging/ Relatedness
Initiation, separation, integration
Desirable Activity Identified regulation Apprenticeship
Affective Commitment Autonomy/ Competence Cognitive Theories of Action

These themes were the most common descrip- (1999, p. 1) and “how do existing societies provide
tions of “why” when Ellen described her DDR people with the possibilities and resources for rich
play. These three themes also represent an ag- and fulfilling lives,” Fairclough (2003, p. 202). It
gregation of each theory, but with emphasis on was for this reason that these methods were used to
activity, space, and groups, as well as the mood explore and code the phenomenological interview
that needed to be present in those themes to be transcript. Although a sample of one participant
attractive. is not very robust for generalization, it provided
a starting point for more focused theory testing,
as well as to provide insights for us as designers,
DATA COLLECTION theorists, and education practitioners.

The phenomenological interview methodology

(van Manen, 1997) was used to try to elicit re- INTERVIEW
sponses beyond descriptions of rationale to gather
“thick descriptions” (Geertz, 1973) of affective, This first excerpt from the interview begins to
social, corporeal, and cognitive behaviors behind describe the motivation to learn to play Dance
the activity and experience of playing DDR. Dance Revolution. Ellen and I met on a nice
And, also to encourage descriptions that were spring day in the Whittier neighborhood near
thick enough that the researcher might be able the Minneapolis Institute of Arts at a coffee shop
to identify instances of learning and engagement called Spy House. When I asked her about her
situated and distributed across networks of time experience of playing DDR, she said:
and space, mediated through shared activity, and
perhaps to see if there were evidence indicating The first time I ever played Dance Dance Revolu-
what elements in the identity construction process tion was with my friends Tyler and Ben. They had
inform motivation and engagement. it at Devon’s house and everyone was playing this
game. Really, I wanted to hang out with them, I
wanted to participate and so that’s when I started
DATA ANALYSIS learning. Then it was after playing with those guys
for so long that I really started to enjoy the game.
The critical discourse methods as espoused by Gee I actually didn’t have a play station before that,
(1999) and Fairclough (2003) not only provide so I went out and bought a play station just so I
methodologies that are fundamental to qualitative could play DDR, yeah ... yeah, I didn’t want to be
analysis, but are also fundamental to the study left out of it. Games are fun and I just wanted to
of “the scaffolding of human affiliation within spend time with my friends and this is something
cultures and social groups and institutions,” Gee that they were all doing.

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

The basis for Ellen’s learning was Belong- I was excited because this was something I could
ing/Relatedness to a Desirable Group. This idea participate in. I’ve played Halo and I’m not that
of relatedness and Belonging were fundamental good at it and everyone was starting out on this
in her development of skills and collection of for the first time, so I thought I could be one
resources to develop as a player. However, she of those good people at it and get respect from
did not have the feeling of connectedness until people. I was really excited. They have this huge
she was really able to engage in the activity as a TV at Devon’s house and everyone’s around you.
participating member—Autonomy/Competence. I was kind of nervous too because you have to
This indicated introjected regulation, and Identi- do this in front of people. Well, we were all kind
fied Regulation seems to require the performance of sitting on the couch watching the men and I
and seems to require some external indication of was like I want to try it. I mean, some of them
having internalized the values of the group that were interested in seeing me probably because
are expressed through public performance in the they knew I never played before and they made
group and a commitment to practice that showed me where I was probably going to fail, but then
her effort toward group success as an indication I actually really wanted to do it, so I was like, I
of Positive Interdependence. want to do it next! I thought I was going to be
Surprisingly, the activity was not initially a better at the game than I thought I was because
Desirable Activity, “I wanted to participate and I’m thinking, oh these guys they don’t have any
so that’s when I started learning.” After some time coordination. This’ll be easy for me. I’m kind of
participating, she found enjoyment along with her in shape, so I was thinking it would be pretty easy
sense of Belonging to a Desirable Group. This and then I do some of these songs and I was like
phenomenon suggests precedence of Belonging oh, I need to go down a level! I thought I caught
to a Desirable Group for Ellen over engaging in on fairly quickly.
a Desirable Activity, and also suggests that an
individual can develop interest in activity that What was clear from this passage was the
might not have been initially motivating due to importance of the activity and her feeling that
a desire to belong. Speculatively, there may be she could be successful participating and “be one
some indication for the importance of Play as a of those good people at it and get respect from
Subjunctive Mood for developing affinity for an people.” There are several parts to this that are
activity. It was clear that she had already identified especially interesting:
with the people, but, based on the next excerpt,
she had not identified or been identified with 1. Belief in her ability to succeed was essen-
the activity. The descriptions she offers indicate tial in her willingness to perform publicly.
that the activities need to be playful and not so Research on adolescents’ engagement in
serious, and that the activity should offer success literacy, for example, has found that ado-
for assured status. There must be an entry point lescent perceptions of their competence and
for a public performance, and perhaps since this ability to succeed may be a more important
game was new, she could enter without the loss predictor of whether they will engage, than
of status that would come from being new and their past performance. (Alvermann, 2001;
unskilled while the skilled players watched her Anderman et al., 2001; Bean, 2000; Guthrie
and perhaps lost interest in her performance, and & Wigfield, 2000). Studies of adolescents
possibly in her. have also found that they prefer to perform
where they know they will have success

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

(Csikzentmihaly, Rathunde, & Whalen, not, that she needed to participate through perfor-
1996). mance (Autonomy/Competence) to Belong. This
2. The fear of performing in front of the group supports Deci and Ryan’s position that Autonomy,
with Autonomy/Competence, but that since Belonging, and Competence are basic needs that
people were just starting out, she might have underlie motivation and engagement and satisfy
a chance to be good at it and to be respected. Skinner and Belmont’s (1993) assertion of affec-
This may have played an even larger role tive involvement. What is central to these needs
because she was one of the girls who watch are the Activity Space where these young people
from the sofa, not one of “the men” who play could interact as a community through the game;
the games and perform. the subjunctive mood of play that may have al-
3. The importance of the Activity Space and its lowed for the desirability and beliefs in success;
affordances as well as the possible change and the game itself, which seems to be structured
in atmosphere with this new game, where to promote Positive Interdependence and can
there may have been more emphasis on Play create Identified Regulation through structuring
as the Subjunctive Mood. relations through space and activity.
4. The role of Belonging/Relatedness seemed Ellen had already aligned her values internally
to be an important component in her par- as Introjected Regulation, but she had not found
ticipating in the activity and her feeling of an opportunity with a Desirable Activity where
becoming an acknowledged group member. she might have success in the Activity Space and
The structure of the activity, according to feel confident that she would succeed and enjoy
the next excerpt indicated that DDR, as the activity, “I could be one of those good people
compared to other games, offered more of at it and get respect from people.”
an Apprenticeship situation, where others Halo and Counterstrike she described as work
were willing to teach and share; raising the (Sutton-Smith, 1997), which has consequences
level of success and fun through Positive for failure—the desirable group may have been
Interdependence. much more advanced in their performance in Halo
and Counterstrike, and perhaps took playing the
This makes a case for the importance of Affec- game much more seriously and raised the stakes
tive Commitment, Belonging, and Competence, of the performance.
as well as a Cognitive Theory of Action. Although Games and play are often about choices without
these seem to be sublevels of Desirable Activity life-threatening consequences, but that does not
and Desirable Group, that inform and reinforce mean that games are not taken seriously. They can
action, they are important factors that indicate be performance tests (Autonomy/ Competence)
engagement and are likely fundamental to its and Ritual/Rites of Passage that allow for the
sustenance, and also seem to indicate a form of development and affirmation of a place within
reinforcement as socially distributed affect and a group, establishment of pecking orders, and
cognition. through this, community status and entitlement;
Ellen had created a Cognitive Theory of Action it is possible that the experience of being posi-
and knew that it was essential for her to perform tioned to perform and possibly fail was some sort
to be acknowledged and claim membership—an- of initiation, a form of deep play (Geertz, 1973).
other indication of Chapman’s (2003) description This act of bettering oneself in public can be
of engagement, and evidence of Identifiable risky situation—and it really must occur in public
Regulation. To claim Belonging to this Desirable for a person to be seen as Competent/Autonomous
Social Group, she realized whether implicitly or and as an acknowledged group member (Belong-

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

ing). This Ritualistic phenomenon was described sustaining engagement with the practice; and
by Geertz as the “Center Bet” in “Deep Play,” working hard to develop status and identity related
(1973) and based on Ellen’s description, it may to the group and the activity and the freedoms and
be that as competence and expertise evolve, the responsibilities that accompany them.
play gets more serious and the stakes and status
of the performance (Ritual) change, the fear of So, what followed was me just trying to find where I
failure increases with the perceived change in could go to play. Then I kind of got eventually frus-
subjunctive mood from play to work ethos. trated with it—well, not frustrated, but I wanted
to play more, so I decided to buy it for myself.

THE PERFORMANCE/INITIATION Yeah.

Previously, Ellen may have wanted to be part of the You play by yourself to get better to play with other
group, but Ellen stated that the games they were people. I mean, it’s always fun to play by yourself
playing did not provide her with much interest and unlock new songs and things like that.
to play, even though she wanted to belong to the
group and participate in their space. Because of I got it for Christmas from my parents, so I didn’t
this, she may not have been considered as part of have to buy it, but I had to persuade them and make
the group, but maybe more of a tourist or poser sure they got me what I wanted. They didn’t really
because belonging seemed contingent on being understand but they felt okay about it because it
able to “do.” wasn’t something violent or anything like that.

I have a lot of friends who play Counterstrike and Then I was, like, look what I can do! They watched
a lot of ... almost every guy I know plays Halo. You me. They thought it was kind of interesting. This
can enjoy watching those games. I don’t enjoy it was with my family on Christmas. Then my uncles
as much. Like I said, it’s just way more serious. and my little cousin, who was maybe like seven,
They get more serious. Well, it’s like everyone is they all got really interested by it. So my fifty-year-
more quiet and focused, like they really get into old uncles are trying it and they’re getting really
trying to hunt these people down and kill them excited. My little cousin, she’s getting excited
before they are hunted down and killed. DDR, you too. She doesn’t even really understand what’s
are playing against someone but then with Halo happening on the screen but she’s like jumping
and Counterstrike you’re against all these people around on the pad.
and you have to be, like, watching your back all
the time. Even the people watching, they zone out In the DDR trial, Ellen was tested to see how
and just watch it. For me it’s not as fun. As for she would respond to public failure: she could have
DDR, it’s more like people jumping around and quit and gone home, or she could have laughed
are less serious, but it’s still a lot of fun. it off and found the fun in learning and worked
towards acceptance. Ellen found that there were
Prior to Ellen’s embrace of the game, she was others who were beginners that she could improve
a groupie. She could talk about how Devon did, with, and more experienced players who were actu-
but not about her own experience. This came, in ally helpful and willing (Apprenticeship/ Positive
part, as being recognized as a player by her com- Interdependence) to teach. She, also, found that
munity, but it was also a confidence that came of there is no substitute for experience, and that in
public performance (Autonomy/ Competence); order to become a part of the group, she had to go

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through the rites of practice and public initiation. If we can draw from these Activity Spaces and
According to Van Gennep (1960) this ritualized domains and inspire the learner to feel a connec-
process is common to many societies where an tion and affinity to traditional academic fare like
individual passes from one stage of life to another, engineering, literature, mathematics, and so forth
and it can involve separation from childhood as Desirable Activities, we may provide a portal
environment, transition, and incorporation with to embracing academic learning. The challenge
new status. For Turner (1969), this game may not seems to be embedding the learning outcomes
be as monumental as rites celebrating marriage in a high-interest activity with a reinforcement
or death, but it still represents a moment of social network to sustain the activity and continue to
transition and eventual change in status. The im- validate the identity.
portance of this is the public acknowledgement of As Ellen’s ability with the game progressed,
Competence. This seems to be essential to identity she was being recognized as a DDR “gamer girl,”
construction and acceptance as a member of a and this conferred upon her a new identity and
group through the activity that is structured in a way status. She began to find new connections through
that resembles positive interdependence, and may familiar school activities. Her familiar conversa-
be the reinforcement for sustaining engagement. tions changed to unexpected connections in school
It was through the activity that Ellen was con- and at her job; as more people learned about her
ferred status and identity as member not only by new status as a gamer girl, the more she began
her new friends, but through her family and the to meet others with an interest in DDR and to
community, that had the power to convey her status connect with the gamer culture. She had begun to
and acceptance. She became a “gamer girl.” This move beyond her former status as an International
conferred new identity and acceptance allowed Baccalaureate student (Academic), varsity soccer
her to become that gamer beyond her normal player (Jock/Athlete), Band Member (Musician/
relations and to extend her community network band geek) into a more generalized, pop-culture
and develop new relations and status: status, where she was seen as not so serious and
more approachable. It may have been impor-
Because we shared this thing, so it would be, like, tant to Ellen to branch out and change people’s
oh, so whose house are we going to go to tonight perceptions. Perception seems to be essential to
to play DDR? Okay. Well, my friend Devon, his transformation. We can work to create an identity,
house was the main DDR house just because he but it must still be acknowledged to have status.
had a great room for it and everything. And his This may have been her first activity that was
parents didn’t really care how much noise we run by her contemporaries—autonomous and not
made or how late we stayed there, so his house overseen by adults.
is generally the DDR house. Tyler, who was my Perhaps all her work in academics, sports, and
friend prior, we would get together and practice a band had made her appear to be too serious, and
lot. Michael, he bought DDR around the time that easily influenced by adults—a follower. She may
I did and we were basically kind of on the same have also felt constrained by all of her commit-
level, and I got to know him better that way just ments and wanted to break out to meet new, fun
by spending time with all these people. Nick, all people, “Really, I wanted to hang out with them
these other guys, I had kind of known beforehand, ... games are fun.” The proposition that might
but now we spent all this time together. So, it was follow as if a syllogism is that: Gamers are fun,
basically we all met at Devon’s house and that’s and I want to be fun too.
what we would do for weekend-after-weekend- It is only conjecture and anecdotal, and she did
after weekend. not abandon her commitment to band, sports, or

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

academics—she graduated with an International that would make others see her as representative of
Baccalaureate diploma—but as can be imagined, a Desirable Group. The game and her new status
all her work in those areas may have made it seem to have supplanted the importance of being
important to her to find friends who had interests part of the gamer group in Devon’s basement.
beyond her everyday world, and that being a gamer The activity became a means for extending her
would allow her to step away from conversations friend identity reinforcement network as an Af-
about the team, assignments, practicing certain finity Group (Gee, 2001), where people affiliate
pieces of music, and set her apart. Playing the because of an affinity for an activity, maybe to
game and being part of that community allowed be part of the fun—to play. As the activity began
her the ability to decontextualize and detach from to change for the group members, relationships
work and become perceived as fun. started to change, and the emphasis on the game,
Developing these relations may be more than itself, diminished.
fun; it may be an apprenticeship to develop a
coping tool. The importance of play, accord- Well, a lot of the guys that I started playing it
ing to Vygotsky (1978), is decontextualization, with, they moved on to other games because that’s
where an individual can gain gratification and what they do. They focus in on something for a
pleasure even in the midst of unresolved issues really long time and then they’ll find something
and larger, and time- consuming projects. The else will be just released and everybody else will
role of pretense and imagination can bring about just be playing that, so they’ll jump into that.
pleasure and gratification in the face of uncontrol- Then there was always the people who have it,
lable circumstances; this can provide some relief like Tyler and I, who will still play it. We didn’t
through affective reward and pleasure. Perhaps the get bored with it; it’s just then there were other
gaming provided an opportunity to decompress things. No. I don’t play it as much as I do anymore
and laugh in the midst of all that responsibility and my friendships through that have become
and preparation. But, it was seemingly more than different. I mean, we’re all still friends. DDR
that. It was also a way to connect and extend her was just like this common thing that we had to,
status by initiating new players and drawing on like, start us talking and then after that we talked
the interest and social capital, for example, in a about normal things. I became pretty good friends
hotel room on a band trip—another autonomy with a lot of people. I dated one of the guys that
supporting activity space where the identity could I met for awhile. I don’t know, it wasn’t, like, any
be reinforced with status from new participants. different than like you meet people playing for a
Yeah, it was a school band trip. So, a lot of sports team. You have something in common and
us went and it turned out that a whole bunch of that’s what you’re coming together to do, and
people knew what DDR was. It was interesting then you talk about other stuff because we’re not
to see them play. Tyler and I, we kind of felt cool just focused on DDR. Well, at my work it’s kind
because our group that we had played with had of similar too. We’re all stuck working together
progressed better than these other people that we and so then we get talking. Soccer and sports a
were seeing play. They were like, oh man, this lot. Any kind of group that you all come together
kid is so good and we play with him all the time. and you have something to talk about and then
Tyler and I played against these people. Yeah, we we just eventually expand on that and that’s how
beat them pretty bad. we became friends.
In this instance, the game activity did extend
beyond the familiar Activity Spaces like Devon’s The DDR game did facilitate relationships
basement; it even seemed to provide an activity in ways that other games and activities did not,

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

but in the end, the initial motivation may need to try on and project different emotions, and build
come from a purpose that only the individual can comfort and trust through a common experience.
develop. But, play can facilitate this and may make In terms of identity construction, the game
the entrance to a group, the practice, and eventual may take a form of a Ritual/ Rite of Passage:
mastery of knowledge, activity space, and activity The Activity Space is no longer like the ordinary
more likely to be enticing, and possibly provide world. The rules and roles in a game are different
for sustained engagement and eventual mastery. and even changed for the sake of experimentation
This makes a case for Play as a Subjunctive Mood with social norms. Interpersonal boundaries can
and the importance of Positive Interdependence. be tested without endangering status and relation-
Playgroups, and the activities that support ships—it is a trial, a testing. As with Ritual/ Rites of
them, provide a common ground for interaction. Passage, when Play acts as the Subjunctive Mood,
There is definitely a pecking order that comes different parts of person can emerge and people
from demonstrable competence and evidence of can try on different personae without recrimina-
knowledge from the semiotic domains from the tion, because they are only playing.
game. Games are built upon play, pretense, and
decontextualization, but once these activities no
longer provide pleasure and gratification, the CONCLUSION
activity may quickly end and the relationships
and spaces that contextualize and support them In answering the original question, “Why did
may change in the way that Ellen’s DDR group she sustain engagement?” it became evident that
cooled off: “and my friendships though have her motivation to sustain engagement over time
become different. I mean, we’re all still friends.” changed. She was attracted to the activity because
Games are structured forms of play, Dubbels she wanted to be friends with the kids who hung
(2008) that provide rules and roles that are defined out at Devon’s basement—she wanted to be an
to help members to decontextualize from the acknowledged member of the group, not part of
ordinary world where they have responsibility, the fan club. To do this she had to perform and
deadlines, and environments that they cannot risk ridicule and a possible reduction in status.
control. These same rules and roles also help them Geertz (1973) described this spatially in that the
to know their status in the game, share common, further away one is from the “Center Bet,” or the
spontaneous, and authentic experience without central public performance, the lower your status
going too deeply into personal motives, nega- and importance to the main event and performers.
tive feelings, and Freudian melt-downs. Corsaro To be part of this group, she needed to perform,
(1985) called this play group phenomenon the but she was hesitant to try because the games be-
Actors Dilemma. According to Corsaro, the ing played did not mesh with her sense of play
Freudian meltdown, or over-sharing, is one of and fun. Perhaps because the play of these group
the most common causes of playgroup breakup. members with these games (Halo, Counterstrike)
Perhaps play is the coping mechanism that allows was already too far advanced for them to toler-
for detachment and the ability to constructively ate a “newb” (new player) at the controller, and
work on what can be changed and separating out might create a break-down of the activity. In this
that which cannot be changed. Game roles may case, the challenge is learning how to improve
also allow for exploration of other peoples’ values performance through the activity of playing better
and experience in a safe space without getting too players than oneself.
deep or real, which represents an opportunity to Ellen decided that it might be better not impose
her learning during prime-time play and risk the

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

ridicule or contempt of poor performance. The that lack of play was a key factor in Whitman’s
lesson seems to be readying oneself to play in the homicidal actions – if he had experienced regular
“Center Bet,” which she did with DDR. If one is moments of spontaneous play during his life,
not contributing to the play, learning, and/or sta- they believed he would have developed the skill,
tus of the group, perhaps spectators understand flexibility, and strength to cope with the stressful
their place on the periphery, and that perception situations without violence.
is the key to transformation, and this is mediated Brown continued exploring Play Deprivation
through play as subjunctive mood. as a construct and found similar patterns in other
This ability to detach and decontextualize violent offenders, and even traffic deaths related
through play can be a very valuable trait when to aggression and chemical issues. The role of play
dealing with pressures of studying for exams, cannot be underestimated for its ability to decon-
working, and other responsibilities that cannot textualize and reframe experience. Play therapy
offer immediate gratification. This inability to currently is a treatment in child psychology for
decontextualize and detach is one of the central helping children talk about and understand forces
behaviors inherent in Play Deprivation (Brown, beyond their control.
1999), a diagnosis used to make sense of the
incredible violence of Charles Whitmore and
his shooting spree from the bell tower at Texas RELEVANCE OF ANALYSIS
A&M University. It was found that Whitmore was
raised in a very rigid environment where he was The utility of this analysis comes from these
not allowed friends or play. He experienced a life recalled phenomena as a pattern for planning
that looked very successful on the surface. But, instruction and understanding why people learn.
in 1966 he committed what was the largest mass We learn to become. We create and engage to gain
murder in the history of the USA. According to new experience and entitlement and gain status
the National Institute for Play (1), Brown, who without danger in our social network, as well as
was a psychiatrist at Baylor College of Medicine to learn from others, whether it is a workplace
at the time, collected behavioral data for a team competency, gaining social skills, or as a means
of expert researchers, appointed by the Texas of adapting to stress.
governor, to understand what led to Whitmore’s The role of Play as a Subjunctive Mood in these
mass murder. What was found through interview, Activity Spaces and Desirable Groups may be the
diary, and reconstructing is that Whitmore had organizing principle that makes these groups and
been under extreme, unrelenting, stress. After activities desirable as part of identity construction,
many unsuccessful efforts to resolve the stress, as well as the means for identity construction and
he ultimately succumbed to a sense of power- reinforcement to sustain engagement. For a person
lessness; he felt no option was left other than the to facilitate and construct an identity, they may
homicidal-suicidal ... Whitman had been raised in a need to play, just as children play as doctors, fire-
tyrannical, abusive household. From birth through fighters, teachers, mothers, and even animals and
age 18, Whitman’s natural playfulness had been dinosaurs in games. It is through pretense that we
systematically and dramatically suppressed by an are able to imagine and create cognitive theories
overbearing father. A lifelong lack of play deprived of action and circumstance, and it is through play
him of opportunities to view life with optimism, that we develop this capacity.
test alternatives, or learn the social skills that, as If we want to sustain engagement, we need to
part of spontaneous play, prepare individuals to help students develop the capacity for Identified
cope with life stress. The committee concluded Regulation, where they may turn their play into

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

meaningful performance when asked to perform ing engagement and creating the initial portal for
in activities that begin to resemble rites of initia- engaging learners in focused approaches to work
tion and deep play. This process creates a subtle and delay of immediate gratification for the kind
transition where the initial play activity becomes of rewards that rigor and sacrifice deliver.
serious and is approached with the focus of work. I have used these principles on several oc-
Like what Ellen experienced watching advanced casions to explore games and play as effective
players of Halo and Counterstrike, and eventually methods for aligning content and process with
what she experienced in practicing in addition to resistant and reluctant learners. I have used it to
school, homework, and lessons, to prepare for create games for reading instruction, literature
DDR at Devon’s. instruction, engineering, mathematics, leader-
ship, and organizational change. To demonstrate
how this can be done, I created a game called
IMPLICATIONS AND LESSONS Dry Dock to teach engineering that I will use to
FOR DESIGNING INSTRUCTIONAL demonstrate the four major instructional design
ENVIRONMENTS principles for play.

This transcript from Ellen’s experience makes a

case for developing instructional environments PRINCIPLE 1: PLAY AS A
that allow for playful, autonomous group inter- SUBJUNCTIVE MODE
action structured as a game to allow for play in
much the same way that ritual demands play. The Engineering can be a very fun class, but the
group and space “Re–Place” and the rite offers curriculum I was supposed to teach was very
“Re-Creation.” un-fun. In fact the curriculum was the source of
The use of play as the basis for designing the dysfunction. I was being asked to start class
instruction should not be underestimated. Often by presenting standards, why the standards were
we forget that play is our natural approach to important, and tell the students why they were
learning. When working with very young people, learning what they were learning. I found that
such as infants, toddlers, and small children, we this was much more for the benefit of observers
align instruction with their interests, and allow evaluating the quality of my teaching than it was
objects to help direct inquiry. It is through the use to motivate and engage the students.
of toys and exaggerated actions and emphasis in I use standards, and I feel it is important to share
modeling target behavior that we allow for failure the larger scheme of things behind activities and
to be an inherent and necessary part of learning. what they might be preparing for, but I do it with
The hesitation many educators express with this Play as the Subjunctive Mood. The first thing I did
approach is that we have much to do, and little was to quit thinking that these kids would commit
time to do it. It begins to sound like the white rab- to a curriculum just because it was posted up on
bit in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland running the wall. It is not enough to tell students how they
worriedly and anxiously “we’re late, we’re late!” are going to fulfill standards and a rubric.
Stress pressure and anxiety are a natural part For most, fear of failure was not an issue.
of learning, just as play is a natural part of learn- Many of them were accustomed to it. They had
ing, however, fear and threat scenarios are not checked out as an act of integrity, and in doing so,
often great motivators, in addition, fear and stress had found that they could dictate terms to teachers
eventually take their toll on the body, mind, and because of their disruptive behavior. Although my
spirit. Play may be the correct context for sustain- departure from the scripted curriculum of having

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

students redesign coffee mugs and the “do it or but they now had permission to be playful and
fail” curriculum did not always sit well with the perhaps fail. Play implies failure, recovery and
administrators; it did result in engagement from experimentation. Many of the kids made crazy
my students (who did not drink coffee). boats that would never work, but they were fairly
I told the students that we were going to be successful in using the terms to justify their de-
having a boat race, and that I would be bringing sign for each race. It is not always what you do,
in my wading pool from home, and that we would or whom you do it with—it is how you do it, and
be making sail boats out of Styrofoam to race that you do it at all.
across the pool. I structured all of the engineering,
statistics, and technical writing so that they were
embodied in the task, and that through experience, PRINCIPLE 2: DESIRABLE
they could discover them. What was essential ACTIVITIES
in this case was not so much joining a desirable
group, but in participating in a desirable activity One of the key issues in creating sustained engage-
where their group could interact in the activity ment and identified regulation is in creating activi-
space semi-independently, and that the task was ties that align with the goals and purposes of the
one where they believed that they would have learner, or exposing the learner to something they
early and instant success. think is really cool and they want to do. Making
In addition to this, I also tried an experiment boats was not what many teens would consider a
where I used a different approach to creation of “cool” activity, but it did hold attraction for them
subjunctive mood in the activity: Work as sub- when I showed them the tools, the materials, and
junctive mood: I told the students that we were gave a brief overview of what they would have to
really behind in our work and that we would have do. Getting kids to engage may just be a matter of
to work hard and be rigorous in our approach to creating some fun, and showing that they can have
these boats. I stressed that it was incumbent upon early and instant success; that they can work with
us to learn terms like resistance, surface area, mo- some autonomy in a space where there is wiggle
mentum, and force and apply them into our hull room for them to be expressive; and that they can
designs. I was talking, but they were ignoring me, make adjustments if they make mistakes. There
tuning me out. When I asked them what they were must be time allowed to go deeply into learning to
supposed to do, many of them did not know, and allow for the student to commit to the expression
many of them expressed that they did not care. of self into their work. This might mean going off
To test this I introduced the activity where task and making red sails even though it has noth-
Play was the subjunctive mood: I told the class ing to do with learning the Bernoulli Effect, the
that we had a fun activity where we were going competition, or the embedded learning outcomes.
to be building boats and that we were going to The opportunity to make aesthetic and seem-
have four kinds of races: speed, weight bearing, ingly inconsequential changes allowed them
stability, and general purpose. I told them that I investment in the activity through personal ex-
was going to be showing them examples of boat pression and to eventually invest in a cognitive
hulls and that they should play with them a bit theory of the activity, and also allow for a belief
to decide what style of boat they were going to in their future success. Add to this the opportunity
make for the races they were going to participate to work cooperatively and learn from the work
in. I found that kids had listened, knew what to of other class members—some call this copying,
do, and really wanted to start. All of the same I call it modeling and apprenticeship—then they
principles and terms were still present in the unit, can make a start (often full of errors and mistakes)

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

and adjust for excellence as they work with others they will likely have fine grain memory of the
and begin to better understand the project/activity. experience to draw upon for future use. Thus,
In this way we enable the spontaneous neutral creating these mental images is very important
experience that can be useful for beginning the for creating the motivation to engage, belief in
learning process and also building relationships future success, and a cognitive theory of action.
and belonging, and autonomy and competence
through the activity. • Desirable Groups: provide roles and iden-
The key to this principle is in embedding tities they can try on and play with and of-
the learning in the activity so that learners can fer the ability to change roles and play with
discover the learning principles in the process of the identities.
the activity through performance and reflection, ◦◦ A key word for instruction should be
where they compare what they have done with “TOGETHER”
the work of others, and the instructor can provide
encouragement to scaffold further development— Working with others: A great draw because it
this is an apprenticeship model with roles, rules, allows for interaction. Many students need to be
and positive interdependence. Oddly, this is often able to copy other students until they are able to
also the process of inquiry, discovery, and failure IMAGINE and create a cognitive theory of action.
recovery, although time consuming, is often the Some learners do not learn well from instructors.
process through which scientific principles were They need to watch another learner translate the
discovered before they were concentrated into experience. Through this, they not only learn
abstractions in textbooks for memorization and how to start the assignment, but also how to cre-
testing-- they were tripped over by the scientists ate a cognitive theory of action on which they
and then operationalized into methodology. This can improvise and express themselves through
can be done when we think of instruction as and commit to the activity. I cannot tell you how
games and learning as structured forms of play. many times I have seen resistant learners get into
Some important elements for designing instruc- a groove and not want to stop the project once
tion as play are offered in this framework of play they finally get started!
for instructional design modified from Dubbels’
(2008) Taxonomy of Play: • Roles: In the case of the boat project,
they became Naval Architects and Marine
• Cognitive Theories of Action: we capture Engineers; just learning about what these
the imagination and build cognitive theo- folks do as a profession, and, that these pro-
ries of action through imagery/ visualiza- fessions exist opened a lot of student eyes
tion (mental modeling). and created schema for the semiotic do-
◦◦ A key word for the instruction should mains of each role. They also had Learning
be “IMAGINE”. and Functional roles (see Appendix B).
• Structuring group work: The creation of
This first category in the taxonomy provides roles in cooperative learning as Johnson
a basis for testing comprehension. It is important and Johnson suggest (1994) is very power-
to be able to create mental model and theory of ful and also what we see in early childhood
the action. The key attributes are visualization play, as well as more advanced game expe-
and imaginatively creating mental models and rience for video games, teaching empathy,
segmenting process and attributes for indexing and modeling interaction for professional
in memory. If learners index and visualize well, development. In structuring the work

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

through roles, each group member has resource management; awareness

role specific tasks. One can play Return to of likelihood of an action based on
Castle Wolfenstein or look at game-specif- knowledge of the game and instruc-
ic roles (character classes) in Appendix A tional environment, and attempted
and Appendix B, and imagine how these quantification and probability of fail-
roles would culminate in teamwork for a ure or success.
mission. Each character class has several
unique abilities and these come with dif- This structure for instructional design comes
ferent learning roles and functional roles. from A Taxonomy for Play and is aligned with a
◦◦ Identity/Semiotic Domains/ scale for levels of cognitive theories of action in
Epistemic Frames: Provide rules, Dubbels (2008). This triarchical model, the third
roles, values, language, actions, and leg being reading comprehension, has been the
tools associated with the roles and basis for a number of successful curriculum units
identities (semiotic domains) that as well as digital games, allowing for direct link-
they can work with, and act on that age to learning and comprehension metrics and is
which is inherent to the task, where also available at http://www.vgalt.com.
the performance is the assessment.
The role of the Naval Architect is to
design a marine vessel for specific ac- PRINCIPLE 3: SPACES
tivities. The elements that define this
role are the tools, activities, language, Spaces are where we can offer activity, autonomy,
values, and outcomes associated with interaction, and relationships. By creating spaces
the role, and ultimately, the boat where learners can self-govern to an extent, we
floats or it doesn’t. This embodiment make them desirable, especially if there are desir-
is informative assessment, where the able tools and resources as affordances. What I
action provides immediate feedback did with the boat unit was to create a rite of pas-
through complete or partial mastery, sage to get from one learning space to another.
or failure and the role provides for The students were told that to use the tools and
measure of progress and schema de- start on their hull designs, that they had to use the
velopment based on knowledge of the hull examples and sketch a hull design, and then
semiotic domains. explain why and how the hull would perform well
◦◦ Create choices and branching deci- in specific race conditions (speed, weight-bearing,
sion network: It is important here that stability, general purpose)—then they were to go
the learners explain their cognitive and test their design and hypotheses.
theories of action and are asked to uti- I was able to create different work spaces by
lize and explain the identity tool box offering tools and independent construction of
to support their choices and why they their boats with a number of hot-wire cutting tools
did what they did, and what might be (for the Styrofoam) if they were able to sketch and
next. explain their design based upon the hull exemplars
◦◦ Contingency/Probability: This comes and key vocabulary I had postered around the
about when we consider the possible classroom walls; this was also where I had placed
contingencies that might come from the wading pool for the races, and where students
an action through prediction and hy- could make test runs of their constructed boats.
pothesis testing. Examples of this are

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

In a sense, I had created a threshold or Lim- • Affinity Groups, which explicate the im-
inality into my classroom space, much like a portance of the activity in conveying
game allows one to level up, or passing a rank group membership and status through evi-
elevates a soldier. It was a rite of passage of one dence from the semiotic domains, which
space to another. The new space allowing more are signs, signals, and markings acquired
autonomy and less controlled interaction through and bestowed through experience in com-
a verbal examination and demonstration of applied munities of practice and apprenticeship
knowledge and competence—a knowledge act experiences.
(Dubbels, 2008). • Self-Determination Theory provides the
elements that lead to internalization of
these activities, values, language, rela-
PRINCIPAL 4: DESIRABLE GROUPS tions, and spaces for the actualization and
internalized regulation of motivation and
This was mentioned in the Desirable Activities, but engagement into activities and habits that
this deserves its own principal. The role of Desir- provide a source of satisfaction beyond the
able Groups was primary for Ellen as a motivator external, or extrinsic rewards that into ac-
for her to become a DDR expert. What makes it tivity that is self-satisfying and self-fulfill-
especially relevant is the role of socially desirable ing for enjoyment and effectance, so that
groups and the influence they hold in conferring engagement is sustained and informs the
identity, the entitlement, and status that go with it. individual’s identity and status.
The role of groups cannot be underestimated for • Social Interdependence and Cooperative
identity construction and the rituals that convey it. Learning, which provide insights into how
If Wenger (1998) is correct, and identity is central to structure learning contexts and positive
to human learning, and as Buckingham states, that interdependence for learning, relations,
identity is developed by the individual, but must and alignment of identity with valued cul-
be recognized and conferred through community tural norms through Instructional design.
through some type of performance or ritual, then
the structuring of ritualized activities for status These are all brought together with the aware-
and competency construction may be immensely ness that play may be the foundation for the
important for not only creating engaging activities, construction and development of these descrip-
but to sustain them and make them life habits. tions—a portal to work, where we learn that play
The studies operationalized in this analysis is the initiation, as well as the rite—and through
provide several key features, that when brought ritualized behavior, activity, and representation,
together provide a very powerful tool kit for in- with allowance for learning and failure recovery
structional design: we grow, evolve, and make meaning through men-
tal models and prediction-- and thus innovation
• Communities of practice, which represent and deep seated cognitive theories of action due
the established pathway into community, to the inherent process of reflection and do-overs
status, and entitlement. This model aids in play and games to heighten public performance
in our understanding of the distribution of and status.
knowledge through webs and networks of Play seems to be the subjunctive mood that
sharing, modeling, and instruction through mediates entry into work and competence, and
status, identity, community ritual, and possibly to expertise. As play becomes more
affiliation competitive through more complex cooperation

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

and trust, play and learning deepens into effort, Games are structured forms of play (Dubbels,
application, and work. 2008) that can provide the portal to complex social
In addition, play is the foundation for ritual and cultural cognitive enhancement and progres-
and representation, and central to creating the sion. They represent new forms of ritual and safe
context and subjunctive mood for performance contexts for contest and accomplishment through
that supports apprenticeship, culture, and social challenging apprenticeships in expert systems,
learning. Play is fundamentally important for where an expert might not have been available in
building life habits such as fitness, reading, and the past. Games may be the new rite of passage
even simple things such as manners and coop- and rituals, or as Vygotsky (1978) called toys
erative behavior. In his treatise on play, Homo “pivots,” where a banana can become a phone in
Ludens, Johan Huizinga (1938) posited that play a child’s play, where play is a transitional stage
was the basis of culture, and Lewis Mumford that is the beginning of separating the meaning of
(1945) reasserted this in his treatise The Myth of an object from literal to figurative. Games may
the Machine—stating that it was it was imitation be an elaborate pivot for accomplishment, status,
(mimesis), role play, the creation of miniature and entitlement through modern day social and
environments, and the symbolic fields of play cultural networks in virtual and real space, and
where every function of life were modeled as a these may be the elements that motivate and sustain
game to develop competency and advance what engagement and provide real answers for design-
was known and yet to be known. ing learning contexts and sustaining engagement
Dubbels (2008), in the spirit of Vygotsky, and creating the kinds of identities that engender
(1978), furthered this by stating that play and habits of lifelong learning and activity.
representation are the factory of our conceptual
abilities, and if play involves the creation of ab-
stractions and models of the world, then sharing REFERENCES
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Buckingham, D. (Ed.). (2008). Youth, Identity,
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Chapman, E. (2003). Alternative approaches to Gee, J. P. (2005). Semiotic social spaces and
assessing student engagement rates. Practical affinity spaces: From The Age of Mythology to
Assessment, Research and Evaluation, 8(13). today’s schools. In D. Barton & K. Tusting (Eds.),
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Skinner, E. A., & Belmont, M. J. (1993). Motiva- velopment of higher psychological processes. (M.
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Sutton-Smith, B. (1997). The ambiguity of play. Learning, meaning, and identity. Cambridge, UK:
Boston: Harvard University Press. Cambridge University Press.

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APPENDIX A. CHARACTER CLASSES

Typical character classes and game roles from a video game can be used as a model for designing class-
room instruction for learning roles (see Appendix B also). In this case from the game Return to Castle
Wolfenstein. Each character class has different skills and fit what Shaffer (2006) calls an Epistemic
Frame: the ways of knowing, of deciding what is worth knowing, and of adding to the collective body
of knowledge and understanding of a community of practice, where by playing the medic and learning
the opportunities and constraints, one begins to create a cognitive framework, or schema for a content
domain of identity, knowledge, competence, language, values, and activity. Roles like these can be
structured into instruction, just as they are reinforced in communities of practice and the hegemony of
social practice and institution.
From Wikipedia:

Soldier: The soldier is the only class that can use heavy weapons. They are: mortar, portable machine
gun (MG42), flamethrower, and bazooka/Panzerfaust. On the No-Quarter mod the Venom machine-
gun and the BAR (Allies) or StG44 (Axis) have been added as well. Leveling up gives the Soldier
benefits such as the ability to run with heavy weapons (instead of being slowed down).
Medic: The medic has the unique ability to drop health packs, as well as revive fallen players with a
syringe. They also regenerate health at a constant rate, and have a higher base health than any other
class, which makes them the most common class for close-in combat. When a player has achieved
skill level 4 in medic, they get Self Adrenaline, which enables them to sprint for, longer and take
less damage for a certain amount of time. Some of the medics act as Rambo Medics. Their emphasis
is on killing rather than healing or reviving.
Engineer: The engineer is the only class which comes equipped with pliers, which can be used to repair
vehicles, to arm/defuse (dynamite or land mines), or to construct (command posts, machine-gun
nests, and barriers). As most missions require some amount of construction and/or blowing up of the
enemy’s construction to win the objective, and as defusing dynamite can be very useful, engineers
are often invaluable, and one of the most commonly chosen classes. The engineer is also the only
class capable of using rifle muzzle grenades.
Field ops: The field ops is a support class which has the ability to drop ammo packs for other players,
as well as call air strikes (by throwing a colored smoke-grenade at the target) and artillery strikes
(by looking through the binoculars and choosing where they want the artillery support fired). This
class has low initial health, but makes up for having an unlimited supply of ammunition.
Covert ops: The covert ops is the only class which can use the scoped FG42 automatic rifle, the si-
lenced Sten submachine gun (or MP-34 on some Mods), and a silenced, scoped rifle (M1 Garand
for Allies, K43 Mauser for Axis). The covert ops has the ability to wear a fallen enemy soldier’s
clothes to go about disguised, throw smoke-grenades to reduce visibility temporarily, and place
and remotely detonate explosive satchels. By looking through a pair of binoculars, the covert ops
can spot enemy landmines, bringing them up on their team-map. The covert ops also show enemy
soldiers on the team-map. Medic, Engineer, This creates a fluid transition to the next category.

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

APPENDIX B. LEARNING AND FUNCTIONAL ROLES FOR DESIGNING

STRUCTURED INTERACTION AND POSITIVE INTERDEPENDENCE

Functional Roles–Adopted from http://www.myread.org/organisation.htm

ENCOURAGER and COP

• Reads instructions and directs participation

• Read the instructions
• Call for speakers
• Organize turn-taking
• Call for votes
• Count votes
• State agreed position

ENCOURAGER and SPY

• Summarizes findings and trades ideas with other groups

• Check up on other groups
• Trade ideas with other groups

*Allowed to leave your place when directed by the teacher

ENCOURAGER and SCRIBE

• Writes and reports groups ideas; is not a gatekeeper.

• Record all ideas
• Don’t block
• Seek clarification

ENCOURAGER and STORE KEEPER

Locates, collects and distributes resources including informational resources like web pages and ency-
clopedia entries

• Get all the materials for the entire group

• Collect worksheets from the teacher
• Sharpen pencils
• Tidy up

*Allowed to leave your place without teacher permission

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 Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

LEARNING ROLE for LITERACY

Freebody (1992) and Freebody and Luke (1990) identify the roles literate people take on that can be
used in a classroom for activities that involve reading or the study of literacies that involves narratives
and cultural phenomenon.

CODE BREAKER

How do I crack this code?

What words are interesting, difficult or tricky? How did you work them out?
What words have unusual spelling?
What words have the same sound or letter pattern or number of syllables?
What words have the same base word or prefix or suffix?
What words mean the same (synonyms)?
What smaller word can you find in this word to help you work it out?
What words are tricky to pronounce?
How is this word used in this context?
What different reading strategies did you use to decode this text?
Are the pictures close ups, mid or long shots?
Are the pictures high angle or low angle?
Were there any word pictures, eg similes and metaphors? How did you work them out?

USER

What do I do with this text?

What sort of text is this? (Information, story/narrative) How do you know?

Is it fact or opinion? How do you know?
How can you find information in this text?
How did the author start this text? Did it suit its purpose?
Who would read a text like this? Why?
If you wrote a text like this what words and phrases would you use?
How is the language the same/ different from other similar texts you have read?
Could the text help solve a real life problem?
If you were going to put this text on a web page, how would it be different to the print version?
What is the purpose of this text?
Could you use these ideas in a poem, story, play, advertisement, report, brochure or poster?
How would the language, structure and change?

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Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage

PARTICIPANT (EXPERT)

What does this text mean to me?

Does the text remind you of something that has happened to you or to someone else you know?
What does the title/cover suggest that the text is about?
What might happen next? What words or phrases give you this idea?
What are the characters thinking and feeling? How do you know?
What message is the author presenting?
What are the main ideas presented?
What do the pictures (graphs, diagrams, tables, captions, illustrations) tell us?
Do they fit in with the text and do they provide more information?
What did you feel as you read this part?
Describe or draw a picture of a character, event or scene from the text.

ANALYST (INVESTIGATOR)

What does this text do to me?

Is the text fair?

What would the text be like if the main characters were girls rather than boys and vice versa?
Consider different race and cultural backgrounds too.
How would the text be different if told from another point of view?
How would the text be different if told in another time or place, eg 1900 or 2100?
Why do you think the author chose this title?
Think about why the author chose particular words and phrases.
Are there stereotypes in the text?
Who does the text favor or represent?
Who does the text reject or silence?
How does this text claim authority? (Consider language, structure and content)
Who is allowed to speak? Who is quoted?

This work was previously published in International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations (IJGCMS), Volume
1, Issue 4, edited by Richard E. Ferdig, pp. 63-89, copyright 2009 by IGI Publishing (an imprint of IGI Global).

1131
 Section V
Organizational and
Social Implications

This section includes a spacious range of inquiry and research pertaining to the behavioral, emotional, social and
organizational impact of instructional design around the world. From case studies in Africa to studies of gaming
on developmentally disabled and learning disabled children to plagiarism and community collaboration, this
section compels the humanities, education, and IT scholar all. Section 5 also focuses on hesitance in some faculty
members’ integration with instructional design, a growing issue among those involved with education who are
already forced to “wear many hats” at the higher education level. With more than 20 chapters, the discussions on
hand in this section detail current and suggest future research into the integration of global instructional design as
well as implementation of ethical considerations for all organizations. Overall, these chapters present a detailed
investigation of the complex relationship between individuals, organizations and instructional design.
 1133

Chapter 5.1
Culturally Negotiating the
Meanings of Technology Use
Deepak Prem Subramony
Utah State University, USA

ABSTRACT ing in a range of organizational contexts within

our field may be able to gain insight from the
This chapter explores how the “meanings” of remarkably universal nature of the problems and
technology use are being culturally negotiated solutions involved in this extreme and instructive
between Western educators and native Iñupiat Es- situation of socio-cultural tension.
kimo learners at schools across the Alaskan Arctic
region, as part of a wider examination of the impact
of the Western product and process technologies INTRODUCTION
embodied by these schools upon the socio-cultural
consciousness of the non-Western learners whose Our field has, in recent decades, witnessed vast
educational needs they seek to serve. There are populations of learners and performers in schools
two distinct aspects to this intercultural negotia- and workplaces across the planet being dramati-
tion between educators and learners: (1) attempts cally affected by the rapidly strengthening twin
of the former to reconcile their practices with the forces of globalization and human migration. On
latter’s values, standards, and expectations; and the one hand, the worldwide spread of Western
(2) efforts of the latter to culturally appropriate the capitalism is leading to the rapid infiltration of
non-indigenous technologies being made available Western technology into far-flung areas wherein
to them. It is expected that professionals work- they were previously absent, thereby impacting
formerly unaffected populations. On the other
hand, rising mobility as a result of improved
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch501

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Culturally Negotiating the Meanings of Technology Use

transportation links and growing international where the indigenous Iñupiat (Eskimo) population
commerce is leading to increased demographic has, in recent decades, been impacted by unprec-
heterogeneity within hitherto comfortably ho- edented oil wealth. The area of particular interest
mogenous societies. The increasing diversity of to us, in this case, is the resultant provision of an
socio-cultural variables—including race, ethnic- environment that is exceptionally rich in Western
ity, nationality, language, and religion—among technologies within the region’s schools, which,
learner and worker populations resulting from incidentally, happen to be run almost entirely by
the aforementioned phenomena will undoubtedly expatriate educators from the “lower 48” United
mediate learning and performance across a wide States. Meanwhile, the majority of learners served
range of educational and organizational settings by these schools come from traditional Iñupiat
(Powell, 1997a; Subramony, 2004). families that, until very recently, depended almost
Mainstream theory and practice in the field entirely upon subsistence hunting, whaling, and
of educational technology, however, have not gathering for survival.
been very successful at evolving and adapting in In this paper we will briefly examine the impact
light of these socioeconomic and demographic of the Western product and process technologies
changes (Subramony, 2004, 2006). While domi- that are embodied by the Boreal Slope School
nant Western-originated ideas, tools, and pro- District (BSSD) schools upon the socio-cultural
cedures—in other words, product and process consciousness of the native Iñupiat Eskimo learn-
technologies—related to education, instruction, ers whose educational needs are served by these
training, and performance are impacting the lives schools. This documentation involves exploring
of more and more non-Western learners both how the meanings of technology use are being
within and outside the geographical boundaries of negotiated between the imported Western educa-
Western civilization, very little research is being tors on the one hand and the native Iñupiat learn-
done in our field to document and understand the ers on the other. There are two distinct aspects to
dynamics of this cultural interchange, specifically this negotiation, namely: (1) the attempts of the
in terms of the negotiation between Western and former to reconcile their practices with the values,
non-Western cultural groups of the sociological standards, and expectations of Iñupiat learners;
“meanings” of using these technologies—that is, and (2) the efforts of the latter to culturally ap-
what, if anything, are those agents promoting and propriate the non-indigenous technologies being
implementing these technologies doing to make made available to them. This author believes that
the latter more culturally relevant to the lives of professionals working in a range of organizational
Non-western learners; and how these technologies contexts within our field may be able to gain insight
are being culturally appropriated or rejected by from the remarkably universal nature of the prob-
non-Western target populations. lems and solutions involved in this extreme and
In a modest attempt to steer the prevailing instructive situation of socio-cultural tension. As
theoretical and practical discourse in our field cultural anthropologist Norman Chance explains,
towards considering questions and issues of the “by seeing how events are intimately linked to
aforementioned kind, the author of this paper en- comparable forces present in other settings (we
lists the help of data from a particularly interesting can) come to appreciate the common themes of
and dramatic case involving the introduction of historical process along with the uniqueness of
Western educational technologies into a culturally cultural difference … (since) though differentiated
unique non-Western population. Very briefly, the by culture, we are all united by history” (Chance,
geographical context of this cultural interaction is 1990, p. xvii).
a vast expanse of Arctic tundra in northern Alaska

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Culturally Negotiating the Meanings of Technology Use

BACKGROUND peer-reviewed journals in the field during 2002-

2003 featured an explicit discussion of cultural
This two-part section features a brief discussion factors in learning or technology use.
of the current state of inattention towards issues of Reformist, culturally conscious scholars have
cultural diversity among learners and technology attributed the neglect described previously to the
users within the mainstream academic discourse historical foundation of traditional curricula within
in educational technology, followed by a concise our field in the conservative, Western philosophi-
contextual description of the site and case from cal canons of positivist science, patriarchy, and
which data has been drawn to illustrate the key Eurocentrism. According to them, this prevailing
issues discussed in this paper. view of the field (1) distances our research and
practice from the multiple values and needs of
Background of Inattention non-Western sociocultural groups by co-opting its
language, analogies, and metaphors from military,
Back in 1997, Gary Powell—then a faculty industrial, and medical spheres (Jamison, 1992);
member at Wayne State University’s prestigious (2) tends to hold largely media-based and exog-
Instructional Technology Program—was among enous views of cultural minority groups; and (3)
the first scholars to recognize the neglect of cul- generally sees success as a de-raced phenomenon
tural factors by the mainstream discourse within achieved through meritocracy (Swartz, 2003).
our field. He lamented how matters of cultural, Many mainstream scholars in our field thus seem
racial, and ethnic diversity among learners were to believe that issues of cultural diversity among
not eliciting the level of attention they deserve learners are already being given more attention
in our field’s texts, journals, and conferences—a than they deserve, that—as noted educational
neglect that persisted despite a growing acknowl- evaluator Reeves (1997) described their feelings—
edgement that key learner characteristics such these issues are merely “a passing fad, a byproduct
as prior knowledge, entry behaviors, ability, and of the current attention to multiculturalism” (p. 27)
motivation, all of which are heavily influenced by within North American and European academia.
the latter’s cultural backgrounds, must be taken Reeves (1997) went on to describe how his
into consideration to enhance learning (Powell, own perspectives on the field—as those of other
1997a). Seven years later, Subramony (2004) evaluation authorities, most of whom are White
surveyed the current situation and found that not males steeped in Western philosophy, psychology,
much had changed in the intervening time: Much and research methodology—have been biased by
of the curriculum in leading graduate programs in professional experiences that rarely addressed
the field across the nation still did not address the multicultural or diversity issues. Powell (1997b)
relevance of cultural differences among learners; also revealed how many middle-class, White
only three out of 41 chapters in the most recent scholars and practitioners in our field display
(2003) Handbook of Research for Educational ethnocentric attitudes, judge the world by their
Communications and Technology brought out own cultural values, and have little interest in
by the Association for Educational Communica- understanding any cultural differences lying at the
tions and Technology (AECT) contained any heart of their target learners’ lives. Thiagarajan
discussion of cultural issues; a mere 2.5% of the (1988) concurred with Powell (1997b) in noting
more than 500 refereed presentations at the 2003 that mainstream Western scholars commonly
AECT International Convention tackled this topic; ignore minority learners’ cultural reactions to
and finally, just 2.9% of the 379 research- and competition, public recognition, negative feed-
development-related articles published in six, key, back, authority figures, and gender differences,

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instead assuming that their own cultural tradition studied by this author through successive site visits
represents the best or only way. Meanwhile, noted over a 2-year period. Inquiry methods employed to
learning scientist Thomas Schwen (personal com- this end included individual and group interviews,
munication, 2003) bemoaned how educational observations, and document analyses. This vast
technologists are often “seduced by the belief Arctic district is headquartered in Borealis, ad-
that their research and development endeavors ministrative headquarters of a region of sparsely-
are value-free and therefore immune to social and peopled, treeless, marshy, mostly-frozen tundra
technical criticism.” that holds “the largest petroleum deposit ever
Scholars and practitioners in our field are thus encountered in North America, with an estimate
finding the faces of their target learners changing of 9.6 billion barrels of recoverable oil” (Chance,
faster than their ability to modify their instructional 1990, p. 153). Borealis has grown into “the focal
and classroom management strategies, curricular point of Eskimo adjustment to the modern world,
materials, and, most importantly, their mindsets the crossroads of contact with big money, western
that leave them predisposed to regard diversity at culture, and industrialization” (Boeri, 1983, p.
best as “interesting,” and at worst as a “deficit,” 193) and the “testing ground where the success
and to make erroneous assumptions about cul- of the wedding of modern government, Western
tures other than their own (Powell, 1997b). Such technology, and big money with the values Iñupiat
attitudes, in Schwen’s words, serve to restrict place on their heritage and traditional lands will
social choice, impose pedagogical options, and be decided” (Blackman, 1989, p. 32).
deprive equal access. As Thomas, Mitchell, and Blackman (1989) describes Borealis as a site
Joseph (2002) go on to describe: “By not directly that “leaves a strong impression on the Outsider. As
addressing culture in the design of instruction, the northernmost city in the western hemisphere,
many products have been designed that inad- the largest Eskimo community in North America,
equately address the needs of the population for oil boomtown, and seat of the largest ‘county’
whom the instruction was designed. Unintended government in the United States, (Borealis) is the
consequences of this shortcoming include the sort of place that attracts modern-day curiosity
production of ineffective instructional products, seekers” (p. 3). What makes Borealis’ character
the under-use of potentially effective products, especially unique is the pace at which it has
culturally insensitive products, and products evolved from a pre-agricultural, hunter-gatherer
that are deemed overtly culturally offensive by settlement into a modern, technology-intensive
some members of certain populations.” These socioeconomic hub for the entire northern third
negative consequences of our field’s neglect of of the state of Alaska. As cultural anthropologists
cultural issues are worsened by the pre-existing, Worl and Smythe (1986) explain, Borealis natives
well-documented socio-economic and educational currently in their 60s and older experienced, within
challenges faced by many non-Western learners. the span of their lifetimes, “changes from dog-
sleds to snowmobiles, from heating homes with
Site/Case Background blubber to natural gas, and from wearing caribou
clothing to denim and polyester. Some witnessed
The case described in this paper, the BSSD, (please the abandonment of customary practices, such as
note that to protect the privacy of informants/ac- the (formal wife-swapping arrangements) and the
tors and organizations involved, all geographical, burial of personal property with the dead” (p. 22).
institutional, and personal names pertaining to the Particularly intriguing to an educational tech-
site and case have been changed) was extensively nologist is the unique educational environment that

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Borealis’ K-12 schools are providing to an equally issues within corporate settings may be interested
unique learner population. These schools feature in Marken’s (2006) recent account of a Fortune
the juxtaposition of a technology-intensive, oil- 100 company featuring a similar circumstance.
wealth-fuelled educational system, based on the
modern, dominant Western model, with a student
body coming from Iñupiat families that deeply KEY ISSUES
and demonstrably cherish their traditional native
ways of knowing and being. The BSSD currently Getting back to the case at hand, it is indeed a
runs 10 technology-rich schools spanning the recurring feature at schools in Native-populated
enormous, sparsely populated region. While the regions across North America—such as the Far
relatively large settlement of Borealis—boasting a North and Indian reservations further south—that
population of a few thousand souls—is served by a predominantly indigenous learner population is
separate elementary, middle, and high schools, the being served by a predominantly Western educa-
seven other significant Boreal Slope settlements, tor group. Such circumstances pose unique chal-
given their small sizes, each have a single, unified lenges to both learners and educators. When this
K-12 school. Borealis High School (BHS) opened author interviewed new BHS teacher Lacy while
in 1983 at a cost of $85 million and incessantly conducting fieldwork in Borealis, the incongru-
expanded and upgraded since then as the flagship ity of this situation seemed apparent to her from
institution, the largest and best-equipped school very early on:
on the Boreal Slope, “the showpiece of them all”
(Blackman, 1989, p. 31). In 2004 the total enroll- In the first week of school, we had that welcome
ment at BHS was 273 students. The school costs assembly, and that’s when it really hit home, be-
averaged $21,000 per student per year to run, with cause I’d had the classes, that whole day, seeing
the average graduating class comprising around new faces and trying to get names, but being in
30 individuals. that assembly literally gave a very clear picture
Interestingly, as Blackman (1989) explains, of kind of what was happening in the community,
while home rule for the Iñupiat has brought a because we had the superintendent, the principal
measure of local control over Boreal Slope schools, and the vice-principal, they all spoke at different
with the Iñupiat-majority Boreal Slope Borough times up on stage, and we’re in this really nice
School Board making decisions on programmatic auditorium, and then you’ve got all the teachers,
and budgetary issues, the education of Iñupiat kind of up and around the auditorium so you can
students within the BSSD schools remains largely see all the teachers they’re standing in the stairs
in the hands of non-Native administrators, teach- and in the back, so it’s like this, and everyone’s
ers, and staff imported from outside the region, White, almost everyone has come from the ‘lower
mostly from the “lower 48” United States. It 48,’ the teachers, the superintendent, the princi-
is these Western-educated outsiders who get to pal, kind of the positions of power in terms of the
make most of the immediate administrative and schools are White, and then, I was standing in the
pedagogical decisions that affect the educational back, and you look down through all the students
experiences of the Iñupiat students. Such cross- sitting right in the middle, and most of them have
cultural control, common across the inhabited this jet-black hair, and it was like, OK now what
world since colonial times, has strengthened as a exactly are we doing here? And it was just very,
phenomenon in recent decades thanks to globaliza- it was kind of eerie, disconcerting.
tion. Those interested in performance technology

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Meanwhile, interacting with Native Iñupiat ON THE USE OF WESTERN

informants in Borealis and reviewing the literature EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES TO
pertaining to the evolution of modern Western- SERVE NON-WESTERN LEARNERS
style education in the North American Arctic over
the past century or so leads one to an understand- In an illuminating session at BHS, technology
ing that there existed no such institution similar teacher Annabelle permitted this author to observe
to a Western “school” within traditional Iñupiaq a 75-minute keyboarding and word processing
society. Learning was experiential and organic, skills class session she was conducting. Annabelle
with the young learning their social behavior and started the class off by handing her learners hard
Arctic survival skills from their family and from copies of a sample cover letter for a job applica-
the community. The process of education was thus tion, asking them to copy it into a Microsoft Word
naturalistic and all-encompassing, because, in es- file as a “warm-up exercise.” Written by a certain
sence, as a local Iñupiaq elder expressed it, “school Robert Goldstein of Huntington, WV, the letter
was life.” But with the advent of Western-style was addressed to Frank Westerman, Fire Chief
schooling in the Arctic there was now a dichotomy of the Huntington Fire District and expressed
between education and life, between school and its writer’s desire to be considered for a position
community, a division brought about by the prod- of firefighter trainee. Annabelle reported having
uct and process technologies that came along with photocopied the letter from a textbook on busi-
the Western educational institutions—institutions ness communication. The fact that the letter did
that were systemically alien to the physical and not contain a single reference to an Arctic or even
cultural environment of the Boreal Slope. an Alaskan context—being, instead, set entirely
Add on to this fact the unique exigencies of within a “lower 48” milieu—did not appear to
Borealis’Arctic location and the extreme technol- cause much concern to Annabelle, nor did she
ogy richness of its school environments, and the seem to have considered the possibility that this
matter becomes even more complicated. One of situation could be fixed so easily, that is, just by
this author’s primary objectives in studying this changing a couple of names and geographical
case, as mentioned earlier, was to document the references in the letter before handing it out to
impact of the Western product and process tech- the learners.
nologies embodied by the BSSD schools upon the In the meantime, after the learners—seven
sociocultural consciousness of the native Iñupiat Iñupiat and a Filipina—had finished copying Mr.
learners whose educational needs were being Goldstein’s letter to Mr. Westerman, Annabelle had
served by these schools. It was explained that them move on to do a set of typing exercises using
this documentation involved exploring how the the All The Right Type software program, which
meanings of technology use were being negotiated had been purchased by BHS and made available
between the Western educators on the one hand and on the school server. The program presented the
the Iñupiat learners on the other, with their being learners with a series of sentences in succession to
two distinct aspects to this negotiation, namely: copy, keeping track of their speed and accuracy and
(1) the attempts of the former to reconcile their providing feedback on these variables. Once again,
practices with the values, standards, and expecta- not a single one of these practice sentences seemed
tions of Iñupiat learners; and (2) the efforts of the to be related in any way to the learners’ cultural
latter to culturally appropriate the non-indigenous or geographical context, but instead smacked of a
technologies being made available to them. In the traditional “Dick and Jane” paradigm. Examples
following two sections the reader is presented with of sentences the learners faced included “Danny
a short exploration into these aspects. is flying to Denver in January”; “Nora is staying

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over in Niagara Falls”; The 6 girls each ate over Readers may note how Annabelle’s response
6 plums”; “I baked 23 pies, while Jill baked 13”; seems, interestingly, to convey the assumption that
“24 cows, 14 cats, 24 pigs, 44 horses”; “Manuel technology could be used as a vehicle for work-
picked 114 apples from 4 trees”; and so on. It ing with culturally relevant subject matter—in
was rather intriguing for this author to watch the other words, that it was basically the “content” in
learners dutifully copying these sentences while which cultural elements found their expression.
belonging to a geographical locale in which there Such a viewpoint would also suggest that, with
existed no trees, cows, pigs, or horses whatsoever, cultural elements being primarily couched within
and where the general population, as a rule, did content and with technology being merely a tool
not keep cats as pets, or include pies, plums, or used to deal with the content, there was, thus,
apples as part of their diet. not very much in terms of embedded cultural
Meanwhile, when Annabelle—who also taught elements within the technologies themselves.
media classes and oversaw yearbook produc- Such assumptions would be neatly congruent
tion—was asked to describe what she did during with mainstream discourses in our field that, as
these classes to make the classroom experiences Jamison (1992) describes, define technology as
more responsive to her learners’ native culture, a neutral technical apparatus or technique, and
this was what she answered: promote Western technology as the ideal catalyst
for global progress.
(For example) if I taught TV production here, Annabelle meanwhile had provided this author
the subject matter for some of the videos may be with copies of six previously published BHS
different than in the ‘Lower 48,’ but certainly the yearbooks. Upon analysis, however, very little
use of technology would be the same ... I think as evidence could be seen of any conscious efforts to
a teacher, that’s the one thing you want to be re- include Iñupiaq cultural elements within even the
ally careful of, and I think as any good yearbook content of these volumes, except that most of the
teacher ... I try and be a guide and a coach, and photographs therein showed Iñupiat faces. While
I try and teach them journalistic (and design) some of the yearbooks sported vaguely culture-
standards ... but the content, I really try and let the or location-specific titles—the 1996 volume was
kids decide. And yeah, there will be cultural ele- titled “Breaking the Ice;” the one from 1997 was
ments in the yearbook, you know, the big headline “Dancing to the Beat of a Different Drummer;”
when you open page one, is, “Arrigaa,” which and the 2004 edition was titled “On the Water’s
is an Iñupiaq word, and that’s the first word in Edge…”—none of the six yearbooks had a single
the yearbook this year! So yeah, there is a lot of page devoted to content in the native Iñupiaq
that ... the theme for the yearbook is “The View language. As for the reporting of any Iñupiaq
from the Boat,” it’s a reference to whalers and culture-specific activities, the 2004 yearbook
whaling, and things work in like that a lot. They could well be held as a representative exemplar:
ask a lot of times whether senior quotes, do they within its 104 pages, there were exactly three
have to be in English. “No, your senior quote photographs related to whaling, one picture from
doesn’t have to be in English,” ... and I think we a sewing class, and, rather inexplicably, one of a
had them submitted in three different languages skin mask made by a different (Nunamiut) Eskimo
so far besides English ... so, I think it would be group. The rest of the yearbook indeed looked
horrible if the yearbook from Borealis High School very much like one from anywhere within the
looked exactly like the one from (a school in the “lower 48” United States, with coverage devoted
‘lower 48’United States)! It would be wrong, and, to matters such as sporting activities, academics,
I don’t think it does! fine arts, student government, and Western-style

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social events such as a block party and the an- I mean, look at, when you walk into the school,
nual Homecoming ceremony, plus with the usual you feel like you are an outsider in your own
student portraits. And ironically, these yearbooks community in a building that is Western. So, in
displayed production standards equaling those of the first place, there is that discomfort with just
yearbooks from any affluent suburban U.S. school, aesthetics, with the environment, as you walk into
featuring profuse illustrations and high-quality a building. All the people who are in the school,
paper and binding materials. as the teachers, as the administrators, they are
This author also visited a 75-minute CAD- from the ‘lower 48,’ they hardly know much about
CAM class at BHS, taught by shop teacher Liam the kids they are working with … so, in the first
using an expensive, new Shopbot device. The place there is that, wall because of the differences
installation comprised of a bank of computers for in who and what the school is all about, and who
design work, plus the Shopbot machine for doing and what the community is all about … because
the actual machining. Learners could design an we’ve continued to import curriculum, import all
object on one of the computers using CAD soft- of the text books, import anything we use in the
ware, and then go over to the Shopbot and have it classroom, coupled with the fact that 99.9 per cent
create the object they just designed. Two Iñupiaq of our teachers are not of this area, they are from
male learners were working on designing wooden the ‘lower 48,’ we’ve continued to perpetuate, I
wall plaques the day the class was observed. One think, and strongly believe, the assimilation that
of the former was making a plaque that read “The occurs … in the schools, we’ve of course initiated
Ahsoak’s Residence—No Trespassing—Guard a language program and we’ve done little bits
Dog on Duty,” while the second was making one and pieces of integrating culture here and there,
that read “Mama Susan’s Kitchen.” It was intrigu- but it’s not systemic, it’s not systematic. And so,
ing to watch the two boys manufacture plaques by virtue of that fact, I believe that we make our
of the kind that, honestly, could be encountered children, when they enter the classroom, leave
pretty much anywhere in the country. This author who they are outside; we are mainstreaming them.
asked Liam how might any of this relate to the
Iñupiat’s own craft traditions. He replied that he Meanwhile, when this author spoke to Isabel,
would sometimes find Iñupiat learners picking one of the very few Native teachers in the District,
out from among the standardized design templates about how she, as an Iñupiaq educator, might use
those that featured vaguely “native-looking” pat- technology differently—from mainstream ap-
terns or elements, for the products they created proaches—within her classroom, she described
using the Shopbot. her approach thus:
The aforementioned examples have been cited
basically to illustrate a strongly felt perception on Um, it’s mostly teaching techniques, or how I teach,
this author’s part that, while some efforts were I teach it, instead of sitting at the board writing
certainly being taken to allow the learners to down, this is what you do, you know, and then
express their cultural elements, the school as a talking, what I do is I sit with them and I rarely
whole remained an essentially Western institution say anything because in Iñupiaq culture when
in the way it was structured and run, and in the you are showing somebody how to do something,
product and process technologies it employed. you don’t, it’s not an oral thing, it’s a very visual
Gail, chief of the BSSD’s Department of Bilin- thing, you see somebody doing something, and
gual and Multicultural Education (DBME) and a they just follow you. Most of the time we’ll just
native Iñupiaq herself, seemed to agree with this sit there and I’ll be at a computer, and the kids
perception: will be all around me and I’ll say, this is what I’m

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trying to do, you know, I tell them to explore, that seems like hibernation time to them, it’s just so
kind of stuff, it’s very visual. I do say it orally, I different – and I don’t think life is compartmen-
say it and I write it on the board, but most of my talized as much here by the mainstream as it will
teaching techniques is showing them how to use be down South, you know where you’ve got your
a computer, what icons mean what … you know, work and your exercise time and your friends and
that kind of awareness is, I had no idea that my your family and it’s all split up in different things,
teaching techniques were different, I think when seems like here it is just natural for everything to
I was in grad school it kind of made me aware kind of blend together, so, the education would
that I was doing it. [laughing] come naturally, and part of it does, subsistence-
wise, from family…
Some of the Western teachers that this author
spoke with divulged—during informal lunchtime BHS assistant principal Carl also spoke about
chats in the BHS staff dining room—that they the incompatibility of Western-style diurnal sched-
realized how the BSSD schools, and all the prod- uling in the geographic and cultural contexts of
uct and process technologies therein, represented the Boreal Slope:
an inherently Western system. The academic
year model, with school during fall and spring Up here people, their time clock gets very messed
and time off in the summer, was based upon the up, because you have to look at the fact that start-
Euro-American agrarian cycle, being originally ing beginning of May, the sun’s out 24 hours a
set up that way so as to permit pupils to help their day. And so, throughout the summertime these kids
families on the farm during the warmer growing might sleep from nine a.m. to three p.m. and be up
season and attend school during the lean period all night long. It’s just, you know, there’s no record
between fall harvest and spring sowing. Mean- of time really, time isn’t necessarily important to
while, the nine-to-three school day was based upon them, and so they just sleep when they are tired and
the prevalent day-night cycles—and consequent participate in activities, subsistence activities, or
diurnal routines—at much lower latitudes than hunting, or time with family and friends, whenever.
in the Arctic. This incongruity was not lost upon And so, as we get into the Fall season, when school
new BHS teacher Lacy: starts, we have all these kids that are completely
backwards as far as their timeline, and then of
…(T)his traditional (Western) kind of schedule, course we go into the opposite, where, now, here
you know, every 90 minutes, and getting here at at the end of October, you know, the sun doesn’t
9:00, and being out at 3:30, it just seems to go come in up now until ten or eleven and it’s going
very against the more traditional (Iñupiat) way down at, you know, five o’clock, and that’s going
of living in terms of real cyclical—the reason to get shorter and shorter, to the point where, you
they don’t see time the way we do is because of know, the sun won’t be coming up at all. And so
the kind of seasons they have, the constant light then you get the opposite people, sometimes that
and the constant dark, it is very different from the are sleepy during the day and awake at night and
diurnal cycle we know, and I was reading some- vice versa. It’s just, you don’t realize how much it
where before I came up here, was that bring your affects you until you come and you live it. And it’s
earplugs, because the kids will be out at four in hard to really understand it being in the ‘lower
the morning during the summer, playing, and kids 48,’ because, you just get used to it … and here,
literally will, they’ll take naps, get up, play, eat it’s a little bit different.
something, and then go to sleep again, then wake
back up, and then when darkness sets in that just

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Meanwhile, when this author examined the list that are often reflected in the standardized tests.”
of Approved Course Offerings for 2004-2005 at He claimed that NCLB and other such external
BHS, there was little to show that this school was mandates had drastically reduced local educators’
following a curriculum that was different, to any powers to make the administrative and pedagogical
meaningful degree, from high school curricula at decisions they judged as being appropriate to the
any mainstream “lower 48” school. Out of the total cultural and geographic needs of the learners and
of 238 approved courses listed, a mere 7.6%, or communities they served. He specifically men-
18 courses—two courses in Arctic Science, two tioned the NCLB’s overarching focus on “reading,
in Alaska Studies, two in Subsistence Art, two writing, and math,” as discouraging local efforts
in Skin Sewing, eight in Iñupiaq Language, and to develop geographically and culturally relevant
two in Arctic Survival Training—were explicitly practices, curricula, and technologies.
related to the physical and cultural environment
of the region. When this author pointed this out
to BSSD administrators and asked them why the ON NON-WESTERN LEARNERS’
curricula at BSSD schools had to be so similar CULTURAL APPROPRIATION OF
to curricula at schools elsewhere, the common EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES
response was that the district was compelled to
adhere to standards formulated externally at state During a session at the Borealis Public Library, this
and federal levels, standards imposed by the Alaska author observed 11 Iñupiat teenagers—five males
Department of Education & Early Development and six females—use a bank of public computing
and mandates from Washington, DC such as the stations. Without exception every one appeared
No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). As BHS supremely at ease with the computer; most seemed
principal Ryan lamented: to be in a very cheerful mood indeed. What is more,
the same cheerful, comfortable manner—one
… every time indigenous people in Alaska seem might even characterize it as “happiness”—was
to be making some progress, there’s a piece of also visible among young technology users in the
legislation that comes about with a hammer that various school settings this author observed. Each
can knock them down again … that’s the conflict one of them seemed able to touch-type rapidly
all the time, because, you know, we have a federal while keeping their eyes fixed on the screen, and
mandate, and then you have a community and their very sparing use of the mouse suggested that
a cultural expectation, and no one ever seems they were also familiar with common keyboard
to be able to agree on how those two should be shortcuts. The youngsters, without exception,
integrated. had multiple windows open on their computers
and were switching between windows rapidly
Focusing particular ire on the controversial and as they worked. Most of these windows were of
influential NCLB legislation, Ryan described it instant messaging conversations; in fact, the only
unflatteringly as a “ball and chain” on the BSSD programs that any of the youth could be seen us-
schools, a “one-size-fits-all kind of thing” that ing were instant messengers and Web browsers.
ignored the fact that “every area geographically is Computing at the public library seemed to be
different, has different needs,” and thus penalized a “social” activity for most of the Iñupiat young-
Iñupiat learners “for being an indigenous people, sters this author observed, in the sense that they
for being isolated, for not being in a position to could be often seen chatting verbally with each
be exposed to a lot of the same types of educa- other—smiling and laughing a lot during the pro-
tional situations, just everyday living situations cess—while working on the computer, and also

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appeared to be frequently interrupted by friends Learner #3: [Laughing, loudly] Type one word!
and acquaintances that came and left as they
pleased, the latter often staying for not more than a [Widespread laughter among learners.]
few minutes. Even the computer users themselves
often quit their machines and left the building, Annabelle: Um, no, actually we are now going
only to return a short while later and reoccupy the to make our own tables, with a heading, a
latter—or whatever machine was available at the sub-heading, four columns, and ten rows!
time. The most interesting part was how some of Remember, you can use data from the Al-
the Iñupiat youth using the computers seemed to manac for the tables you make.
all be part of the same chat room(s) online and Learner #1: Why can’t I make a table in Excel
seemed to be communicating with each other via and copy it into Word? It is easier!
the chat software as well as—by virtue of being Annabelle: That should be OK, but, you know, it
in the same room together—verbally. is worthwhile to learn how to do it in Word.
The interesting social behavior described in the Learner #1: But I already know how to do it in
previous paragraphs—using the public library’s Word!
computer bank in an intensive, informal, familiar Annabelle: OK, then.
manner; using this setting as a social venue to Learner #4: I’d like to do one with seven columns
touch base with friends and acquaintances; chat- and seven rows, is that OK?
ting with peers via the computer even though the Annabelle: Yes, that is OK.
latter might be in the same room at the time; and
so on—might be attributable to a relative lack The utterances made by the learners in the
of access to computers and the Internet at home. previous conversation would suggest not only
The learners, by virtue of having plentiful access a significant confidence and comfort level with
to these technologies at school, had become used technology use in the classroom, but also a cer-
to working with them and were thus led to coun- tain proactive spirit in terms of selecting tasks to
teract the fact that they often did not have such accomplish and, in a larger sense, designing the
access at home by making the public computing classroom experience to meet their specific needs.
facilities—such as the computer bank at the public The learners could be seen using the appropriate
library—into a veritable home-away-from-home, technical terminology—cell, split, merge, column,
where they could do the things that boys and girls row, copy, paste, and so forth—when they referred
who had access to technology at home would to specific tasks/problems, or when they asked
logically do from the comfort of their own homes. for help. A similar spirit was also visible in BHS
Moving on to school settings, consider the air technology teacher Trent’s office productivity
of mischievous confidence permeating the fol- tools class; note the following dialogue between
lowing exchange, between Annabelle and Iñupiat Trent and one of the young Iñupiat learners tak-
learners in her keyboarding/word processing skills ing the class:
class at BHS, after the latter had finished their
typing exercises: Learner: [To Trent] What are we doing today?
Trent: Today we are learning Microsoft Word.
Annabelle: [Smiling, inquiringly] OK, so what Learner: Oh, I already know that!
are we going to do now? Trent: What do you know?
Learner #1: [Smiling, cheerful] Type one para- Learner: See, I know how to make tables. I also
graph! know how to write business letters.
Learner #2: [Laughing] Type one sentence!

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Trent: OK, then there’ll be somewhat of an very conscientious—often asking the teacher for
overlap. feedback on their work—and deeply engrossed
in the tasks at hand, much more so than the boys,
[Learner groans in mock exasperation.] and more so even than the occasional Caucasian
or Filipina girls spotted in the classes. Most of the
Trent: [Laughing] But you know what, that means Iñupiat girls were done with the exercises/assign-
it will be easier for you! ments given to them in record time, often taking
just a few minutes to finish, and producing work of
[Learner giggles as if highly amused.] excellent quality nevertheless. It was particularly
The previous two exchanges would also sug- fascinating to watch them blaze furiously and
gest a sure grasp, among the learners involved, accurately through the series of typing exercises
of key concepts and principles related to the sub- within the All The Right Type software in order to
ject matter being taught. This attribute was also get to the “reward” computer game offered by the
discernible in the following tête-à-tête between program to learners that successfully completed
Trent and another of his learners: their assigned exercise modules.
The few Iñupiat boys that were present in the
Trent: What does a jagged red underline mean computing classes this author observed put up a
in Word? comparatively unimpressive performance when
Learner: That’s a word spelled wrong! assessed against their female counterparts. They
Trent: But does Word know how to recognize seemed less interested in what was going on in
names? class, and less willing to do the work that was
Learner: No. required of them. For example, one of the boys
Trent: So what do you do if you’re going to use in Annabelle’s yearbook/newspaper class was
a particular name or other word often that not working at all; he was instead busy play-
Word does not recognize? ing a game on his computer. Another spent the
Learner: You can add it to the custom dictionary. entire class session lounging back in his chair,
Trent: And what color is the line that indicates biting his thumbnail, and staring at his computer
grammar errors? screen without doing anything. In Annabelle’s
Learner: Green! keyboarding/word processing skills class, this
author noticed the one boy present in the room
Meanwhile, what was most interesting to this working much more slowly in comparison with
author was the fact that every single learner fea- the girls, lounging around for a significant portion
tured in the previous three conversations was an of the class period, and generally appearing rather
Iñupiaq female. Girls appreciably outnumbered bored and distracted. Meanwhile, the two boys
boys in all the computing classes this author ob- who were signed up for Trent’s office productivity
served at BHS, with Liam’s Shopbot class being tools class did not even show up to class the day
the sole exception: there were 6 girls versus 1 the observations were conducted.
boy in Annabelle’s keyboarding/word process- This author subsequently asked Isabel—since
ing skills class, 14 versus 3 in her yearbook/ she was Iñupiat, had been in high school herself
newspaper class, and 8 versus 2 in Trent’s office not so long ago, was young enough to still be
productivity tools class. The Iñupiat girls invari- “with it” in terms of current Iñupiat youth culture
ably worked quickly—markedly faster than their and behaviors, and was also currently teaching
male counterparts—and quietly, with little chatting Iñupiat learners at BMS—what she thought about
or discussions among themselves. They seemed my observations. She nodded in confirmation,

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explaining what was seen as being part of a more order to buy more guns and ammunition so they
wide-ranging socio-cultural and gender dynamic could do more hunting. They just did not appear
among the Iñupiat: to want to move on to the final destination, which
was the point of the game, they did not seem to
…(T)his is really odd, I’ve found that women will care if their decisions eventually caused them to
get an education, it is more socially acceptable “die,” they rather would die hunting. Trent said it
for a woman to get an education, than a male, looked to him like this was not just a reflection of
for some reason, I’ve been thinking about this a the usual desire among aggressive young boys to
lot, [laughing] I think a lot of it is based on, in shoot things up like in an arcade game, but rather,
the past, the men it is a more physical thing … as he explained, “they are hunters, that was what
(among the Iñupiat men) technology like the snow they wanted to do.” Trent even mentioned how one
machine is a big deal here, it’s a huge deal, it’s of the game’s developers came up to the school to
a social status, I hear kids today, was one kid’s visit, and when he saw what the boys were doing
parents got a new snow machine, he was teasing he was upset and protested that this was not what
another kid’s parents because it was an old snow the game was supposed to be about at all!
machine, you know, that kind of thing, it’s become Meanwhile, some technology educators this
a social status … the snow machine is like a huge author met with also spoke about the apparent
deal here. Not so much computers, oddly enough, superficiality of the Iñupiat youth’s mastery over
it’s really odd, computers are not seen as a social computer-based technologies. In their view, while
status (among the men), but snow machines are, a majority of the latter exhibited a strong penchant
rifles, you know, things that can kind of border, sit for, and remarkable mastery over, the consumer
between, straddle those two worlds, hunting, the level of interaction with technology—electronic
gathering, and the technological world. communication, online shopping, game playing,
and so forth—very few, if any, seemed to exhibit
Trent told this author he noticed that the boys significant technological skills at the producer
in his classes seemed to have very short atten- level, such as programming, design, or hardware
tion spans for traditional classroom activities. competencies; in fact, very few expressed even an
However, in the same breath he noted that the interest in acquiring such proficiencies. As BHS
boys seemed to prefer “hands-on activities,” and technology teacher Abel revealed:
remarked “however, when they are out hunt-
ing or doing subsistence (activities) they show I look at what’s happened with my classes in,
much more inclination to sit still and be patient you know, I’m providing that opportunity for that
and persevere!” He also related an interesting upper division, computer repair and networking,
story dating from the 1990s. He was supervising but the amount of kids that are in that are not as
his Iñupiat learners as they interacted with the high as you would expect … I would love to see
educational game Oregon Trail, which involved programming as one of the things we do but you
players making strategic decisions while navigat- know, I’ve just got to develop that base interest
ing their way across the North American continent first before we can go into it…
in the footsteps of early Western colonists. Trent
described how, when male learners got to the part In the same breath, however, Abel also ex-
where they had an opportunity to hunt wildfowl, plained what he saw as the reason for this reluc-
they would proceed to spend all their time and tance to acquire higher-level technology skills:
material resources hunting ducks and geese. They
would progressively sell all of their belongings in

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I will be honest with you, the biggest applications we have your, some technology that is limitedly
these students use on the outside would probably supporting our infrastructure. You know, you don’t
be the Office material, being able to work with have a Microsoft or an Intel. (Learners in the big
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, those types cities of the ‘lower 48’) just have models to look
of basic job skills get their foot into the door and see. Everybody knows, you know, Portland,
when they get outside. These skills are relevant Oregon, has an Intel plant, Apple in San Jose, HP
especially in the Boreal Slope, you look at the plants all over, you know, kids are very in tune with
(county government), the highest number of jobs the technology, who the technology leaders are
are available through (them), and you look at and where they are at. And so, who the technology
what kind of skills they need … and they look for players are and if you are important you do. In
those types of things, you know. San Jose you do, in Boston. So I think, it’s just that
everywhere you look it’s just technology … And
This author also asked Jason—the BSSD tech- many of the kids here, some of them may want to
nology coordinator—and Ryan to share their views go outside for a college degree, but many want
in this regard, given the unique insights arising to return here, specially the Iñupiat population.
out of their vast experiences and responsibilities The majority, even if they go elsewhere to get an
related to the district and its learners. Jason’s education, they see themselves returning and liv-
explanation for the phenomenon was “there are ing here in Borealis. And so, you know, to say, I
very few role models in the community who want to be a programmer, or system engineer or,
are proficient users of technology. Kids don’t there is a limited need for that here in Borealis,
see it being used at home, people at home don’t but it’s not a huge demand. Are any of their fathers
understand it, and therefore don’t appreciate it. or mothers any of those things? No. You know, I
Kids struggle therefore to find a place for it in think, you know, we are typically inspired by much
their lives.” Ryan, meanwhile, provided a rich of our, you know, surroundings. You know, they
and detailed exposition of what he believed were love to dance, they love the whaling, it is huge,
the environmental factors inhibiting the develop- get out of school for a couple of weeks in Spring
ment of young Iñupiat learners into accomplished … Kids are interested in that. I don’t know how at
technology producers: this level how we are going to get them interested
and inspire them into being programmers or, you
I think, that’s what isolation, being in an isolated know, systems engineers. There are some Iñupiat
environment, inhibits … (if the learners) are in a kids who see themselves thus, but they don’t see
real technology environment, if you are in Seattle themselves returning to Borealis.
or Portland, there are these facilities right next
door, and in their school, and there is partnership Furthermore, there was also talk of inappropri-
with schools, many of them have parents who ate use of technology by the Iñupiat youngsters.
are engineers and computer programmers and Jason, for instance, described how he was forced
designers and systems engineers, it’s a language to block the chat protocol on school computers
right in the home. So, I think that’s the reason, because “the detriments outweighed the benefits;”
the isolation just doesn’t promote that. Who do as he explained, the chat feature “was being mis-
we have locally here, occasionally we have a used and abused. Kids were going to porn chat
teacher, such a small population, and how deep sites and chatting very inappropriately, sharing
do you go with it anyway? And then, what’s your personal information. The kids were going to
model? What’s our model, to show why you want meet gentlemen in other states.” BSSD chief
to go really deep? We have your system network,

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librarian Tammie seconded Jason in this regard; fuelled modernity; caught—literally—between

as she described: whale hunting and online shopping, between
skin-sewing and instant messaging. Now, while
…(F)or instance we have the Internet here in the Borealis represents a particularly extreme and
library and, of course, as an educator I would like instructive case of this phenomenon, it is by no
to think that (the learners are) out there pursu- means unique in having to straddle two worlds at
ing great thoughts and increasing their educa- once in this day and age. Similar struggles to main-
tional opportunities on the Internet, but generally tain a balance between indigenous traditions and
speaking when I wander over to see what they’re Westernization—the latter usually occurring under
looking at, it’s snowmobile sites, Tupac Shakur the guise of “globalization,” “modernization,”
sites, Britney Spears sites. So if they are not on or “progress”—are now taking place throughout
task for specific assignments, there’s a lot of non- most of the non-Western world, from indigenous
educational uses I guess, and so I wish they’d be communities across the Americas and Oceania,
more excited about learning, just inquiring about to the oil sheikhdoms in the Arabian Gulf, to the
things, but I don’t see an awful lot of that. vast emerging economies of India and China, to
the established “Asian Tiger” societies in the Far
Tammie also mentioned copyright violations— East. Technological catalysts like the information
unwitting or otherwise—resulting from learners’ revolution and media convergence are currently
use of new media technologies as a potentially playing a particularly powerful role in exacerbat-
serious issue: ing cultural ferment and disjunction of this sort
across vast swathes of the planet.
We also don’t allow Napster-type downloading From stakeholder accounts obtained by this
activities, primarily because of the amount of author, life seemed particularly challenging for
space on the pipeline that it takes, but also some Iñupiat youth, who were being exposed relent-
of those things are just illegal and we cannot lessly to the latest technological and curricular
encourage that kind of activity. I don’t see much offerings at school, and were yet expected by their
awareness or interest among the kids in terms of community to retain an interest in their traditions.
the ethical-legal issues surrounding technology, The multiple, competing priorities and constraints
copyright issues, plagiarism, I know teachers talk that acted upon those caught in such a situation
about it, I don’t think they have a good grasp of were well expressed by some of the young Iñupiat
these issues, it’s becoming more and more of an learners at BHS whom this author spoke with. As
issue though, for students that they need to real- Caleb explained, it was not easy when “our elders
ize that… would like us to learn our traditional knowledge
but in school we need to learn other stuff.” Kent
added that “some parts are hard to manage, like
EXPLORING THE CULTURAL learning how to do stuff on the computer and also
IMPACT OF WESTERN how to put skin on the boat (frame) at the same
TECHNOLOGIES ON NON- time, and how to be good at both!” Delia in the
WESTERN COMMUNITIES meantime talked about how it was hard to balance
mutually exclusive activities and expectations
One of the predominant themes that this author into one’s schedule: “It’s hard to go hunting and
has hoped to explicate via this paper is the sense camping when you’ve got school and work to
of Borealis as a community wedged between the do.” Fabian summed it up eloquently when he
realms of timeless Iñupiat tradition and of oil- described how managing expectations was “real

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hard because … you have to learn one way at her personal opinion, technology was “damaging”
school and another way in life.” to the Iñupiaq youngsters:
Meanwhile, Isabel, speaking from the per-
spective of a young Iñupiaq adult who had re- I have two (younger) children that I am losing in
cently grown up facing the same pressures and the oral (Iñupiaq) language, because … there’s
had survived the additional cultural challenge too much TV, there’s the X-Box, the Nintendo, the
of getting a higher education in the “lower 48” PlayStations, and all those games. The games I
and then moving back up to Borealis to live and don’t approve of, I don’t allow my children to buy
work, declared that while the BSSD schools were and take it home, because I feel it’s damaging to
embracing technology-mediated learning, she them, in terms of their lifestyle, because we Iñupiat,
nevertheless thought it went completely against I myself was raised in a very strict world. If you
Iñupiaq culture: are taught something, you are expected to learn it.
And that’s how I expected my children to be raised.
Technology in schools is becoming a bigger deal, And this is the reason why I mentioned about my
we have the IAN (Instructional Applications two younger children, that today’s technology is
Network) lab, they learn reading, and linguistics, damaging. I have to repeatedly say Iñupiaq words
through a computer, the teacher reads out loud to to those two, in order for them to understand it. In
them and they go on a computer. It’s becoming more comparison, my older children, they speak English
and more accepted to learn from a computer … about 75 per cent of the time, but they understand
but it is totally against our tradition, traditionally when I speak to them in Iñupiaq. Whereas the
you learn from a person, not from a machine. It’s two younger ones, I have to repeatedly tell them
barely Iñupiaq. I learned how to cut up a duck, before they can finally understand what I am try-
and my uncle sat there, he rarely would say any- ing to say … Technology is bad because it will
thing, he’d just say “Don’t eat this!” [laughing] stop the process of the child’s learning system, if
“you can eat this if you really want to,” “scrape you are not using it correctly. With a child in the
this,” you know, that kind of thing. But that was home, it stops the learning process of subsistence
how I learned it, just watching him do it four or lifestyle and oral language. I don’t know how else
five times and then trying it myself. That’s how to put it. That’s my point of view, that’s the way I
I learned to cook, I was horrible at it, burned a see it in my home. Some families have a problem
lot of things, but they let me try it over and over because their children are so into all this tech-
again until I learned it from making mistakes or nology stuff that they don’t want to leave their
whatever. But now it’s if you press the right but- home, because they want to watch TV, they want
ton, till you hit the right one, like a rat hitting a, to play the games. Their parents, their uncles or
trying to get a treat! aunts or whoever wants to take them subsistence
hunting, they say no, the game is more important
Many of the older Iñupiat this author met in than your subsistence lifestyle. It’s getting to that
Borealis seemed convinced that the pervasive, point and there are quite a few families I think,
seductive, Western technology-based activities that are like that now.
were affecting their younger generation’s learn-
ing processes, and especially taking the latter’s DBME secretary Hailey, meanwhile, felt
time and attention away from learning their that computer-based technologies—specifically
traditional activities and native language. Parent games—might be making Iñupiat youth using
and community member Erika declared that, in them more prone to violence:

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A lot of crimes are committed by the youth. They just communicating with something that doesn’t
have computers, they have video games, and talk back to you.” Besides, she pointed out, “the
nowadays the video games are getting more and medium of most of these programs is in English …
more violent. There is more blood, there is more so the more dependent you become on technology
gore, and some kids demonstrate it, and I have the more it makes you speak English”—at the ex-
a grandson that I can testify to that, I mean, he pense of speaking Iñupiaq. Another Iñupiaq parent
gets really, he gets his whole body involved, he is who said she believed technology was distracting
four years old. And, you know, if he is not playing her children from traditional native pursuits was
the video game he gets frustrated and that little IEP secretary Tina, who related how she had been
spark just sets him off and he just starts punch- trying to get her daughter involved in beadwork
ing into his sister, you know, and I can see how it and sewing but the latter was not interested: “She
affects him. Seeing that, on there, it’s very easy. wants to play in the computer, she wants to go
And, you know, he doesn’t know what he’s doing, and play with these little games that are battery
I mean, he knows he’s throwing the punches and operated, you know, computer games, the Game
what not, but he doesn’t realize that he’s grabbing Boy, yeah.” Meanwhile, local community leader
it from that video game and it’s implanted in his Curtis also alleged that the younger Iñupiat’s na-
head that quickly. tive traditions and language were being affected
by computer-based technologies, and blamed the
Another Iñupiaq parent and community schools for getting them hooked on to the latter:
member who believed that modern educational
technologies were taking young Iñupiat learners’ In many houses across the (region) the kids are
attention away from their culture was Billie, a going to school, they are getting exposed to com-
staff member in the Heritage Center’s education puters and technology, they are forced to learn it,
program: they are learning it, they are even getting to like
learning it, they are surfing the Internet all day
Technology is taking a little bit away from our long and playing games, and when they go back
traditional way of life and I wish they wouldn’t home they don’t have that there, their elders and
emphasize it so much that you need to go to work, parents don’t have that exposure to that kind of
that you need to know all this technology. At the technology, it is creating a distance between the
schools, that is what it’s all about now, technol- kids and their elders. Grandma and grandpa’s
ogy. I think the schools should emphasize less time to talk to you has been taken over by Game
on technology and more on traditional cultural Boys and computers. The parents and grandpar-
values, because pretty soon we are going to lose ents are being removed from the child’s world.
our culture. The more technology there is for the Isolate them, that way you can regulate them
kids to learn, the less of the traditional way of life easier. The language is slowly disappearing, the
they will know. You will not have more hunters to values we have on animals and how to treat them
hunt for a living. are disappearing, and they are being replaced by
technology.
When I spoke with native community leader
and school board member Eva, she also alleged When this author asked BHS senior Georgina
that modern communications technologies were about all this, she nodded, agreeing that not very
adversely affecting the Iñupiat youth’s native many Iñupiat youth of around her age in Borealis
language skills, because, as she noted, “you are liked participating in traditional activities. When
not communicating with a human being, you are asked what she thought might be the reasons for

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this, she replied “Because they have their snow And it’s really tough to do that … Even if you sat
machines, they have computers, they have other down and learned everything from an elder, it
stuff to do, they want to focus on their school…” won’t help you get a job, it won’t help you get your
When asked further her if she thought technol- new snow machine and new rifles, you know, the
ogy was distracting the Iñupiat youth in today’s elders’ wisdom doesn’t get you money! It might
Borealis from their traditions, she agreed, saying bring you something else, but it’s still, why learn it,
“because it is just so much easier to get to know, when you’re not going to get money, when you’re
we have a computer in almost every room or every not going to be paid, when you’re not going to
house now.” She said technology appeared more get the stuff that you want. It’s become obsolete,
attractive than traditional activities to modern-day which is horrible, I mean.
Iñupiat youth “because it’s all around, everywhere,
and it’s something new and their parents don’t Testimonies as provided by Curtis and Isabel
know it and they want to do something their suggest that the communicative distance—the
parents don’t know.” Fabian also agreed that so-called generation gap—between Iñupiat youth
technology was distancing Iñupiat youth from and their elders has been increasing in modern
their cultural traditions: “Stuff like technology times, and that technological changes may have
and computers, it takes a lot of time away from been in no small part responsible for hastening
learning traditional activities ... The more people this process. Nita, the project manager for the lo-
spend time with computers, the less time they cal native Heritage Center, echoed exactly such
spend on subsistence. Some of my friends don’t perceptions, indicating technology and Western
hunt but … live an ordinary life.” education as key causative factors:
Meanwhile, Isabel felt the schools were doing
a better job selling technology to the Iñupiat youth I would think it’s kind of getting harder for the
than the Iñupiat elders were doing selling their kids to relate to their elders, because they are
traditions; but then, as she saw it, it was so much learning a different way, like we still have our
easier to sell technology as compared to tradition, elders here, and you respect your elders and
because knowledge of technology brought with family members, especially your grandparents,
it the promise of material gain: and that still exists, it’s just the train of thought
for the kids I would think when they’re going to
The children seem much more sold on technology school, they’re using just technology, technology,
than on tradition. I think it is way easier to sell technology, and they have some classes that relate
technology, when the world is based on technol- to the culture, the Iñupiaq classes in the school,
ogy. It’s really, really easy to say, well, if you know but having that also, it’s not full-blown Iñupiaq
how to use Microsoft Word, you can get a job, all day long, it’s just for a half hour to an hour
you can get money. It’s easier to say that. Trying a day, and that’s kind of being lost in a way too,
to explain to a kid why he should learn how to where the culture is slowly dying out, because of
butcher a caribou, I think it’s a lot harder. It takes the way the education is taught it is more of an
hours and it smells bad and it’s gross, [laughing] English, American history, and I don’t see big
they don’t see it on TV, you know, they don’t see efforts being pushed for a lot of cultural things
any kind of real need for it. Because you don’t to be viewed for classroom papers…
see stuff like that on TV, you don’t have anybody
saying that it’s important, and the people that Some of the younger Iñupiat I spoke with
are saying that it’s important just say you have seemed to agree that the elders were no longer
to learn it without explaining why it’s important. as important a source of knowledge as they were

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in the days when traditional ways of knowing munications technologies as promoting a capitalist
prevailed across the region. “Our elders don’t ethos among the Iñupiat:
really know about the Internet or computers,”
Caleb declared. Kent concurred, laughing: “Our (The Iñupiat youth) have a society kind of telling
grandparents don’t know about or use comput- you that old things are bad, and mostly they get
ers.” “They didn’t have computers back then,” this through TV, old things are bad, old things are
Carla explained. “They can tell you all about their only for documentaries on the History Channel,
traditional things, but not about computers and [laughing] they’re not very exciting, new things
stuff.” Caleb agreed: “They grew up hunting, no are good, new snow machines, new computers,
school, and all that kind of stuff.” Besides, this you know, new things are good, lots of them, and
author also gathered from conversations with so you have capitalism, a very capitalist kind of
some of the Iñupiat informants that, from where ethos, and it’s seeping into the culture here. I think
they stood, it looked very much like the Western technology is a vehicle for capitalism, it’s not sit-
technologies were actively trying to replace Iñu- ting there cramming it down our throats, but it is,
piat traditions with alternative ways of living. As some of the capitalism is from people coming in
Isabel put it, “now we have the world telling us from other places, but most of it is through technol-
that information and, not only just information ogy, it’s a vehicle, it’s not like technology is bad
but superior information comes from technology, and it’s like a drug dealer [laughing] sitting there,
from sciences, from computers, you know, this but it is a vehicle, in several ways, I mean, TV is
kind of stuff [pointing around her classroom].” the obvious, really obvious place, the Internet, you
Curtis, in the meantime, elaborated on this issue get a lot of stuff on the Internet, I know that some
with passion: kids who have access to it, they tell their friends
that this is cool, [laughing] because everybody in
The role that technology plays in this culture is California thinks it’s cool, but it is a way. I mean
very negative, because it’s goal, it’s direction, if you can imagine not having any technology or
is that it has to eliminate this culture in order communication up here, it might just become like
to be the superior culture ... You know, in order a time capsule, but stuff’s being poured in, it’s
for (the Westerners) to be an expert they have to being poured in at a faster, faster rate…
remove someone like me. And once they remove
me then they become the expert, with their lim- Meanwhile, talking about how basic cultural
ited knowledge. Now when you look at Western values dear to the Iñupiat were being eroded in
culture and its technology, that is exactly what it recent times, Tammie revealed how she sometimes
does. What it does is to remove traditional forms felt modern computer-based technologies, with
to knowledge in order to make room for itself … their emphasis on individual, competitive modes
Right now the whole school system is, technically of learning and social action, were at odds with
speaking, physically removing our language … the Iñupiat’s traditional collective, collaborative
And once you take a language away, its total ethos, and she wondered how that might be af-
educational structure has just been wiped out. fecting the native learners as they worked with
Its knowledge has just been erased ... That’s how these technologies:
you destroy cultures.
The traditional culture is all about sharing and
Furthermore, Isabel also saw the modern, cooperation and collaboration, while the main-
Western computer-based educational and com- stream culture is competition and privacy and
patenting, ownership of ideas, I can imagine for

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someone who comes from a tradition where every- about a significant change of mindset here among
thing is collaborative, to get used to the idea that the Iñupiat. For a lot of the whaling captains we
everything is individual, that even information is have today, it’s the glory in the catch that they’re
privately owned. I don’t know if they have really after, which is just so wrong in terms of our culture.
internalized that, it’s interesting how that might It’s not “my desire to feed everybody,” it’s “the
be a real war of cultures there, because they are credit I’m going to get for catching it.” That is a
getting those two different messages definitely, culture-killer. That is what came with the Western
within the community it is still very much that way, ethos, with Western technology; that change of
it is a community built on traditional principles of mindset from cooperation to competition.
sharing an collaboration, I suppose when you’re
riding two cultures that’s one of the things you’ve Taking the discussion regarding traditional
got to learn to do, it’s you have to sort of figure cooperative values versus technology-inspired
out when those more traditional values are ap- competition further, some of the Iñupiat informants
propriate and when these other ones should take spoke of a new “digital divide” arising among the
precedence … and it’s hard for (the Iñupiat youth) Iñupiat of Borealis, one that manifested itself in
to sort of get it to where it meshes in their minds, multiple ways. For instance, Nita talked about
get their brains around it… a technological divide between wealthier and
less wealthy individuals, relating how some of
Curtis agreed heartily, claiming that destroying the craftspeople she worked with at the Heritage
the Iñupiat’s culture of cooperation and collective Center felt disadvantaged compared to others
action was part of the Western socio-economic and because they did not have access to computers
cultural system’s larger plan to isolate, regulate, and the Internet like the others did; for these
and culturally assimilate the Iñupiat: people, lack of access was a barrier between
themselves and commercial success. She also
In summertime … you’ll find us way out there on talked about another dimension of the digital
the ice, just enjoying life out there, and when we divide, of inter-generational relationship issues
find each other we don’t ask each other what they provoked by unequal access to and proficiency
have in their boats, we go in their and find what with modern technologies, describing how “the
we like and eat it. If it’s in their boat, it’s mine, younger generation for sure has a lot of knowledge
if it’s in my boat, it’s theirs; our culture stresses of technology, a lot of access to the computers
cooperation and collaboration, for example the because of the schools, whereas the elders don’t
whale hunt, one man cannot do it, it takes an have access to that.”
entire village to bring in one whale, and then the
whale is distributed to everybody, shared. With
computers, it’s all one person to a computer. DISCUSSION/FUTURE TRENDS
There’s no collaboration anymore. Same thing
with Christianity. Only you can save yourself, The epic cultural conflict taking place in the
only you can take yourself to Heaven. There are Alaskan Arctic—between the hegemonic West-
great similarities between Western technology ern techno-centric, globalizing, commodifying,
and Christianity, they both have the same goal; capitalist-consumerist socio-economic juggernaut
the goal of isolation. Isolate them, that way you with its gigantic ecological footprint (see Bowers,
can regulate them easier. Western culture has two 2000; Bowers, Vasquez, & Roaf, 2000) on the
engines, agents, its technology and its religion, and one hand and the diametrically opposite native
with the two of these they have managed to bring Iñupiat life-ways on the other—has clearly taken

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its toll on Iñupiat communities across the region. sense of isolation, displacement, disorientation,
As in many other parts of the world, here too, as and alienation brought about by the progressive
Bowers et al. (2000) describe, Western science, breakdown of their traditional ways of living
technology, and ideas of “progress” have been in the face of a relentless onslaught of foreign
used as the basis of a new ideology that justifies socio-economic and cultural influences. Curtis
the extinction of the local culture if it fails to adapt suggested that technological pastimes—along
to the expanding network of computer-mediated with alcohol and religion—were non-indigenous
intelligence required by the global economy, as a fixes that the Iñupiat, despairing over the erosion
result of which much local knowledge has been of their traditional culture life-ways, were turning
unceremoniously relegated to the junk heap of a to in their hour of loss:
past that is seen as being no longer economically
useful. Curtis and Isabel—two of the Native in- … (W)e have a very unhappy society. You see a
formants for this study—hit upon this point when lot of cheerful people up in the front, but when
they described how, as they saw it, Western tech- you look in the side you see people never sobering
nologies were actively trying to replace Iñupiat up, and you go to the church and you see them
traditions with alternative ways of living. extremists in their churches, you see children
Meanwhile, as Bowers et al. (2000) explain, hooked on to television and video-games and the
these ostensibly more “advanced” Western tech- Internet. When you go extreme something else,
nologies have an ecological footprint that under- that is not indigenous to you, you are unhappy.
mines the viability of the earth’s ecosystems; on the You might sing loud, and pray hard, and be a
other hand, the traditional Iñupiat culture—which, very good Christian, they’re hiding something,
like many other non-Western indigenous cultures, they’re trying to substitute something. They are
had taken an alternate pathway of development and substituting a lost way of life, a teaching mecha-
had demonstrated the capacity to live in a long- nism, a self-regulating mechanism, you know, as
term sustainable relationship with its harsh and a society, a culture, we were self-contained, we
challenging environment—was actually the one didn’t need anybody in the world, to feed ourselves
better adapted to its surroundings from an evolu- and take care of ourselves. That’s what American
tionary standpoint. The new, computer-mediated technology does to our culture. The technology
modes of learning and living—as representative is responsible for this because the people here
of a Western consumer culture that emphasizes see a smarter culture than theirs that has taken
building boundaries between people and nature— their land away, their way of life, and regulate
has unfortunately accelerated the process of the what they eat.
Iñupiat communities’ alienation from their natural
milieu; and over the decades, the resultant losses So what could the outlook be like for the current
of local knowledge and patterns of moral reciproc- and future generations of Iñupiat caught between
ity essential to traditional Iñupiat community life technology and tradition? To understand this, it
has significantly affected the region’s cultural and might help to ask some of the local Iñupiat com-
ecological well-being (see Bowers et al., 2000). munity leaders in Borealis to describe what they
Consequently, Borealis today is not a very would define as “success,” in terms of the Iñupiat
happy place. It is no secret that the small native youth’s relationships with Western education and
communities across the Alaskan Arctic currently technology. When asked, Curtis mentioned his
suffer from some of the nation’s highest rates of own children as examples of “successful” young
alcoholism, drug abuse, domestic violence, and Iñupiat in today’s world:
suicide—symptoms of the people’s heightening

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In my house we have a computer in every room, as she explained, not many Iñupiat youth were
and all of my kids use them regularly. I have no eager to construct themselves in the identity of
trouble with that at all; if the world can use it, if a Western-educated schoolteacher, because the
they have better access to the world, great. They latter usually came across to them as the “weird
might be able to learn something out there yet. But creature” that “came from Michigan, … popped
when I take them out into the country, they know in and popped out and most of the time didn’t
what to do. They know where the animals are, stay for more than six months.” Besides, Erika
that they already know. That I have taught them. alleged that the Iñupiat youth were discouraged
Any one of my kids can catch ptarmigan without from seeing themselves in the teaching profession
shooting them, without traps. They know how to due to the Western teachers “looking down upon
stop a caribou from running away. Computers the Iñupiat.” Isabel explained that the act of “be-
and technology just gives them better access to coming part of the system,” of “going over to the
the world. I don’t feel access to the world as a other side” was still “really hard to understand”
threat. Because the values I want them to have are for the average Iñupiat youngster. As she put it,
already in them and no one can take that away. “it’s so far, from … growing up traditionally, from
On the one hand I have taught them how to live (their) traditional past, in many ways. There’s a
in the Arctic, their home. On the other hand, the huge gap, and who in the world’s going to jump
world is theirs, too. They can go anyplace and that gap? Why in the world should you jump that
survive, but at the same time they have solid roots gap?” going on to add that “only now it’s kind
here. I think I would call that a successful state of becoming obvious that without that education,
of affairs. And that is what I would wish for the you know, you’re on welfare!”
other Iñupiat kids as well. Nita, who was one of the Iñupiat who had
obtained a higher education and taken up a job
Meanwhile, Erika emphasized true success as that involved using computer-based technologies,
being able to go out to the world, get educated ardently emphasized the role of Western education
in their ways, and return to the Boreal Slope to and technology in ensuring the Iñupiat youth’s
contribute to the welfare of the local community, future success:
a view approximating a “think globally, act lo-
cally” type of ethos: I’ve seen how people come from out of town, get
all the jobs, and I checked to see why people from
There are a few students who leave the Slope out of town are getting jobs and we the Iñupiat
after graduating from high school to get a higher people are not, there was just this education part,
education so they can come back home to their that you need to have college, you need to have
community, and those are the ones that will be your education to get a good job … it was like a
pursuing what they see is lacking in the community. stumbling block, that education that you needed
If we can get the expectations of the students to … what I always stress to my kids is get your
fit into the shoes of those students who are going education. That’s what you need … education,
out to receive higher education, that would be a even though the education that is available is not
success for us. related to our culture, we still need it to survive,
to pay for your food, to pay for your bills, for
One person who did seem to fit this ideal your electricity, for your homes, you need a job,
was Isabel, who had made the choice to leave and all the jobs that are open need that first step.
the Slope, obtain a college education, and return You need to have at least a high school education,
home to serve her people as a teacher. But then, and if you don’t have it your name will be at the

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bottom of the list and never come up, and you also in that she admitted her familial circumstances
need to know how to use computers because they were rather unusual for an Iñupiaq growing up
all have computers in the workplace, it is hard in Arctic Alaska:
for employers to train someone new unless they
understand you fully, what you want them to do In my case, in my family, the teachers’ expecta-
on the computer, and there’s always security and tions and the parents’ expectations were the same
data loss issues that you could have if the person … which is really rare, my parents are both, they
doesn’t know what they are doing. both have degrees, and Master’s and, they both
had really good educations, so our expectations
Curtis concurred: “(T)hey won’t hire you until were completely different … Probably around
you have a minimum of high school education, five per cent (have parents like mine), that’s just
and then in any place that pays you need a college a guess, very rarely, and it’s usually somebody
education. If you don’t have a college education who has experience out of here. So it’s not a local,
you’re dead, as far as the dollar world is con- well they’re local but they’ve had experiences in
cerned.” The predominant notion of success that the ‘lower 48’ (United States).
was expressed by the Iñupiat community leaders
interviewed as part of this study thus featured
the twin desires to simultaneously maintain tra- CONCLUSION
dition while continuing to enjoy the benefits of
modernity. Curtis’s account of how his children The cultural hegemony of the Western school
were successfully managing to do just this was system over the Iñupiaq community could be
particularly intriguing, leading this author to won- characterized as forming part of a wider-scale,
der if such a state of affairs was common among historic cultural transformation of the Alaskan
the local families. But Curtis did not think it was: Arctic by impersonal socioeconomic forces that
were larger than—and, for a variety of reasons,
The problem is, my kids are lucky and very much only tenuously comprehended by—individual
an exception. Many other Iñupiat kids do not educators and community members themselves.
come from a similar position of strength. Across While, on the one hand, it might be possible to
all the communities in the Boreal Slope, you will characterize the Iñupiat youth and community
find that over sixty per cent of the people cannot served by these schools as being helpless victims
find work, there is no work. So they cannot af- being buffeted by the inexorable forces of West-
ford things like this … I am a geologist, my wife ernization and globalization as embodied by the
is a college graduate, my oldest girl is a college Western product and process technologies rapidly
graduate, the second-oldest one on his last year, and insidiously infiltrating their sociocultural life,
the next one is starting his second year. We are on the other hand they could also be recognized
definitely not the typical Boreal Slope family. as active agents striving against overwhelming
When a family has problems with society, or with odds to create valid cultural forms in response to
the law, or being able to take care of themselves, a barrage of complex social, economic, cultural,
they call this house, they call me, and I tell them and technological stimuli. To this author, this act
what they have to do. of “praxis”—referring to Willis’ (1977) expanded
construct of praxis, which differs from the classic
Isabel—who also would be considered as a Marxian view of praxis by encompassing not just
“success” by the standards of many people, both the act of work but the whole act of constructing
Iñupiat and Western—concurred with Curtis one’s cultural identity in society—appeared to

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reflect and be shaped by two sets of contradic- culture’s ways of knowing and value system
tory desires on the part of the Iñupiat: (1) to hold reinforced by computer-based technologies and
onto what was left of their precious traditional those characterizing their own indigenous cultural
culture, and (2) simultaneously to reap the benefits traditions; (2) distinguish between the appropriate
accruing from the adoption of modern Western and inappropriate uses of the technologies that
technological solutions. fill their schools, workplaces, and homes; (3)
In the midst of all this could be perceived a realize how important aspects of community are
fundamental disjunction between the cultural transformed or lost when using these technolo-
expectations of the school and the cultural ex- gies as the basis of thought, communication, and
pectations of the local community in terms of the problem solving; and (4) use these technologies
essential issues and goals related to the endeavor in ways that recognize the culture gains and
of educating the current and future generations of losses arising from their integral role within the
Iñupiat youth, further complicated by a lack of destructive, culture-transforming cycle of media-
consensus among the Iñupiat themselves on these controlled communication, consumerism, and
matters. As Lipka, Mohatt, and the Ciulistet Group identity formation.
(1998) explain in a nutshell, these conflicts have
been “exacerbated by the historic context of colo-
nization” of the Alaskan Natives, “the degree of REFERENCES
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(p. 4). The situation does not seem to be helped by an Iñupiaq woman. Seattle: University of Wash-
the local community’s astonishing lack of owner- ington Press.
ship over the schooling of their children—by the Boeri, D. (1983). People of the ice whale: Eskimos,
fact that the native learners, wracked by pressing white men, and the whale. New York: E. P. Dutton.
“internal” issues related to their besieged culture,
were being served almost exclusively by imported Bowers, C. A. (2000). Let them eat data: How
Western-trained educators, who could but only computers affect education, cultural diversity, and
offer “external” solutions, the effectiveness of the prospects of ecological sustainability. Athens:
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The Iñupiat of Arctic Alaska, after enduring
Bowers, C. A., Vasquez, M., & Roaf, M. (2000).
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financial control over the schooling of their chil- Chance, N. A. (1990). The Iñupiat and arctic
dren by the late 20th century. Learning how to Alaska: An ethnography of development. Fort
effectively exercise this control after decades of Worth, TX: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
oppression and alienation is bound to be a slow
Jamison, P. K. (1992). Adopting a critical stance
and painstaking process. It is a process that, as
towards technology and education: The possibility
Bowers et al. (2000) advocate, will need to involve
for liberatory technology in an information tech-
efforts to ensure that subsequent generations of
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Iñupiat are educated to (1) understand the funda-
Indiana University, Bloomington.
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Lipka, J., & Mohatt, G. V., & the Ciulistet Group. Willis, P. (1977). Learning to labor: How work-
(1998). Transforming the culture of schools: ing class kids get working class jobs. New York:
Yup’ik Eskimo examples. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Columbia University Press.
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Worl, R., & Smythe, C. W. (1986). (Borealis):
Marken, J. (2006). An application of activity A decade of modernization. Anchorage, AK:
theory: A case of global training. Performance Minerals Management Service—Alaska Outer
Improvement Quarterly, 19(2), 27–50. Continental Shelf Region.
Powell, G. C. (1997a). Diversity and educational
technology: Introduction to special issue. Educa-
tional Technology, 37(2), 5. KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Powell, G. C. (1997b). On being a culturally Culture: Culture refers to “the sum total of
sensitive instructional designer and educator. ways of living, including values, beliefs, aes-
Educational Technology, 37(2), 6–14. thetic standards, linguistic expression, patterns
Powell, G. C. (1997c). Understanding the lan- of thinking, behavioral norms, and styles of com-
guage of diversity. Educational Technology, munication” (Powell, 1997c, p. 15) developed by
37(2), 15–16. a particular group of people.
Diversity: Diversity, as used in this paper,
Reeves, T. C. (1997). An evaluator looks at cultural refers specifically to differences based on cul-
diversity. Educational Technology, 37(2), 27–31. ture—as defined previously—nationality, race,
Subramony, D. P. (2004). Instructional technolo- ethnicity, language, and religion. Additional
gists’ inattention to issues of cultural diversity aspects of diversity that are often considered by
among learners. Educational Technology, 44(4), educators include age, gender, sexual orientation/
19–24. preference, ability, geographical location, and
socio-economic status.
Subramony, D. P. (2006). Culturally and geo- Educational/Instructional Technology:
graphically relevant performance interventions: Educational/instructional technology, as used in
A case study from Arctic Alaska. Performance this paper, refers to the growing field of research
Improvement Quarterly, 19(2), 115–133. and practice involving the application of inter-
Swartz, E. (2003). Teaching white preservice teach- disciplinary inquiry and emergent technologies
ers: Pedagogy for change. Urban Education, 38(3), towards the solution of instructional and perfor-
255–278. doi:10.1177/0042085903038003001 mance problems.
Educational Technology (pl. Educational
Thiagarajan, S. (1988). Performance technol- Technologies): Educational technology, as used in
ogy in multicultural environments. Performance this paper, refers to the growing range of human-
& Instruction, 27(7), 14–16. doi:10.1002/ engineered tools—both products and processes—
pfi.4170270705 employed within educational contexts towards
Thomas, M., Mitchell, M., & Joseph, R. (2002). the ultimate goals of promoting and enhancing
The third dimension of ADDIE: A cultural em- student learning.
brace. TechTrends, 46(2), 40–45. doi:10.1007/ Iñupiaq (pl. Iñupiat): Iñupiaq refers to the
BF02772075 Arctic people who make their home in the north
and northwest parts of the state of Alaska; the
term Iñupiaqt/Eskimo is also sometimes used.

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Additionally, Iñupiaq is the name given to the Western: Western, as used in this paper, re-
native language of the Iñupiat. fers to (1) peoples of European origin and their
Non-Western: Non-Western, as used in this descendants settled across other continents,
paper, refers to (1) peoples of non-European ori- notably the Americas and Oceania; and (2) their
gin—tracing their roots instead to Asia, Africa, common heritage of spiritual, intellectual, social,
or indigenous populations of the Americas and and material culture.
Oceania; and (2) their diverse heritages of spiritual,
intellectual, social, and material culture.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 842-868, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 5.2
Cross-Cultural Learning
Objects (XCLOs)
Andrea L. Edmundson
eWorld Learning, Inc., USA

INTRODUCTION of social and collaborative tools, mobile learning,

and dynamic computing (EDUCAUSE Learning
“Networked virtual organizations outperform Initiative, 2006). These tools, coupled with the
competitors by responding more quickly to global reach of NVOs, will precipitate unprec-
customers, collaborating better with partners to edented contact between educators and learners
perform value added activities, and fully stan- from other cultures. Because e-learning is a cul-
dardizing their business processes, data, and IT tural artifact—embedded with the nuances of the
infrastructure” (Cisco Systems Inc., 2003). Thus, culture that designs it—e-learning will need to be
networked and virtual organizations (NVOs) de- translated, localized, and adapted in profound ways
pend heavily on the agility afforded by effective to suit the needs and preferences of learners in other
communications, ease of sharing information, and cultures. Localization addresses obvious visual
virtual integration of business functions. Such and textual differences found in other cultures,
agility however, requires a trained workforce. In such as icons, symbols, gestures, and so forth.
keeping with its reliance on technology, NVOs, However, the deeper ramifications of culture,
especially those in the U.S. (Bersin, 2005; Rivera such as what people value, how they learn, solve
& Paradise, 2006; Sugrue & Rivera, 2005), fre- problems, and so forth, will require approaches
quently utilize e-learning as their source of training that are more sophisticated. Reusable learning
and education. In e-learning, there is a proliferation objects (RLOs) are “plug and play” chunks of
learning materials (content, teaching approaches,
and so forth) that allow instructional designers
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch502

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Cross-Cultural Learning Objects (XCLOs)

to construct and modify e-learning in an easy, object as “any digital resource that can be reused
efficient, and effective manner that parallels the to support learning.” Extensive databases, such as
agility demanded by NVOs in business functions. the Multimedia Educational Research for Learn-
RLOs are fast becoming the foundation of rapid ing and Online Teaching [MERLOT] (MERLOT,
e-learning development (EDUCAUSE Learning 2006), have been created to house these RLOs
Initiative, 2006). However, cross-cultural learning created by educators and to make them available
objects (XCLOs) meet the additional challenge of to other educators.
creating e-learning that accommodates the more The extensive coverage of reusable learn-
profound cultural differences of global learn- ing objects on Web sites such as http://www.
ers, such as those generated by different values, reusablelearning.org/ (Reusable Learning Project,
national cultural dimensions, and even diverse 2005-2005) and Eduworks (2001-2005) are ex-
levels of techno-literacy. This article describes amples of how RLOs have grown in popularity
XCLOs in more detail and illustrates how they and sophistication.
can be used by NVOs to maintain their requisite
agile workforce. Reusable Learning Objects

Reusable learning objects represent an alterna-

BACKGROUND tive approach to content development. In this
approach, content is broken down into chunks.
Technically, a learning object (LO) is a simple From a pedagogical perspective, each chunk might
unit of instruction designed to achieve a specific play a specific role within an instructional design
learning objective. A variety of learning objects methodology…
can be designed to achieve the same objective,
allowing instructional designers to choose activi- • Each chunk must be able to communicate
ties based on the demographics of learners, media, with learning systems using a standardized
environments, and so forth. When one speaks of method that does not depend on the system
learning objects today, it is usually in the context • How a learner moves between chunks is
of e-learning because LOs are digital and designed controlled by the learning system.
to be reusable (reusable learning objects or RLOs), • Each chunk must have a description that
which is accomplished by designing them to meet enables designers to search for and find the
established standards for a specific data format, right chunk for the right job.
such as Sharable Content Object Reference
Model (SCORM) and Aviation (all encompass- Such chunks are called learning objects. There
ing) Industry Computer-Based Training (CBT) is no standard for the size (or granularity) of a
Committee (AICC) (Wikipedia, 2007). A simple learning object (Eduworks Corporation, 2001-
definition of an RLO is “[a] self-contained piece 2005).
of learning material with an associated learning The primary benefit of using RLOs for rapid
objective, which could be of any size and in a e-learning development, as well as for cultural
range of media” (Crawley, 2006). adaptation, is that the needs of different groups
NETg (2003) defines [RLOs] by three compo- of learners can be met by using these “chunks” to
nents that must be present: the object must have a adapt existing courses instead of creating new ones
measurable objective, it must have an activity that for every different group of targeted learners. The
exactly matches this objective, and it must have major premise, while not entirely proven, is that
an assessment. Wiley (2000) defines a learning the cultural characteristics of learners will need to

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Cross-Cultural Learning Objects (XCLOs)

be “matched” to characteristics of the e-learning Group LLC, 2006), a definition that more aptly
courses. The largest producers of e-learning are describes what instructional designers are trying
in Western cultures, but the largest and fastest to accomplish when in adapting e-learning for
growing consumer groups are in Eastern cultures multiple cultural groups. This author contends that
(Van Dam & Rogers, 2002). Thus, as e-learning is the term cross-cultural learning objects (XCLOs)
further globalized, education and training profes- better defines the characteristics of RLOs for
sionals will be challenged to meet the culturally- globalized e-learning and, in addition, proposes
based needs of these learners. Businesses, higher that the e-learning industry adopt the term cross-
education, and e-learning producers are rapidly cultural learning object [XCLO] into standard
adopting RLOs in the instructional design of usage. Hence, the term would be distinguished
e-learning, [but] also, recognizing “[the] issues from CLO, already coined by the heritage and
around re-use of e-content and cultural models of museum industry.
teaching and learning” (Selinger, 2005) and “how
culture and IT skills influence development and
delivery of e-learning materials” (Benson et al., MAIN FOCUS
2005). Educators acknowledge that “Many objects
are culturally-inflected, which is to say that they So, how do XCLOs work and how should they
may not be appropriate at all for diverse learners be employed?
in remote settings…” (Nash, 2005). They are As a result of classical research and theories
also recognizing RLOs as cultural artifacts and in industrial anthropology, Hofstede (1997),
the inherent socio-cultural differences presented Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1998), and
(Berge & Fjuk, n.d.). others, such as Edward T. Hall (1981), identified
categories of characteristics across which mem-
Cross-Cultural Learning Objects bers of cultures can be compared and contrasted
at a national level called cultural dimensions.
However, the term cultural learning object (CLO) While each researcher categorized these dimen-
has already been coined. CLOs are digital rep- sions differently, the concepts are similar: large
resentations of art, historical places, and other groups of people within certain national groups
physical artifacts of the world’s cultural groups. (countries) tend to possess similar characteristics
An initial Internet search for cultural learning that differentiate them from members of other
objects illustrates that, for the most part, these national groups. (For brevity, only segments of
are reusable learning objects used in the cultural Hofstede’s and Trompenaars’ research will be used
heritage industries, such as museums (DigiCULT, in this article; however, the reader should further
2003; Giorgini & Cardinali, 2003). The concept of explore the seminal works of Geert Hofstede
cultural learning objects came into existence with (1997) Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-
the proliferation of online museums, digitized art, Turner (1998), Edward T. Hall (1981), and the
and the need to move and store these objects for other theorists in the reference list).
either display or for educational purposes. Based on his research of more than 100,000 in-
Thus, in order to distinguish the CLOs used dividuals in 54 countries, Hofstede created indexes
within the heritage industry from those used to (ratings from low to high) for four categories of
created culturally adapted e-learning, an alterna- characteristics used to describe cultural groups:
tive moniker is needed. The term cross-cultural power distance, individualism, masculinity, and
is defined as “…comparing or dealing with two uncertainty avoidance. The power distance index
or more different cultures” (Lexico Publishing (PDI) is “the extent to which the less powerful

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members of institutions and organizations expect members of collectivist societies depend on social
and accept that power is distributed unequally” relationships and may expect differential treatment
(Hofstede, 1997, p. 27). He defined individualistic based upon their social class. Globally, collectiv-
(IDV) societies as those “in which ties between ist societies are predominant. (Hofstede, 1997)
individuals are loose” (1997, p. 51). By contrast,
collectivist societies are those “in which people Thus, in the scenario above, an American
from birth onwards are integrated into strong, learner (low PDI) would be accustomed to chal-
cohesive ingroups, which throughout people’s lenging and questioning the instructor; whereas, a
lifetime continue to protect them in exchange for learner from India might defer to the instructor’s
unquestioned loyalty” (Hofstede, 1997, p. 51). He authority position and not question him or her (high
also defined a dimension called “masculinity ver- PDI). The presumption is that, to some degree, such
sus femininity” (MAS) in terms of how a culture differences will affect learning outcomes and need
socializes its members to perform gender roles. to be addressed. Learning outcomes were defined
In a masculine culture, men are expected to be by Henderson (1996) as any results that reflect
tough and assertive, while women are perceived the acquisition of skills and knowledge, such as
as tender and modest. In a feminine culture, men the effectiveness of instructional techniques, and
and women are more likely to have similar roles; as students’ perceptions or attitudes. The goal of
both are expected to be tender and modest, even instructional design is to ensure equitable out-
if men also express some assertiveness. Lastly, comes for all learners. Most e-learning is designed
uncertainty avoidance (UAI) is “the extent to by Western countries, such as the United States,
which the members of the culture feel threatened which have the highest indexes of PDI and IDV
by uncertain or unknown situations” (Hofstede, among the nations studied; in contrast, Eastern
1997, p. 113). Uncertainty avoidance is not risk and countries in developing areas tend to have low
avoidance; rather, it refers to a pattern of reduc- PDI and IDV indexes, posing challenges in both
ing ambiguity. classrooms and e-learning. Table 1 summarizes the
Not surprisingly, such characteristics are mani- different cultural dimensions indexes of American
fested by students and teachers and, consequently, and Indian learners as shown by Hofstede (1997).
within cultural artifacts (such as e-learning) as Classical theorists and researchers in education
well. have long recognized the impact of culture on
Edmundson (2007c) describes two of Hofst- education (Gardner, 1989; Hall & Hall, 1977;
ede’s four cultural dimensions, power distance Lave, 1988; Spindler, 1963, 1974, 1987; Vygotsky,
and individualism, as he related them to education: 1997). Contemporary researchers and theorists
(Downey et al., 2004; Edmundson, 2004; Hen-
In nations with a low-power distance index (PDI), derson, 1993, 1996, 2007; Jaju et al., 2002;
teachers and students tend to be perceived as McLoughlin, 1999, 2000, 2007; Reeves, 1994)
equals. Teachers are not authoritative subject mat- are finding that cultural dimensions have an impact
ter experts, but rather are facilitators of student- on how people learn and/or how they prefer to
centered education. In high-PDI nations, teachers learn specifically within e-learning. Dunn and
are authorities, and students do not question their Marinetti (2000-2004) were two of the earliest
knowledge (Hofstede, 1997). Students in nations thinkers that recognized learning objects as a way
with a high-individualism index (IDV) expect to to culturally adapt e-learning:
be treated as equals among peers and faculty,
preferring to work as individuals and expecting [Learning] objects are selected that to some extent
recognition for individual merit. In contrast, tailor the experience to the cultural expectations of

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Table 1. Summary of U.S. and Indian indexes for Hofstede’s four cultural dimensions

Dimension PDI IDV MAS UAI

(range of lowest to highest (lowest-11; highest-104) (lowest-6 highest-91) (lowest-5 highest-95) (lowest-8 highest-112)
scores, using all countries)
USA 40 91 62 46
India 77 48 56 40
© 2007, Andrea Edmundson. Used with permission.

the learner… The great advantage of object-based Italians have a high “ascription” score whereas
elearning is that once you have identified some the Americans’ score on this dimension is low. If
of the key [cultural] dimensions for your major the course were designed in America, for example,
cultural areas, you can deliver the same objects it might contain an introductory video of the
to those who share similar traits. course designer who, as a corporate professional
in workplace performance, tells learners about the
Table 2 proffers an example of how a course value of the course. However, the Italians may not
developed in the United States (U.S.) might be give this professional much credence because he/
adapted for learners in India. The suggested uses she is unknown. As a solution, (presuming this
for XCLOs are highlighted in bold. Note that, proves to be the case), the introductory component
while the need for adaptations are presumed, of the course could be created as an XCLO. For
the author recommends several ways in which high-ascription Italians, the introduction may be
to determine (a) if any changes are needed and presented by a well-known, respected and titled
(b) other ways—beyond changes in instructional authority in Italy.
design—in which to adapt e-learning. As illustrated in this article, educational re-
Marinetti & Dunn (2002) illustrated how searchers and practitioners are becoming more
XCLOs could be used in a course that was origi- aware of the need to adapt complex e-learning for
nally designed in the U.S. but adapted for Italian use in other cultures: “The digital object should
learners, based on the cultural dimension, achieve- be appropriate culturally, and the meanings that
ment v. ascription orientation, a cultural dimension it communicates within a cultural context should
described by Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner reinforce learning objectives,” and “understanding
(1998) that is similar to Hofstede’s PDI. the cultural beliefs and values is critical in develop-
According to Marinetti and Dunn (2002): ing an instructional strategy that uses learning ob-
jects” (Nash, 2005, p. 416). Localization addresses
Achievement-oriented cultures judge people ac- obvious visual and textual differences found in
cording to what they have accomplished. They other cultures such as icons, symbols, gestures,
make limited use of titles and respect to superiors and so forth. However, the deeper ramifications
is accorded depending on their knowledge and of culture, such as what people value, how they
performance…[whereas] Ascription-oriented learn, solve problems, and so forth, will require
cultures attribute status depending on birth, kin- approaches that are more sophisticated. Using
ship, gender, and age but also connections and XCLOs will accomplish that goal.
educational record. They make extensive use of
titles.

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 Cross-Cultural Learning Objects (XCLOs)

Table 2. Proposed use of XCLOs, based on assessment of cultural dimensions for the U.S. and India

Course characteristics Learner characteristics Potential adaptations to consider How to measure or evaluate
impact/preferences
Use of American English Taught in schools with • Change words, idioms, colloquial- Determine learner familiar-
British English isms ity with American English and
• Provide learners with a glossary idioms, and other colloquialisms
• Do nothing used in the course.
Use of American icons and Highly educated, work for • Replace with those known to Determine learner familiar-
brand names, such as Harley Americans and are frequently Indian learners ity with American icons, pop
Davidson motorcycles exposed to American culture • Explain differences culture, and other colloquialisms
through mass media, work, • Do nothing used in the course via focus
colleagues group
Lacks cooperative activities Prefer cooperative activities • Use XCLOs Pilot test the course for equi-
and group work (except and group work   ◦ to replace individualistic activi- table learning outcomes; survey
through simulations and ties with more cooperative ones participants about reaction to
post-course discussions)   ◦ to offer a supplemental coop- activities provided
erative activity just for the Indian
learners
• Do nothing; learners may accept
and/or adapt to individualistic
activities
Embodies cognitive- More accustomed to • Use XCLOs Pilot test the course for equi-
constructivist educational instructivist-didactic   ◦ To create course options based table learning outcomes; survey
paradigm approach to teaching on paradigm to which the learners participants about reaction to
are accustomed, such as offering activities provided
written, downloadable handouts of
information in place of an interac-
tive activity
• Do nothing; learners accept and/or
adapt to different paradigm
© 2007, Andrea Edmundson. Used with permission.

FUTURE TRENDS increasingly popular, collected and developed,

and exchanged all over the world. The collection
As discussed, several trends related to the growth and creation of XCLOs will lead to the creation
of NVOs and other types of organizations with of new XCLO databases, similar to MERLOT
global reach indicate that the use of XCLOs is or, alternately, XCLOs will be incorporated into
imperative. Outsourcing, offshoring, and out- existing databases as a subcategory of RLOs. In
tasking of business functions is growing, creating addition, the standards for their development –
the need to rapidly train an agile, cross-cultural content-wise and technologically – will become
workforce. E-learning is more frequently the tool more universal. Educational researchers and
of choice for educating the virtual workforce. The practitioners have begun to introduce ways in
design and use of modular learning objects and which to adapt e-learning for targeted learners in
the logic of reusing content are top areas of focus other cultures, from translation, to localization,
for corporations, higher education, and e-learning to using RLOs. Practical models for adapting
vendors in the U.S. (The eLearning Guild, 2006). e-learning are being developed and tested (Dunn
In addition, an average of 21% of those organiza- & Marinetti, 2007; Edmundson, 2007a, 2007b;
tions wants to increase the global reach of their Henderson, 2007; McLoughlin, 2007). However,
e-learning content (The eLearning Guild, 2006). the first step to integrating XCLOs into e-learning
Given these trends, reusable XCLOs will become is to differentiate between the cultural learning

1164
Cross-Cultural Learning Objects (XCLOs)

objects (CLOs) used in the heritage industries Cisco Systems Inc. (2003). The bridge. Retrieved
and the cross-cultural learning objects (XCLOs) May 15, 2007, from http://www.cisco.com/web/
used in e-learning. about/ac79/wp/bridge.html.
Crawley, J. (2006, January 2006). Itslife. Retrieved
April 27, 2006, from http://www.itslifejimbutno-
CONCLUSION
tasweknowit.org.uk/lt_glossary.htm.
NVOs rely on e-learning to maintain an agile, DigiCULT. (2003, December 9). Learning objects
trained workforce globally. However, members of from cultural and scientific resources. DigiCULT,
world cultures have different values, perspectives, Issue 4. Retrieved April 6, 2006, from http://www.
and even ways of learning. RLOs can address the digicult.info/pages/index.php.
need for rapid e-learning development. Certain
Downey, S., Cordova-Wentling, R. M., Wentling,
organizations such as MERLOT (“Multimedia
T., & Wadsworth, A. (2004, June 15). The relation-
educational research for learning and online teach-
ship between national culture and the usability of
ing [MERLOT],” 2006) have built databases of
an e-learning system. Retrieved October 31, 2005,
RLOs for educators to use. However, no one has
from http://learning.ncsa.uiuc.edu/display-page.
specifically addressed the need to use RLOs for
cfm?Page=Home.
cultural adaptation. To the author’s knowledge,
there is no organized effort to design XCLOs, nor Dunn, P., & Marinetti, A. (2007). Beyond localiza-
are there any databases that house XCLOs. An In- tion: Effective learning strategies for cross-cultural
ternet search for “cross-cultural learning objects” e-learning. In A.L. Edmundson (Ed.), Globalized
resulted in ONE hit, an almost unheard of result e-learning cultural challenges (pp. 255-266).
in today’s Web searches: developing and compil- Hershey, PA: Idea Group Publishing.
ing a repository of cross-cultural learning object
Dunn, P., & Marinetti, A. (2000-2004, unknown).
makes sense in the discipline of e-learning, the
Line zine. Retrieved June 25, 2005, from http://
educational tool of choice for globalized NVOs.
radio.weblogs.com/0125797/2003/10/27.html.
Edmundson, A. L. (2004). The cross-cultural
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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
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index_en.html. AICC: The Aviation (All Encompassing)
Spindler, G. D. (1963). Education and culture: Industry CBT (Computer-Based Training) Com-
Anthropological approaches. New York: Holt, mittee [AICC] is an international association of
Rinehart, and Winston. technology-based training professionals. The
AICC develops guidelines for aviation industry
Spindler, G. D. (Ed.). (1974). Education and [that are being adopted by other industries, as well]
cultural process: Toward an anthropology of edu- in the development, delivery, and evaluation of
cation. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. computer based training, Web-based training and
Spindler, G. D. (Ed.). (1987). Education and related training technologies (Wikipedia, 2007).
cultural process: Anthropological approaches Cross-Cultural [XC]: Comparing or deal-
(2nd ed.). Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press. ing with two or more different cultures (Lexico
Publishing Group LLC, 2006).
Sugrue, B., & Rivera, R. J. (2005). 2006 state of Cross-Cultural Learning Objects [XCLOs]:
the industry in leading enterprises. Alexandria: Cross-cultural learning objects are reusable
American Society for Training and Development learning objects used to adapt e-learning for use
[ASTD]. by multiple cultures, based on the premise that
learners in another culture will learn best by hav-

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 Cross-Cultural Learning Objects (XCLOs)

ing course characteristics and features meet their sarily e-learning…they could be correspondence
needs and cultural preferences. courses, and so forth.
Cultural Artifacts: An instructional design Learning Objects [LO]: A learning object is a
is a cultural artifact. It reflects, often in an in- reusable unit of instruction for elearning. In order
conspicuous or unintentional manner, the values, to use it in different contexts, the presentation has
learning preferences, language, and worldview of to be separated from the content, which calls for
the designer (McLoughlin, 1999). specific data formats. SCORM is such a format
Cultural Dimensions: Cultural dimensions (Wikipedia, 2007).
are the mostly psychological dimensions, or value Learning Outcomes: Results that reflect the
constructs, which can be used to describe a specific acquisition of skills and knowledge, such as the
culture. These are often used in intercultural com- effectiveness of instructional techniques, and as
munication-/cross-cultural communication-based students’ perceptions or attitudes (Henderson,
research. See also Hall (1981), Hofstede (1997), 1996).
and Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner (1998). MERLOT: The Multimedia Educational
(Wikipedia, 2007). Research for Learning and Online Teaching
Distance Education or Distance Learning: (MERLOT) was built to house RLOs created by
Distance education, or distance learning, is a field educators and to make them available to other
of education that focuses on the pedagogy/andra- educators (“Multimedia educational research for
gogy, technology, and instructional systems design learning and online teaching [merlot],” 2006).
that are effectively incorporated in delivering Reusable Learning Objects [RLO]: Reusable
education to students who are not physically “on learning objects represent an alternative approach
site” to receive their education. Instead, teachers to content development. In this approach, content
and students may communicate asynchronously is broken down into chunks. From a pedagogical
(at times of their own choosing) by exchanging perspective, each chunk might play a specific role
printed or electronic media, or through technol- within an instructional design methodology [and
ogy that allows them to communicate in real time can be interchanged and exchanged, depending
(synchronously) (Wikipedia, 2007). on the needs or characteristics of the learners]
E-Learning: E-learning is a general term (Eduworks Corporation, 2001-2005).
used to refer to computer-enhanced learning. It SCORM: SCORM stands for Shareable Con-
is used interchangeably in so many contexts that tent Object Reference Model. This is a standard
it is critical to be clear what one means when for Web-based e-learning. It defines how the in-
one speaks of “e-learning” (Wikipedia, 2007). E- dividual instruction elements are combined on a
learning is a form of distance learning or distance technical level and sets conditions for the software
education; however, the latter two are not neces- needed for using the content (Wikipedia, 2007).

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Networked and Virtual Organizations, edited by Goran D. Putnik
and Maria Manuela Cruz-Cunha, pp. 369-376, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 5.3
Technology Integration
Practices within a
Socioeconomic Context:
Implications for Educational Disparities
and Teacher Preparation

Holim Song
Texas Southern University, USA

Emiel Owens
Texas Southern University, USA

Terry T. Kidd
University of Texas School of Public Health, USA

ABSTRACT dence of whether these disparities continue to

exist, and their effects on student achievement
With the call for curricular and instructional in the classroom.
reform, educational institutions have embarked
on the process to reform their educational prac-
tices to aid the lower SES student in their quest INTRODUCTION
to obtain quality education with the integration
of technology. The study performed was to ex- The rise and use of educational technology in the
amine the socioeconomic disparities of teachers’ 21st century has become one of the dominant is-
technology integration in the classroom as it sues and challenges facing diverse communities,
relates to implementing technology interventions business and industry, educational arenas and the
to support quality teaching and active student larger U.S. society as a whole. Amidst the eupho-
learning. This chapter provides empirical evi- ria and craze over the power and the potential
of information and communication technology
has to transform the way we learn, the ways in
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch503

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

which we communicate, and the ways in which ing Lines, 2001). However, clear evidence of a
society functions, there is an increasing debate digital divide, parallel to historical disparities,
as to who has access and the consequences of continues to distinguish urban schools from their
access to full participation in a democratic U.S. affluent counterparts (Chen & Thielemann, 2001;
society. This debate has particular implication Guttentag & Eilers, 2004; National Center for
for classroom instruction. Educators concerned Education Statistics, 2004). Historical measures
about the chronic underachievement of students of digital equity have been based on the ratio of
often fall prey to the allure of technology as a tool the number of computers divided by the number
for reversing the historical influences of poverty, of students. A more recent measure involves
discrimination, inequity, chronic underachieve- determining levels of Internet access. Another
ment, and lack of opportunity because technology dimension of this problem relates to questions
has the potential to narrow the achievement gap, about differences in home access to technology,
if equally distributed or widen the gap if only therefore impacting urban student achievement.
accessible to selected groups in the educational A second source of disparity in technology
system (Waxman, Connell, & Gray, 2002; Edy- use is how technology is used. Previous studies
burn, Higgins, & Boone, 2005). conducted by Becker (2001) and Finneran (2000)
found that low SES schools are more likely to
use technology for drill and practice, whereas
SOURCES OF SOCIOECONOMIC high SES school uses technology in innovative
DISPARITIES teaching strategies (Becker, 2001; Finneran,
2000). This idea is consistent with the ideas of
Research studies have been devoted to socioeco- curriculum reform and reconceptualization put
nomic disparity in technology integration and use forth by Pinar (2004). Pinar (2004) suggests
in education (National Center for Educational that the instruments of computer technology
Statistics, 2005; U.S. Department of Education, are used to drill and kill students into passing
2005). Becker (2001) found that students from standardized test, not actually being integrated
higher income families have been found to use effectively into classroom instruction or peda-
computers in school and in their homes more gogical practice that promote quality teaching
frequently than students from lower SES fami- and active student learning. He further explains
lies. Students of color from urban schools have that the current use of computer technology in
also been found to have less access to computers urban schools generally serve to turn its us-
compared to Anglo-suburban students (National ers (students) into disembodied and alienated
Telecommunication and Information Administra- subjects. Furthermore, as explained in Becker
tion, 2006). More recently, lower SES schools (2001), high SES students are more likely to use
are only half as likely to have high speed internet technology for school assignment, use e-mails,
compared to high SES schools (Roblyer, 2006). and use educational programs.
Consistent with this idea of access are the issues A third source of disparity in technology use
within the digital divide itself. Despite the con- deals with the nature of technology adoption and
straints on school funding in most states, schools organizational change. A thorough analysis of
have devoted an increasing percentage of their major research related to technology and teacher
annual budgets to technology. The majority of motivation, adoption and usage uncovered im-
the efforts of the educational community over portant factors that are involved in determining
the past decade to acquire hardware, software, their willingness to use such approaches in the
and Internet access have been successful (Divid- teaching and learning process (Braak, 2001;

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Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

Solomon & Wiederhorn, 2000). The literature by the new technology as it takes too much time
indicates that teacher’s willingness to adopt and to learn and use it. The teachers stated that they
implement learning technologies for the teach- had a negative attitude towards technology be-
ing and learning process varies, but all share the cause of their lack of training, lack of experience,
same denominator – proper internal and external and lack of time to prepare an extensive lesson
motivation (Braak, 2001; Mooji & Smoot, 2001; plan, as well as the inability to acquire computer
Solomon & Wiederhorn, 2000). The top reasons access. Bauer (2002) adds that a challenge for
teachers choose to use technology for the teach- teachers is how to use technology along with
ing and learning process dealt with the notion the standards and teachers use the computer to
of continuous training and development, proper augment regular curricular activity, but not as
technology support from technology personnel, an integral transformative tool to assist in the
encouragement from school administration, teaching and learning process.
and an organizational structure that supported The use of technology in the classroom has
teachers using technology. While these are the moved through definable periods involving
key issues ascertained from the research study, programming, computer-assisted instruction,
the ideas of change management, technology problem-solving environments, personal produc-
adoption and innovation, self-efficacy and mo- tivity, web-based instruction, and hypermedia.
tivation, support, and the computing experience Problems associated with limited opportunities
are relevant to this discussion. The American for teacher professional development to learn
Council of Education (2003) report noted that about new innovations (Lonergan, 2001), as
the quest to optimize the use of technology in well as limited funds for new hardware and soft-
schools could not be fulfilled by the mere sup- ware, often result in the routine use of student
ply of more hardware and software. The report learning activities that have been abandoned by
suggested that what needs to be addressed first high-performing schools (Guttentag & Eilers,
are ways to identify, motivate, and equip teach- 2004). Literacy educators have a responsibility
ers with the skills necessary for effective use to be aware of these disparities in technology
of educational technologies in their classroom access and education and to work to narrow gaps
practices. between the technological haves and have-nots
(Bauer, 2002).

TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS
AND ATTITUDES TOWARD METHODS
TECHNOLOGY
The data for the present study was drawn from
Ktoridou, Zarpetea, and Yiangou (2002) studied the base year of the Educational Longitudinal
teachers’ attitudes toward technology in the Survey of 2002-2004 (ELS: 02). The ELS:02 is a
classroom. The study found that most young, national survey administered by National Center
novice teachers expressed a willingness to in- for Educational Statistics to provide an overall
tegrate technology in their lessons than more picture of the present educational experience of
experienced veteran teachers. Moreover, the re- high school students in the U.S. The survey has
searchers implied that younger, less experienced four sub components completed by students,
teachers are more interested in learning how to teachers, parents and school administrators.
use technology since they are more familiar with The design used to collect the data was a two-
it, whereas; experienced teachers felt frustrated stage, stratified national probability sample. The

1171
 Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

survey included 1,052 public and private school courses on the Internet, (b) how often to you use
representing about 12,000 students across the the computer to communicate with colleagues,
country. For the present study the teacher and (c) how often to you use the computer to commu-
administrator survey data was used. The total nicate with parents, (d) how often to you use the
number of teachers that participate in the survey computer to communicate with students, (e) how
was about 7,322. often do you use the computer for administrative
The teacher survey provided items used records and, (f) how often to you use the computer
to measure how much training teachers had to post homework and other information. Again,
received in technology use. The items used to the outcome measures for these items were also
measure teacher training were the following: (a) a four point likert scale, ranging from “never”
received training in basic computer skills, (b) to “more than once a week.”
received training in the use of the Internet, (c) In order to measure the socioeconomics level
received training in integrating technology in the of the school involved, the administrator survey
curriculum, (d) received training in software ap- was used. In this case school administrators
plications, (e) received training in use of Internet, were asked the report the percent on students at
(f) received training in use of other technology their school that were eligible for a free lunch
and, (g) received follow-up or advanced train- program. School percentages were then ranked
ing. The outcome measures for these items were according to eligibility. The distribution of these
dichotomous, yes or no. percent values were divided into three quartiles,
The teacher survey also measured Internet ranging from lowest to high SES schools. The
and Technology use in Instructions. The item total number of teachers that represent the three
provided on the teacher survey to measure this SES levels were about 3933 teachers from low
outcome were the following: (a) how often do SES schools, 2324 from middle SES schools and
you use the computer to create class presenta- about 1065 teachers from high SES schools. To
tions, (b) how often do you use WWW sites to determine if an association exist between tech-
plan lessons, (c) how often do you access model nology training and use by teachers in the school
lesson plans from internet, (d) how often do you with different socioeconomic status a Pearson’s
do research teaching on the internet, (e) how often chi-square test was used.
do you take professional development courses
on the internet, (f) how often do you download
instructional software from the internet, (g) RESULTS
how often do you use the computer to give class
presentations and, (h) how often do you use the Table 1 reports the percent of teachers who re-
computer to prepare multimedia presentations. ceived training on technology preparation and
The outcome measures for these items were also the ability to integrating technology in the cur-
a four point likert scale, ranging from “never” riculum they teach. Eighty three percent of the
to “more than once a week.” teachers indicated they had received training in
Finally, the teacher survey measured how basic computer skills. Similarly, almost eighty
often teachers used technology to communicate percent of the teachers indicated they had received
between parents, students, and for administrative training on software applications (78.7%), use of
duties. The item provided on the teacher survey the internet (78.6%) and integrating technology
to measure this outcome were the following: (a) in curriculum (77.0%). Finally, less than fifty
how often do you take professional development percent of the teachers indicated that they had

1172
Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

Table 1.

Teacher Training
N= 7322
Yes No
Received training in basic computer skills 83.0% 17.0%
Received training in software applications 78.7% 21.3%
Received training in use of Internet 78.6% 21.4%
Received training in use of other technology 45.7% 54.3%
Received training in integrating technology in curriculum 76.4% 23.6%
Received follow-up or advanced training 43.2% 56.8%

received training on the use of other technology used computers to prepare multimedia presenta-
(46.4%) and follow-up or advanced training on tions more than once a week. Similarly, about
technology use (43.2%). seven percent (6.5%) of the teachers indicated
Table 2 reports how often internet and com- they used the computer to give class presenta-
puters are being used by classroom teachers. The tions and to prepare multimedia presentations
most frequent use of the computer by classroom more than once a week. The most frequent use
teachers was to create class presentations. About of the internet was to use www sites to plan les-
eighty percent of the teachers (80.7%) indicated sons. Forty five percent (44.5%) of the teachers
that used computer to create instructional mate- indicated they used a www site more than once
rials more than several times a week. Seven a week. The second highest use of the internet
percent (7.0%) of the teachers indicated they was to access model lesson plans. Only sixteen

Table 2.

Internet and Technology Use in Instructions

N= 7322
Never Less Than Once a Between one a week More than once a
Month and once a month week
How often use computer to create class 2.4% 3.3% 13.6% 80.7%
presentations
How often use WWW sites to plan 6.3% 16.1% 33.0% 44.5%
lessons
How often access model lesson plans 28.7% 30.8% 25.0% 15.5%
from Internet
How often research teaching on 25.4% 34.3% 27.4% 12.9%
Internet
How often did teachers take profession- 88.5% 8.5% 2.0% 1.1%
al development courses on Internet.
How often was download instructional 59.1% 26.5% 11.9% 2.5%
software from Internet used in the class
How often use computer to give 37.1% 33.7% 22.7% 6.5%
How often use computer to 38.2% 34.1% 20.7% 7.0%
prepare multimedia
presentations

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 Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

percent (15.5) of the teachers indicated that they (20.8%) indicated that they used the computer
used the internet to access model lesson plan to post homework/information more than once
more than once a week. Similarly, thirteen per- a week. Finally, less than twenty percent (18.8%)
cent (12.9%) of the teachers indicated they used of the teachers indicated that they used the com-
the internet more than once a week to research puter to communicate with parents.
teaching. Finally, less than 10% of the teachers Table 4 compares teacher training on comput-
indicated they used the internet more than once ers and technology use across socioeconomics
a week for the remaining items, download in- school levels. The results indicated that several
structional software and take development differences (p<.001) exist in technology training
courses on the internet. teachers have received in high, median and low
Table 3 reports communication use of the SES schools. Teachers from high SES school
computer and internet by classroom teachers. indicated a larger percent of them had received
The most frequent use of the computer in com- training in basic computer skills. Eighty four
munication was for administrative purposes. percent (84.1%) of the teachers from high SES
Seventy nine percent (78.6%) reported using the school reported receiving training in basic com-
computer for administrative purposes more than puter skills compared to seventy nine percent
once a week. The second most frequent use of (78.6%) of the teachers from low SES school.
the computer by teachers was for colleague There was a significant difference (p<.001) ex-
discussions. Fifty three percent (52.9%) of the ist on the percent of teachers that received train-
teachers indicated that they used the internet for ing on software applications across the three SES
colleague discussions more than once a week. environments. In this case teachers from Middle
Similarly, almost fifty three percent (52.6%) of level SES school had the highest percent 85.3%,
the teachers indicated that they used the internet compared to 80.6% and 80.9% for Low and high
for colleague discussions and to communicate SES teachers respectively. When asked it they
with colleagues more than once a week. Twenty- had received training in the use of the internet
six percent of the teachers indicated that they there was a significant difference (p<.001).
used the computer to communicate with students Eighty four percent (83.7%) of the teachers from
more than once a week. One fifth of the teachers high SES schools reported they had received

Table 3.

Less Than Once a Between one a week and More than once a week Less Than Once a
Month once a month Month
How often use Internet for col- 17.4% 14.6% 15.0% 52.9%
league discussions
How often use computer to com- 18.2% 14.3% 14.8% 52.6%
municate w/colleagues
How often use computer to com- 41.9% 17.0% 22.3% 18.8%
municate w/parents
How often use computer for ad- 10.7% 4.5% 6.0% 78.6%
ministrative records
How often use computer to Com- 43.6% 16.5% 14.0% 25.9%
municate w/students
How often use computer to host 63.6% 9.4% 6.2% 20.8%
homework/information

1174
Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

Table 4.

Professional Development and training in basic computer skills

N=7322
Yes No Chi-Square
Received training in basic computer skills 78.6% 21.4% 24.5***
SES 81.7% 18.3%
N = 3933 Low 84.1% 15.9%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
Received training in software applications 80.6% 19.4% 28.1***
SES 85.3% 14.7%
N = 3933 Low 80.9% 19.1%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
Received training in use of Internet 77.2% 22.8% 45.2***
SES 82.4% 17.6%
N = 3933 Low 83.7% 16.3%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
Received training in use of other technology 41.2% 58.1% .4
SES 42.2% 57.8%
N = 3933 Low 42.0% 58.0%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
Received training in integrating technology in curriculum 72.6% 27.4% 10.2*
SES 77.1% 22.9%
N = 3933 Low 75.6% 24.6%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
Received follow-up or advanced training 45.5% 54.4% .7
SES 45.1% 54.9%
N = 3933 Low 44.4% 55.6%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High

training compared to about seventy seven percent Table 5 compares teacher internet and tech-
(77.2%) of the teachers from low SES schools. nology use in Instructions across socioeconom-
A little over eighty percent (82.4%) of the teach- ics levels. The results indicated that several
ers from middle SES school reported receiving differences exist (p<.001). The highest use of
training. When asked if they had received train- computers across all three SES groups was how
ing in integrating technology in curriculum often the use computer to prepare multimedia
teachers from middle class school indicated they presentations. Teachers from middle SES schools
had received the most. In this case, 77.1% of the reported the highest percent usage. Eighty percent
teachers from middle class schools compared to (80.4%) of these teachers reported using com-
75.6% and 72.6% for teachers in high and low puter to prepare multimedia presentations more
SES schools. There were no other significant than once a week. Seventy seven percent (76.8%)
differences across the three SES groups on if of the high SES teachers and seventy five percent
teachers had received follow-up or advanced (75.3%) of the low SES teachers reported using
training. computer to prepare multimedia presentations

1175
 Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

more than once a week. Teachers from high SES four percent (64.4%) of the teachers from high
school indicated a larger percent of them use SES school reported using computers to create
computers to create class presentations. Sixty class presentations more than once a week. Re-

Table 5.

Internet and Technology Use in Instructions

N=7322
Less than once a Between once a More than Less than once
month week and once once a week a month
a month
How often use computer to create c lass 6.1% 11.2% 24.8% 57.9% 52.1**
presentations 4.3% 9.8% 27.8% 58.1%
SES 4.3% 8.9% 22.3% 64.4%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use WWW sites to plan lessons 21.0% 34.2% 30.2% 2.9% 58.5***
SES 18.5% 35.0% 27.6% 6.4%
N = 3933 Low 17.0% 30.3% 34.9% 5.1%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often access model lesson plans from 52.7% 35.8% 12.8% 3.5% 75.8***
Internet 47.1% 34.8% 15.9% 6.4%
SES 46.4% 38.1% 19.0% 4.4%
Low
Middle
High
How often research teaching on Internet 47.9% 35.8% 12.8% 3.5% 91.0***
SES 43.0% 34.8% 15.9% 6.4%
N = 3933 Low 38.5% 38.1% 19.0% 4.4%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often take professional development 88.1% 9.6% .9% 1.4% 11.9
courses on internet 86.1% 10.2% 1.9% 1.8%
SES 87.6% 10.1% 1.9% 1.2%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often download instructional software 77.5% 11.1% 4.8% 6.6% 16.5
from Internet 74.2% 12.8% 7.5% 5.5%
SES 75.4% 11.9% 6.8% 5.8%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer to give 59.7% 29.8% 9.0% 1.4% 65.7***
SES 56.5% 30.2% 11.4% 1.9%
N = 3933 Low 49.3% 34.9% 12.6% 3.2%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer to prepare multi- 13.5% 4.7% 6.5% 75.3% 63.9***
media presentations 10.5% 3.0% 6.0% 80.4%
SES 9.6% 3.8% 9.8% 76.8%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High

1176
Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

garding teachers from low SES school about Table 6 compares teacher internet and tech-
fifty eight percent (57.9%) of the teachers re- nology use for communication across socioeco-
ported using computers to create class presenta- nomics levels. The results indicated that several
tions more than once a week. Similar, fifty eight differences exist (p <.001). There was a signifi-
percent of the teachers from middle class schools cant difference in the using the computer to
reported using computers to create class presen- communicate with colleagues. Fifty-five percent
tations more than once a week. The group that (54.7%) of the teachers from high SES school
reported using WWW sites to plan lessons the and forty seventy percent (47.3%) of the teach-
most were teachers from middle SES schools. ers from low SES schools reported using com-
Nineteen percent of the middle school teachers puter to communicate w/colleagues more than
indicated they used WWW sites more than once once a week. Similar, fifty four percent of the
a week. Eighteen percent (17.8) of the teachers teachers from middle SES schools reported using
from High SES schools reported using WWW computer to communicate w/colleagues more
sites more than once a week. Fifteen percent than once a week. There was a significant dif-
(14.6%) of the teachers from low SES schools ference in the using the computer to communicate
reported using WWW sites more than once a with parents. Almost three times as many teach-
week. When asked how often they accessed ers located at High SES schools reported using
model lesson plans from the internet, teachers the computer to communicate with parents more
from low SES schools were less likely to do so. than once a week compared to teachers in low
Over fifty percent (52.7%) reported never ac- SES schools. The percentages were 26.7% and
cessing model lesson plans from the internet. 9.4% respectively. Thirteen percent (13.4%) of
Forty seven percent (47.1%) of the teachers from the middle SES teachers reported using com-
middle SES schools and forty six percent (46.4%) puter to communicate w/parents more than once
of the teachers from high SES schools reported a week. There was a significant difference in the
never accessing model lesson plans from the using the computer to communicate with stu-
internet. Almost fifty percent (47.9%) of the dents. Thirty percent (30.4) teachers from high
teachers from low SES schools compared to SES schools compared to twenty five of the
thirty nine percent (38.5%) of the teachers from teachers from low SES schools reported they
high SES school reported never doing research used computers to communicate with students
teaching on internet. Forty three percent of the more than once a week. Twenty one percent
teachers from middle SES schools reported (20.8%) of the teachers from middle SES schools
never doing research teaching on internet. There reported using the computers to communicate
was a ten percent decrease in usage of the com- with students more than once a week. Finally,
puter to give when comparing teachers from there was a significant difference in the using
High and low SES schools. Close to sixty percent the computer to post homework and information.
(59.7%) of the Low SES teachers and forty nine About twenty two percent (21.7%) of the teach-
percent of the teachers from high SES schools ers from high SES schools compared to twenty
reported never used the computer to give. Fifty percent (20.4%) of the teachers from Low SES
seven percent (57.3%) of the teachers reported schools used computers to post homework and
never using the computer to give. There were no information. Eighteen percent (18.2%) of the
other significant differences for the remaining teachers from middle SES schools reported using
usages of the computer. computers to post homework and information.

1177
 Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

Table 6.

Communication Through Technology

N=7322
Less than once a Between once a More than once Less than
month week and once a a week once a month
month
How often take professional devel- 90.6% 7.0% 1.8% .6% 57.3***
opment courses on internet 90.2% 8.0% 1.1% .7%
SES N = 3933 Low 84.0% 11.6% 2.3% .21%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer to com- 17.3% 16.3% 19.1% 47.3% 53.7***
municate w/colleagues 14.9% 13.8% 17.5% 53.9%
SES 18.0% 14.5% 12.8% 54.7%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer to com- 67.0% 13.0% 10.6% 9.4% 707.8***
municate w/parents 42.0% 19.5% 25.1% 13.4%
SES 33.0% 14.3% 25.8% 26.9%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer to com- 45.2% 18.4% 11.4% 25.0% 177.6***
municate w/students 49.3% 12.7% 17.2% 20.8%
SES 36.2% 19.7% 13.7% 30.4%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer for admin- 13.3% 4.3% 7.2% 75.2% 16.8*
istrative records 10.1% 4.2% 5.5% 80.3%
SES 10.2% 5.3% 5.8% 78.6%
N = 3933 Low
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High
How often use computer to post 66.7% 8.8% 4.1% 20.4% 52.3***
homework/information 67.3% 7.5% 7.1% 18.2%
SES N = 3933 Low 60.6% 11.1% 6.6% 21.7%
N = 2324 Middle
N = 1065 High

The results also indicated several significant DISCUSSION

differences exist at the .05 level. There was a
significant difference in the using the computer The use of technology in the classroom has been
for administrative records. Seventy nine percent a main focus in improving student learning out-
(78.6%) of the teachers from high SES school comes. Technology not only can provide visual
and seventy five percent (75.2%) of the teachers learning in the classroom, it also opens the door
from low SES schools reported using computers to improve higher level thinking skills. However,
for administrative records more than once a week. for technology to have its greatest effect there
Similar, eighty percent of the teachers from must be equal access and teachers must be well
middle SES schools reported using computers equipped to utilize there potential. The first
for administrative records more than once a week. important finding in the present study relates to

1178
Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

the descriptive results that summarize teacher’s IMPLEMENTING TECHNOLOGY

training on technology use. The results suggest IN URBAN SCHOOLS
that majority of the teachers are receiving train-
ing on the basic use of technology. This training One of the major concerns for urban teachers
includes receiving training in basic computer, when integrating educational technology in the
software applications, training in integrating classroom is the identification of appropriate
technology in curriculum and use of Internet. principles that help achieve high student learning
These teachers however were less likely to have outcomes. Recent research synthesis efforts by
received training in the use of other technology National Center for Education Statistics (2004),
and follow-up or advanced training. the International Society for Technology in
The second important finding was the sum- Education (2004), and Roblyer (2006) provide
mary of teachers’ Internet and Technology Use principles for appropriate ways to use education
in Instruction. Teachers were more likely to use technology in urban schools as supported by
the computer to create class presentations. On the education technology research. Research in
the other hand these teachers were less likely educational technology has also shown that the
to use technology for classroom presentations. effective use of educational technology occurs
Furthermore, only a small number of teachers when the application directly; (a) supports the
used the internet to receive professional develop- curriculum objectives being assessed; (b) pro-
ment or to download instructional software from vides opportunities for student collaboration and
Internet on a consist bases. The most common project/inquiry based learning; (c) adjusts for
use of technology for communication purposes student ability and prior experience, and provides
was for administrative purposes. Teachers also feedback to the student and teacher about student
reported they commonly used computers and performance; (d) is integrated throughout the
the internet to communicate with colleagues on lesson; (e) provides opportunities for students
regular bases. Only a small number of teachers to design and implement projects that extend
reported using computers to communicate with the curriculum content being assessed; and (f)
parents and students. is used in environments where the organization
Comparing technology use and training across leaderships supports technological innovation
school environments indicate that socioeconomic (National Center for Education Statistics, 2004).
status of the school still plays an important role Some examples of the strategies that have proved
in how well teacher are trained and their ability successful in influencing student academic
to use integrate technology in the classroom. In performance include students working in pairs
this case teachers from low SES schools are less on lessons at the computer assisted instruction
likely to have received training in basic computer through social interactions and teamwork (Brain-
skills and internet use compared to teachers bridge, Lasley, Sundre, 2004), digital video clips,
from high SES schools. This leads to less use of audio, and graphics to supplement instruction
technology by teachers from low SES schools to (Boster, Meyer, Roberto & Inge, 2002); math-
create class presentations. Finally, teachers from ematics curricula focusing on mathematical
low SES schools are less likely to use technology analysis of real-world situations supported by
for communication purposes. This includes com- computer assisted instructional software program
munication between teacher and student, along (Koedinger & Anderson, 1999; Cuban, 2001);
with teacher-parent communications. multimedia creation involving research skills
to locate content resources, capability to apply
learning to real world situations, organizational

1179
 Technology Integration Practices within a Socioeconomic Context

skills, and interest in content (Cradler & Cradler, power of technology in the teaching and learning
1999); software programs that allow students to process can offer the urban learner, thus leading
be aware where they are in the inquiry process our educational system to fulfill the promise of
and to reflect upon their own and other students’ providing quality teaching and student learning
inquiries (White & Frederiksen, 1998); word for a more consistent and dynamic educational
processing software that utilizes writing prompts; learning environment that continues to support
and online feedback among peers who know one the ideals and concepts of the great American
another allows learners to feel more comfortable education system.
with and adept at critiquing and editing written
work (Coley, Cradler, & Engel, 1997).
REFERENCES

CONCLUSION American Council on Education. (2003). Build-

ing a stronger higher education community: Con-
As we look to the future, technology is often necting with our members. 2003 Annual Report.
viewed as an enticing means of closing the Retrieved November 15, 2007 from http://www.
achievement gap. The current literature has im- acenet.edu/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Searc
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less without the other. High-speed connections,
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complete digital services, and modern comput-
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Brainbridge, W. L., Lasley, T. J., & Sundre, S.
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M. (2004). Policy initiatives to improve urban
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teachers with a relevant framework to understand
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Chen, L. I., & Thielemann, J. (2001). Under- Johnson, R. S. (2002). Using data to close the
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Koedinger, K., & Anderson. (1999). PUMP
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Ktoridou, D., Zarpetea, P., & Yiangou, E. (2002).
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Technology innovation challenge grant year 2 dou3/
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Lonergan, M. (2001). Preparing urban teach-
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standardsl.

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Waxman, H.C., Connell, & J. Gray (December White, B. Y., & Frederiksen, J. R. (1998). In-
2002). Meta-analysis: Effects of educational quiry, modeling, and metacognition: Making
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s1532690xci1601_2

This work was previously published in Solutions and Innovations in Web-Based Technologies for Augmented Learning: Im-
proved Platforms, Tools, and Applications, edited by Nikos Karacapilidis, pp. 203-217, copyright 2009 by Information Science
Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 1183

Chapter 5.4
Assistive Technology for
Individuals with Disabilities
Yukiko Inoue
University of Guam, Guam

INTRODUCTION AT (also called “adaptive technology”) can

particularly help balance weak areas of learning
Census 2000 figures indicate that more than 19% of with strong areas of learning for students with
the U.S. population aged five and older are people disabilities (Behrmann & Jerome, 2002). There
with disabilities (Goddard, 2004). Technology has is a growing recognition that an appropriate up-
the great potential for improving the education and to-date preparation of teachers/tutors and other
quality of life of individuals with special needs. educational professionals working with students
Blackhurst (2005) identifies six distinct types of with disabilities has to focus on information and
technology impacting education: (1) technology of communication technology (ICT), especially on
teaching (instructional approaches designed and AT (Feyerer, Miesenberger, & Wohlhart, 2002).
applied in very precise ways); (2) instructional Since educational attainment can enhance oc-
technology (videotapes and hypermedia); (3) as- cupational attainment, individuals with disabilities
sistive technology (AT) (devices designed to help (mobility impairment, visual impairment, hearing
people with disabilities); (4) medical technology impairment, speech impairment, and learning dis-
(devices which provide respiratory assistance abilities) should be encouraged to participate in
through mechanical ventilation); (5) technology higher education. AT for students with disabilities
productivity tools (computer software and hard- increases options for assisting students with a va-
ware); and (6) information technology (access to riety of exceptional learning needs, allowing them
knowledge and resources). to accomplish educational goals that they could
not accomplish otherwise in the same amount of
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch504 time or in the same manner (Rapp, 2005).

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Assistive Technology for Individuals with Disabilities

BACKGROUND With the implementation of these federal laws,

institutions of higher learning are able to utilize
AT was practically unknown in 1975, the year state agencies in the development of technology
of landmark legislation establishing equal edu- programs based on a universal design model.
cational rights for students with disabilities (and In 2001, the American Library Association
personal technology tools for education were Council approved the AT policy that libraries
in their infancy at that time); in 1997, the Indi- should work with people with disabilities, agen-
viduals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) cies, organizations, and vendors to integrate AT
amendments required AT consideration in every into their facilities and services to meet the needs
student’s Individualized Educational Program of people with a broad range of disabilities, includ-
(IEP) (Dalton, 2002). IDEA is the nation’s special ing learning, mobility, sensory, and developmental
education law, originally enacted in 1975 (Boehner disabilities (Goddard, 2004).
& Castle, 2005): “The Act responded to increased
awareness of the need to educate children with
disabilities and to judicial decisions requiring ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY
states to provide an education for children with FOR INDIVIDUALS WITH
disabilities if they provide an education for chil- DISABILITIES IN THE INCLUSIVE
dren without disabilities” (p. 1). EDUCATION SYSTEM
The late 1970s and early 1980s saw the intro-
duction and refinement of the micro-computer; Over the past two decades, for instance, the
the 1980s also witnessed an increased emphasis enrollment of students with disabilities and the
on AT and the emergence of technology literature demands for related services in higher education
and computer software targeted directly at special have greatly increased (Christ & Stodden, 2005).
education; and major technology advances such Online programs have worked to make Web sites
as the evolution of the Internet occurred during accessible to deaf and blind users particularly
the 1990s (Blackhurst, 2005). by providing closed-captioned text and textual
The first significant law dedicated to AT was descriptions of graphics, even though experts
the Technology Related Assistance for Individuals have found out that online programs often lack
with Disabilities Act (TRAID) of 1988 (Public accommodations for students with learning dis-
Law 100-407), which established a definition and abilities such as dyslexia and attention-deficit
criteria for those in the field of AT (Campbell, disorder (Carnevale, 2005).
2004):
Inclusion and AT Devices
The legislation’s primary accomplishment was to
provide grant funding for states to establish AT re- Inclusive education (the practice of keeping special
source centers…. Although many regard AT (such education students in regular classrooms as much
as computer software) as high tech, this definition as possible and feasible) is part of the regular
is all encompassing. The law also provides for school system in many European countries, and
low-tech devices, such as pencil grips, weighted inclusive teachers should be able to reach the
writing implements, and magnifying glasses…. In special educational needs of all students (Feyerer,
1998, the federal government passed the Assis- 2002). ICT can facilitate this challenging task,
tive Technology Act (ATA) (Public Law 105-394), and AT has the enormous potential to improve
which reaffirmed the government’s commitment access to education and employment for disabled
to AT. (p. 168) individuals. AT also has the potential to ensure

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that computing is as effective and as comfortable The typical AT products or devices for indi-
as possible for all learners. viduals with learning needs are outlined in Table
AT devices include: books on tape for a stu- 1. Table 2 describes valuable AT Web sites for
dent who cannot read; word processors, laptop students with disabilities.
computers for a student who has a problem with
writing; augmentative communication devices for Challenging Questions, Universal
a student who has communication problems; and Design, and AT Research
a large monitor for a visually impaired student.
A vast array of application program software is The primary goal of AT is the enhancement of
available for instructing students through tutorial, capabilities and the removal of barriers to per-
drill-and-practice, and simulation; AT can be com- formance. Five Guiding Principles for Assistive
bined with instructional programs to develop and Technology (2004) planning are quite useful: (1)
improve cognitive, reading, and problem-solving AT can be a barrier; (2) AT may be applicable to
skills (Behrmann & Jerome, 2002). all disability groups and in all phases of education
Students with disabilities often need adapta- and rehabilitation; (3) AT is related to function,
tions made for them so that they can be successful not disability; (4) assessment and intervention in-
in school. AT can give learners the help that they volve a continuous, dynamic process of systematic
need by providing “low” technology strategies problem solving; and (5) AT does not eliminate
(switches, writing devices, or software applica- the need for social and academic skills instruction.
tions), and “high” technology strategies (those that
use sophisticated devices or software applications Challenging Questions
for students with mild and severe disabilities that
enable them to access information) so that they Teachers face challenging questions: Are there
can perform tasks that they would otherwise be simple tools that might be incorporated with the
unable to do (Lewis, 1998). Inclusive teachers student that would provide enough support so
should be able to reach the special educational that referral to special education would not be
needs of all learners, and AT should be part of necessary? And would these provisions allow
inclusive teacher training (Feyerer, 2002). the student to remain in the regular education
classroom? That is why the perceived usefulness
Current Applications of AT by teachers and their perceptions of ability
and AT Resources positively affect students, and their understanding
of inclusion, in serving students in inclusive set-
AT is divided into two categories: (1) any item, tings; thus various in-service AT training sessions
piece of equipment or product system, whether are extremely important.
acquired commercially-off-the-shelf, modified Technology should be used by individual
or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, students who are entitled to special education
or improve functional capabilities of individuals services if it is needed to access the general
with disabilities; and (2) any service that directly education curriculum; recently, there has been a
assists a university’s teacher education programs strong commitment on the part of audiologists and
to provide future teachers with knowledge of educators to improve the acoustic environment for
AT and its importance in helping students learn all students through the development of national
(White, Wepner, & Wetzel, 2003). standards that can be used in the construction and
remodeling of schools (Marttila, 2004). Any tech-

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 Assistive Technology for Individuals with Disabilities

Table 1. AT products or devices for individuals with learning needs

Alternative keyboard It is different from standard keyboards in size, shape, layout, or function. It offers individuals with
special needs greater efficiency, control, and comfort.
Captioning A text transcript of the audio portion of multimedia products, such as video and television, which
is synchronized to the visual events taking place on screen.
Digitized speech Human speech that is recorded onto an integrated circuit chip and which has the ability to be
played back.
Electronic pointing devices It allows the user to control the cursor on the screen using ultrasound, an infrared beam, eye
movements, nerve signals, or brains waves.
Joysticks It may be used as an alternate input device. Joysticks that can be plugged into the computer’s
mouse port can control the cursor on the screen.
Keyboard additions A variety of accessories have been designed to make keyboards more accessible.
Onscreen keyboard These keyboards are software images of a standard or modified keyboard placed on the computer
screen by software.
Optical character recognition OCR software works with a scanner to convert images from a printed page into a standard com-
(OCR) puter file.
Pointing and typing aids A pointing or typing aid is typically a wand or stick used to strike keys on the keyboard.
Screen reader A screen reader is a software program that uses synthesized speech to “speak” graphics and text
out loud.
Switches and switch software Switches offer ways to provide input to a computer when a more direct access method, such as a
standard keyboard or mouse, is not possible.
Talking word processors (TWP) TWPs are writing software programs that provide speech feedback as the student writes, echoing
each letter as it is typed and each word as the spacebar is pressed.
Touch screens This is a device placed on the computer monitor (or built into it) that allows direct selection or
activation of the computer by a touch of the screen.
A telecommunication device for the TDD is a device with a keyboard that sends and receives typed messages over a telephone line.
deaf (TDD)
Voice recognition Voice recognition allows the user to speak to the computer instead of using a keyboard or mouse
to input data or control computer functions.
Voice synthesizer Under control of the screen-reader software, voice-synthesizers can vary the rate, pitch, volume,
and language of the information.
Word prediction programs They enable the user to select a desired word from an on-screen list located in the prediction
window.
Source: The Family Center on Assistive Services and Technology (n.d.)

nology that is necessary to aid a student in meeting Universal Design

IEP goals and objectives qualifies as an AT, and
students who are entitled to special educational The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of
services access AT through the IEP process. The 1990 requires that AT be provided as an accom-
purpose of the IEP is to design an individualized modation to students with disabilities, and one
education program to ensure that students with way to ensure equal access to all students is to
disabilities have adequate educational planning to utilize a universal design model (Campbell, 2004).
accommodate their unique instructional needs and Universal design principles and guidelines for AT,
that these needs are met in appropriate learning which are defined by the World Wide Web Con-
environments; IDEA requires that each student’s sortium (W3C) that make it possible for people
IEP be reviewed at least annually by IEP team with disabilities to use electronic resources easily
members including parents (Copenhaver, 2004). make those resources more accessible to a wide

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Table 2. AT Web sites for students with disabilities

Alliance for Technology Access (ATA) (http:// This is a national network of 41 technology resource centers which help children/adults
www.ataccess.org/) with disabilities, parents, teachers, and others to explore computer systems, adaptive
devices, and software.
Assistive Technology for People with Mental This fact sheet describes devices that are used by children/adults with mental retardation
Retardation (http://thearc.org/faqs/assistqa. and other disabilities to compensate for functional limitations and to enhance learning,
html) independence, mobility, communication, environmental control, and choice.
Center for Electronic Studying Funded by the U.S. Department of Education, the Center has launched three projects
(http://ces.uoregon.edu/) blending portable computer technology with instruction on computer-based study strate-
gies.
Closing The Gap This is an organization that focuses on computer technology for people with special
(http://www.closingthegap.com/) needs through its bi-monthly newspaper, annual international conference, and extensive
Web site.
Disability & Technology: A Resource Collec- Most sites will refer to assistive/adaptive devices that are computer-based and/or related
tion (http://home.nas.net/~galambos/tech.htm) to computer access.
DREAMMS for Kids, Inc. DREAMMS (Developmental Research for the Effective Advancement of Memory and
(http://www.dreamms.org/) Motor Skills) is a non-profit parent and professional service agency, which specializes
in AT-related research, development, and information dissemination.
EASI – Equal Access to Software and Infor- The philosophy behind this Information Technology Centre is to ensure that students
mation – K12 Connection and professionals with disabilities must have the same access to information and
(http://www.rit.edu/~easi/) resources as everyone else.
Early Connections – Technology In Early Connecting technology with the way young children learn: resources and information
Childhood Education (http://www.netc.org/ for educators and care providers.
earlyconnections/)
LD Resources This site contains resources for people with learning disabilities, with a focus on the use
(http://www.ldresources.com/) of AT to help individuals with learning disabilities become successful.
Literacy Instruction Through Technology This is a research project focusing on the use of technology to improve the reading
(LITT) (http://edweb.sdsu.edu/SPED/Pro- skills of students with learning disabilities. Project LITT is located at San Diego State
jectLitt/LITT) University.
Speaking to Write This is a federally-funded project which explores the use of speech recognition technol-
(http://www.edc.org/spk2wrt/) ogy by secondary students with disabilities.
Tools for Understanding (http://www.ups.edu/ This site is for educators who teach mathematics and are interested in integrating com-
community/tofu/) mon technologies into their daily instruction.
Source: TheFamily Village School (2006)

variety of devices, such as handhelds (Goddard, service providers. Universal design makes room
2004). Universal instructional design is “the design for users of all abilities” (p. 172).
of instructional materials and activities that make
the learning goals achievable by individuals with AT Research
wide differences in their abilities to see, hear,
speak, move, read, write, understand English, Hetzroni and Shrieber (2004) investigated the use
attend, organize, engage, and remember (Burgs- of a word processor for enhancing the academic
tahler, cited in Campbell, 2004, p. 167). Colleges outcomes of students with writing disabilities in
should not restrict the use of AT to those students high school. Their research indicated the clear
being serviced by disability service providers difference between handwritten and computer
(Campbell, 2004): “Often there are individuals phases. In paper-and-pencil phases, students
who benefit from AT that do not have disabilities produced more spelling mistakes, more reading
or have disabilities and have not registered with errors, and lower quality of organization and

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structure in comparison with the phases in which Colleges and universities could develop an
a computer equipped with a word processor was interdepartmental curricula and students from
used (the word processor could be considered a each target audience could attend and learn how
writing tool for those students who have writing interdependent they are in serving the AT needs
difficulties where compensation for disabilities of students and adults, and, according to Osborn
becomes more appropriate). (2006), this would insure that participating stu-
According to Sharpe, Johnson, Izzo, and Mur- dents: (1) gain an awareness of AT services and
ray’s (2005) research, students with disabilities devices, (2) understand the principles of universal
(N = 139) identified the following AT products or design, and (3) know about federal and state laws
devices that they were generally satisfied with: that impact rights to AT devices and services. In
scanner (35%), talking books (20%), portable the near future, knowledge of AT may become a
note taking (17%), text help software (15%), requirement for licensing.
optical character recognition (14%), specialized Telematic multi-disciplinary AT is essentially
tape recorders (12%), voice recognition (12%), ICT or e-learning (video conferencing and the
mouse/switch options (10%), adapted worksta- Internet, for example) and offers to many the
tion (10%), word prediction software (9%), solution to common obstacles associated with
talking dictionary (8%), screen readers (6%), attending educational courses, such as classroom
adapted keyboard (6%), screen magnification- and lecture availability, and lack of adequate
software (5%), real-time captioning (5%), screen transportation. Traditional higher education
magnification-devices (4%), pointer (4%), talking will increasingly adopt greater components of
calculators (3%), Braille note takers (3%), assis- e-learning. As Turner-Smith and Devlin (2005)
tive listening devices (3%), speaker phones (3%), maintain, e-learning has enormous potential for
video captioning (3%), hearing aides (1%), and use as a component of AT education; AT will be
augmentative communication (1%). increasingly recognized as an umbrella term for
any device or system that allows individuals to
perform a task they would otherwise be unable
FUTURE TRENDS to do, and that increases the ease and safety with
which the task can be performed.
Currently, AT is used primarily as an equalizer—
a compensatory tool—and on occasion applied
universally. As institutions of higher learning CONCLUSION
become more willing to develop a universal de-
sign approach to educating, the need to provide Currently there are over 20,000 items classified as
separate accommodations for those individuals “AT devices,” for all disabilities, all ages, and all
with disabilities will diminish (Campbell, 2004). levels of functioning; AT can help individuals talk,
One of the principles with respect to AT that can write, move, see, read, and hear for themselves
be applied universally, it is important to develop a (Center for Innovations in Special Education,
technology curriculum that is based on universal 2002). The devices range from low-tech sup-
design principles (to improve skill areas, such as ports (large pencils for writing, and calculators
reading, writing, organization, note-taking, and for building math skills) to high-tech supports
using the Internet particularly); doing so definitely (specialized software, and voice-output commu-
sets the educational foundation for all learners nication devices). Since each student’s technol-
within the classroom environment (Copenhaver, ogy needs are unique, the support necessary for
2004). implementing technology requires a variety of

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Assistive Technology for Individuals with Disabilities

types of AT awareness training for teachers and Center for Innovations in Special Education.
other educational professionals. Such awareness (2002). Do you know... Special Education Pro-
training could be provided as a staff in-service grams, 4(1), 3-6. Washington, DC: Author.
training under the institution’s comprehensive
Christ, T. W., & Stodden, R. (2005). Advances
system of personal development plan under IDEA
of developing survey constructs when compar-
(Copenhaver, 2004).
ing educational supports offered to students with
In the final analysis, a major challenge is to
disabilities in postsecondary education. Journal
move decisions about technology applications to
of Vocational Rehabilitation, 22, 23–31.
the point where they reflect a state of the science;
such technology applications must be studied con- Copenhaver, J. (2004). Guidelines in special
tinuously in objective ways so that educators can education. Logan, UT: Mountain Plains Regional
make informed decisions about their AT selection Resource Center.
to best meet the needs of individuals with learning
Dalton, E. M. (2002). Assistive technology in
disabilities (Blackhurst, 2005).
education: A review of policies, standards, and
curriculum integration from 1997 through 2000
involving assistive technology and the individuals
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Journal of Learning Disabilities, 37(2), 143–154. technology.
doi:10.1177/00222194040370020501 Early Intervention Services: A program of
Lewis, R. B. (1998). Assistive technology and activities and services, including assistive technol-
learning disabilities: Today’s realities and tomor- ogy, required by the Individuals with Disabilities
row’s promises. Journal of Learning Disabilities, Education Act for children from birth through
31(1), 16-26, & 54. age two.
Learning Disabilities: Conditions that cause
Marttila, J. (2004). Listing technologies for indi- people to understand and process information
viduals and the classroom. Topics in Language more slowly than average. These individuals may
Disorders, 24(1), 31–50. require information to be presented in multiple
Osborn, S. R. (2006). Trends in assistive technol- formats before they completely understand it.
ogy services and technology. Florida alliance Multisensory Learning: An instructional ap-
assistive services & technology. Retrieved Febru- proach that combines auditory, visual, and tactile
ary 3, 2006, from http://faast.org/atr_trends.cfm elements into a learning task. Tracing sandpaper
numbers while saying a number fact aloud would
Rapp, W. H. (2005). Using assistive technology be a multisensory learning activity.
with students with exceptional learning needs. Prereferral Process: A procedure in which
Reading & Writing Quarterly, 21, 193–196. special and regular education teachers develop
doi:10.1080/10573560590915996 trial strategies to help a student showing difficulty
Sharpe, M. N., Johnson, D. R., Izzo, M., & Murray, in learning remain in the regular classroom.
A. (2005). An analysis of instructional accom- Special Education: Specially-designed in-
modations and assistive technologies used by struction to meet the unique needs of a student with
postsecondary graduate with disabilities. Journal disabilities including but not limited to instruction
of Vocational Rehabilitation, 22, 3–11. conducted in the classroom.
Universal Design: Designing programs, ser-
Turner-Smith, A., & Devlin, A. (2005). E-learning vices, tools, and facilities so that they are usable,
for assistive technology professionals—A review without additional modification, by the widest
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phy.2004.09.019

This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Information Technology Curriculum Integration, edited by Lawrence
A. Tomei, pp. 56-62, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 5.5
Cognitive-Adaptive
Instructional Systems for
Special Needs Learners
Bruce J. Diamond
William Paterson University, USA

Gregory M. Shreve
Kent State University, USA

ABSTRACT CHAPTER OBJECTIVES

This chapter provides a perspective on the prob- This chapter should help the reader:
lems, challenges, and unique opportunities faced
by instructors and designers of information tech- • Better understand the nature and extent
nology in helping students who are differently- of the problems faced by special needs
abled learn more effectively in online environ- learners
ments. The proposed solution is provided in the • Better understand the interrelationships be-
form of a cognitive-adaptive instructional system. tween cognitive and sensory impairments
This system provides menu-driven adaptive op- and their potential impact on participation
tions or online assessments that evaluate a student’s in online learning communities
cognitive and sensory needs. These needs are • Understand the importance of integrating
translated into cognitive-sensory profiles, which adaptive instructional capabilities into on-
are linked to compensatory and remedial actions. line instructional models
These actions render content automatically and • Understand the key technical concepts
dynamically in ways that provide adaptations that underlying the cognitive-adaptive in-
compensate for a student’s special-needs while structional system and identify potential
complementing their strengths. applications

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch505

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Cognitive-Adaptive Instructional Systems for Special Needs Learners

INTRODUCTION disabilities (LDs) or deficiencies in basic skills or

academic achievement, to learn more effectively.
Recent decades have seen significant advances In order to achieve the goal of providing effective
in the design and implementation of hardware online instruction to diverse user populations, a
and software for delivering online and computer- cognitive-adaptive instructional system that uses
assisted instruction. Educational applications of adaptive hypermedia is proposed. The ways in
information technology are increasingly integrated which this system can be used to accommodate
into a diverse array of devices, from personal a diverse range of cognitive and sensory impair-
digital assistants and cell phones, to laptop and ments and skill deficiencies will be described. In
desktop computers. They are deployed in a diz- explaining how this system can be implemented,
zying variety of forms, ranging from broadband new Web-based information technologies will be
distance learning to CD-based instruction and discussed. In addition, examples of online appli-
digital textbooks. Information technology is in- cations of adaptive models will be provided in
creasingly the primary instructional vehicle for a order to demonstrate that such a practice-based
number of application areas including basic skills system can help meet the learning needs of special
training in companies, educational telemedicine, students.
military training, and, of course, the delivery of
K-12 and college curricula.
At the same time that this technological in- BACKGROUND
frastructure is developing, our understanding of
the pedagogy of online and computer-assisted Special needs individuals at risk in digital
instruction is rapidly increasing. As a result, more learning environments are of all ages and at all
and more individuals participate successfully in developmental stages. They become cognitively
innovative learning environments that are par- “differently-abled” due to the effects of aging,
tially or wholly computer-based and increasingly accidents (e.g., traumatic brain injury), disease, or
delivered online. As we learn more about how specific developmental or inherited neurological
students learn online, we can develop increasingly conditions. Many of these individuals are often left
sophisticated and effective instructional models behind in traditional classroom environments. The
to inform and guide more effective instructional failure to provide for their information process-
information system design. One population at ing and learning needs in online and other digital
risk in this new digital learning environment is environments will only widen an educational and
students who have inherited or acquired cogni- social participation gap that already threatens their
tive and sensory impairments. These impairments full inclusion in 21st century life. If we do not
may interfere with a student’s ability to access address the problems and special needs of such
and learn subject matter in both traditional and differently-abled users, we will help promote the
in digital information rich environments. These development of a generation of digitally disenfran-
special needs students will challenge our ability chised individuals who are not able to participate
to translate educational and cognitive remediation equitably in technology-mediated educational,
theory into practice and into the design of more cultural, social, and economic communities. The
intelligent online educational technology systems. effectiveness with which issues relating to the ac-
Therefore, the goal of this chapter is to provide cessibility and utility of digital environments by
a context and rationale for the need to develop the differently-abled are addressed will critically
and use adaptive instructional systems in order impact the role that information technology will
to help students, especially those with learning play for these populations now and in the future.

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Instructional models and information architec- solving. Impairments contribute to lower levels
tures for learners with special needs must provide of school achievement than would be expected
mechanisms that dynamically adapt the informa- based on intelligence. The prevalence of LDs in
tion delivery interface as well as the organization the United States is estimated to be up to 6% of
and presentation of instructional content to the the school children aged 6-18 (Lewitt & Baker,
learner’s unique cognitive-sensory impairment 1996), translating into approximately six million
profile. Such “cognitive-adaptive” instructional children. Given that 11 million children and adults
information systems have the potential to optimize have learning disabilities, it is one of our most
information delivery for such users and maximize prevalent developmental disabilities (Reiff & Ger-
the efficacy of instruction to the greatest extent ber, 1994). Overall, learning disabilities cost the
possible. A significant issue in online instructional nation an estimated $50 billion in the 1999-2000
modeling for special needs populations will be school year alone (Chambers, Parrish, & Harr,
creating adaptive online instructional systems 2000). Fifty one percent of students receiving
that integrate clinical and educational evaluations special education services in public schools have
of a learner’s cognitive and sensory impairments learning disabilities (OSEP, 2001), and almost
with instructional heuristics. These heuristics one in three college freshmen with disabilities
will then drive specific adaptive and “compensa- report a learning disability (Henderson, 1995).
tory” information system behaviors at the human The National Istitute of Child Health and Human
computer-interface. Development (NICHD) longitudinal studies indi-
cate that of children who are reading-disabled in
Learning Disabilities in Context the third grade, 74% remain reading disabled at
the end of high school. In other words, learning
Cognitive-adaptive instructional systems must disabilities can impact performance in and out
be understood against the background of an in- of the classroom throughout a person’s lifetime.
creasing use of digital resources for educational Educational models for dealing with special-
purposes and an increasing population of special needs students are sometimes driven by instruc-
needs learners with low academic achievement, tional, diagnostic, and assessment techniques
basic skill deficiencies, and learning disabilities that emphasize deficits rather than the creative
associated to cognitive impairment. The impact abilities and resources special needs learners
of digital information delivered via the Internet already possess. Talents and abilities are simply
to all students is dramatic. Ninety seven percent not recognized. The interventional efficacy of
of 12- to 18-year-olds use the Internet, with 61% deficit-oriented techniques is low (Coles, 1987;
reporting the Internet “very” or “extremely” im- Poplin, 1988a, 1988b). As early as 1983, Gardner
portant as an information source compared with widened our view of intelligence to include the
60% for books and 58% for newspapers (UCLA, idea of “multiple intelligences” (e.g., linguistic,
2002). Moreover, “having access to the Internet logico-mathematical, musical-rhythmic, visual-
and its rich resources…is having a positive impact spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, and
on student achievement” (eSchool News, 2003). intra-personal). Among students with learning
However, the number of students diagnosed disabilities, four areas of multiple intelligence
or classified with specific learning disabilities strength have emerged: conceptual writing, di-
has also increased by 34% since 1990-91 (OSEP, vergent thinking, computer aptitude, and musical
2001). Learning disabilities can occur in one or ability. In divergent thinking skills, LD students
more areas of language development, reading, are at least as able as students with no learn-
memory, mathematics, reasoning, and problem ing disabilities (NLD), as measured by the test

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of divergent thinking and the test of divergent conditions, or declines in memory and reasoning
feeling. In some cases, LD students have scored skills due to aging can all adversely impact online
higher than their NLD counterparts on measures information-seeking (Park, 1999) and digital li-
of figural and verbal creativity, such as the Tor- brary searching (Rousseau, Jamieson, Rogers, et
rance test of creativity and the alternative uses al., 1998), resulting in less efficient search strate-
test (Tarver, Ellsworth, & Rounds, 1980). Stone, gies (Mead, Spaulding, Sit, et al., 1997). Czaja,
Poplin, Johnson, and Simpson (1992), reported Sharit, Ownby, Roth, and Nair (2001) reported
no difference between elementary school LD relationships between search and retrieval perfor-
and NLD students with LD students actually mance in older participants and cognitive abili-
scoring higher than NLD students on many of ties (e.g., processing speed, memory, and verbal
these measures. speed). Westerman, Davies, and Glendon (1995)
These areas of multiple intelligence strength, reported that older participants were slower than
especially computer aptitude, create a promising their younger counterparts in retrieving informa-
foundation for educational intervention models for tion (perhaps attributable to difficulty in recalling
special needs learners using computer-assisted and previous links and page information). Moreover,
online technology. On tests of computer aptitude participants with low spatial ability also took
that do not require complex linguistic skills, such longer in retrieving information. These challenges
as the computer aptitude, literacy, and interest are not restricted to the elderly. Younger people
profile (Poplin, Drew, & Gable, 1984), Hearne, (e.g., college students) with a variety of learning
Poplin, Schoneman, and O’Shaughnessy (1988) disabilities can exhibit similar impairments in
reported that students with LD had computer “ap- information processing, working memory, and
titudes” equivalent to those of their non-disabled attention (Henderson, 1995). Glisky and Schachter
counterparts with no gender differences noted. (1988) demonstrated that by using self-paced and
This is relevant to cognitive-adaptive systems, as vanishing cue techniques even individuals with
it suggests that having learning disabilities due to profound memory impairments could learn how
cognitive-sensory impairments will not necessar- to use computer-based systems (although they
ily preclude a student from using and benefiting might not remember the specific learning episode
from instructional systems. However, as computer afterwards).
systems are increasingly used in online learning The areas of memory, attention, executive
environments, more complex cognitive operations function, information processing, and higher-order
and skills will be needed in order to effectively thinking skills are emphasized in the cognitive-
use these learning tools. adaptive approach because these cognitive do-
mains involve skills that mediate student success
Cognitive Impairments, Learning in school-related tasks that require information
Styles, and Instructional Technology manipulation and processing. In other words, these
skills are used in reading and textbook compre-
The development of adaptive instructional sys- hension, attending to class lectures, writing and
tems can be especially challenging in certain thinking effectively, and using instructional and
populations (i.e., older people) because they are information technology tools. Thus, effective ap-
less likely to have computer experience (Czaja proaches for modeling user behavior in impaired
& Sharit, 1998) and may lack the knowledge and individuals should involve educational and clinical
skills required for interacting with computer search assessments of these cognitive domains and result
engines (Morrell, Mayhorn, & Bennett, 2000). in compensatory actions whose effectiveness can
Acquired neurological injuries, developmental

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be demonstrated empirically to have an effect on Educational materials and information delivery

the performance of learning behaviors. systems are generally not designed to meet these
special needs. If an instructional application for
Helping Special Needs Students learners with cognitive impairments and sensory
Learn: Meeting the Challenge impairments is properly designed, it should be
able to quickly and effectively provide personal-
The challenge is that the cognitive impairments ized information display and educational content
that impede students’ academic progress in the packaging. This information would be reflective
classroom can also impede their ability to effec- of the learner’s cognitive strengths as well as
tively use more complex information technology their impairment profile so that the learning en-
tools and resources. However, as previously vironment can fully or partially compensate for
stated, we can build on some of the demonstrated deficiencies in cognition through dynamic system
strengths in computer use exhibited by special adaptation of content and display. The following
learners, but we must also be cognizant of the sections provide a more technological discussion
challenges. For example, school-aged children of current information technologies that will be
with mild to moderate learning disabilities exhibit used to design and build a more flexible and adap-
impairments in working memory compared to tive instructional system.
children of average ability. Impairment is more
severe with increases in task and content complex- Accessibility and Adaptive
ity (Bayliss, Jarrold, Baddeley, & Leigh, 2005). Systems: Current Technologies
The generalized working memory deficit in LD
students has been attributed to storage constraints The impetus underlying the development of
in the executive system (Swanson, 1993). Ineffi- cognitive-adaptive instructional systems is that
cient decoding and word recognition skills during implementation of compensatory information
the reading process can also reduce attention and delivery techniques will enhance educational
memory resources, with comprehension impeded outcomes for learning-disabled users. Recent
by poor verbal recall (Stothard, 1994). Problems developments in the core Web protocols and
in speed of processing, processing verbal and data formats including the extensible markup
visual-spatial material, organizing information, language (XML), cascading stylesheets (CSS),
and multi-tasking can have a devastating impact extensible stylesheet language (XSL), scalable
on functioning both in and out of the classroom, vector graphics (SVG), and the synchronized
but especially in the use of complex information multimedia integration language (SMIL) have
displays and user interfaces. provided a technological infrastructure capable of
supporting innovative new information delivery
systems for learning disabled populations with
TOWARDS THE SOLUTION cognitive impairment.
Many of these protocols (XML, SVG, SMIL)
If special needs learners are going to be able to are “markup languages.” A markup language is
use information systems in educational contexts, a way of using simple text-embedded codes to
including digital libraries, learning object reposi- describe the structure and semantics of documents.
tories, and widespread educational technology XML, for instance, provides a generic mechanism
delivery systems such as Blackboard, WebCT and for describing the content of almost any kind of
Vista, we must develop systems that are adaptive document, while SVG is oriented toward describ-
enough to respond to specific learning disabilities. ing, creating, and controlling the appearance of

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online graphics. SMIL allows for the integration of interface is “rendered” dynamically in real time.
multimedia properties with XML and SVG docu- This on the fly capability is particularly critical
ments. Documents containing markup codes can in the development of adaptive online systems
also be attached to “stylesheet languages” (CSS, since it allows for the dynamic tailoring of Web
XSL) that provide instructions that tell comput- content to individual needs.
ers how to handle and display the contents of a Many of the new protocols also include so-
marked-up document. A basic objective of markup called accessibility features. For instance, the
languages is the separation of content from display. newest CSS specification includes several acces-
A document’s content may be described just one sibility features such as dynamically generated
time using XML, but then presented in multiple content, aural stylesheets, and access to alternative
different presentation formats simply by assigning representations of content that could be used to
new stylesheets to it. In addition to greater flexibil- great effect with differently-abled populations.
ity in the presentation and display of documents, One interesting example of how current online
a new level of interactivity and dynamism can technology helps address users with special needs
be added to digital documents through the use of is the W3C recommendation XHTML+Voice
the “document object model”(DOM). The DOM Profile that combines the VoiceXML markup
is an Internet browser technology that allows for language with XHTML and XML-Events to allow
the attachment of server and client-side scripts voice output from Web pages and voice reaction
(small programs) to documents. For example, the to page events. If these technologies are used in
DOM allows an instructional designer to assign a combination with cognitive adaptive models, they
script creating a popup message to a section of a offer the instructor the capability to alter content,
document. The message would appear whenever presentation, and pedagogy in flexible ways that
a mouse is moved or clicked over the section. The respond to individual student needs, strengths and
combination of scripts and DOM can dynamically weaknesses. Taken together, it seems clear that
access and update the content and structure of the foundation for more accessible and adaptive
HTML (hypertext markup language) and XHTML systems has been established.
(extensible hypertext markup language) and XML
documents. The new World Wide Web Consortium A Global Perspective
(W3C) XML-Events specification makes the
online document interface even more dynamic, In fact, there are a number of initiatives that have
providing for the association of specific DOM tried to address the issues of online information
document behaviors with XML-based markup accessibility for those with cognitive and sensory
languages and content, thereby separating docu- impairments. For instance, in addressing the needs
ment content from scripting. of those with sensory impairments the CAPS
These technologies for separating content from (Communication and Access to Information for
on-screen behavior, presentation, and display can Persons with Special Needs) project of the Euro-
be used to specify how to render underlying content pean Union’s Directorate for Telecommunications,
markup for multiple information appliances and Information Industries and Innovation focused on
multiple user groups “on the fly.” The modality visual (reading) impairment by providing broader
specifications (which information appliance) and access to digitally distributed documents, espe-
presentation specifications (organization and ap- cially newspapers, books, and public information.
pearance) for the document are provided at the The follow-up HARMONY (Horizontal Action
moment the document is invoked. The document for the Harmonization of Accessible Structured
perceived by the user at the human-computer Documents) project tried to improve the quantity

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and quality of documents accessible to the reading control over non-textual content (audio, video,
impaired by focusing on standardization issues, images). New technologies, such as XML and
for example, population needs and compensatory XSL, provide more opportunity for overcoming
actions that could or should be taken by informa- these obstacles to accessible design than simple
tion systems. HTML can offer.
The Federal Government of the United States While the European initiatives have focused on
is also increasingly committed to improving the visual processing impairments, they emphasized
accessibility of information technology and Web- two important issues with broader implications
based information (i.e., Section 508 guidelines for cognitive-adaptive design: (1) the increasing
from the Architectural and Transportation Barriers “digitization” of information previously delivered
Compliance Board of the U.S. Federal Govern- in document form (including Braille for the vi-
ment). In addition, the World Wide Web Consor- sion impaired) has created online accessibility
tium has launched a large-scale Web Accessibility problems, and (2) the need to develop standard
Initiative (WAI), and there have been numerous protocols and formats for representing and dis-
calls for information system and software design playing digitized information.
to subscribe to “universal design” principles—the
notion that design methods can be developed and Developing and Implementing
applied so as to make “products, communications, Cognitive-Adaptive
and the built environment” more usable by more Instructional Systems
people (Aslaksen, 1997). The W3C recognizes
accessibility barriers for the deaf, the blind and The great potential of cognitive-adaptive systems
those with physical disabilities, and argues that derives from the integration of advances in applied
“people with cognitive or neurological disabilities cognitive and clinical neuroscience with recent
may have difficulty interpreting Web pages that developments in online information technology.
lack a consistent navigation structure or that lack What design considerations need to be addressed
visual signposts” (Chisholm, Vanderheiden, & in order to combine these two areas of research
Jacobs, 2001). to benefit special need populations?
This is an implicit recognition that the next step We argue that information can be made more
in online document design and online instructional accessible if several conditions are satisfied in
modeling is to deal with the more “invisible” the information delivery system: (1) educational
cognitive impairments associated with learning content is separated from presentation and display
disabilities. Over the last decade, the hypertext information and stored as “user neutral” learning
markup language-based World Wide Web has objects in an object library, (2) there are methods
become the nation’s premiere educational re- for acquiring and protocols for representing rel-
source. However, using simple HTML documents evant cognitive impairment data in XML-based
as educational tools poses serious accessibility cognitive user profiles, (3) there are standard pro-
problems, particularly if documents need to be tocols for attaching cognitive user profiles to sets
displayed using alternate modalities (Flammia, of adaptive and compensatory actions that systems
1997). The mere digitization of documents does should make when rendering educational content
not ensure their accessibility or utility. Solving at the human-computer interface, and (4) appropri-
accessibility problems can involve difficulties in ate online technologies exist for implementing the
any number of areas including extracting content adaptive actions implied by the profiles.
from format (a necessary first step in alternative
presentation) and exerting finer more dynamic

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Design Elements of a Cognitive- names, and a myriad of other semantic properties

Adaptive Instructional System and relationships.
Even as the educational materials are stripped
The recent appearance of World Wide Web Con- of formatting information to become as user and
sortium standard core protocols like XML and culture-neutral as possible for display purposes
XSL makes a learning-adaptive Web increasingly (Cannataro, Cuzzocrea, Mastroianni et al., 2002),
possible by satisfying the previously mentioned they are enriched with both educational metadata
fourth condition. It remains only to satisfy the and content description metadata. Educationally
first three conditions. The first design element relevant metadata can be provided by an object
of a cognitive-adaptive system involves the schema such as the IEEE LTSC 1484.12 Learning
creation of learning objects via decomposition Object Metadata (LOM) protocol. This metadata
and metadata description. Learning objects have specification provides a rich set of descriptors for
several unique characteristics: (1) they are atomic describing the core characteristics of the resource
and self-contained, decomposed from objects (identifier, title, author, description) as well as a
of greater complexity, (2) they are reusable “in wide range of other characteristics from rights
multiple contexts for multiple purposes,” (3) they management through educational uses, to technical
can be recombined to create larger, more complex information. The LOM specification also provides
structures including lessons, courses and curricula, a rich annotation mechanism to allow users of the
and (4) they are described with metadata about library to add commentary to the resource record
their educational function, physical characteris- as well as a relationship mechanism that allows
tics, semantic content, and other relevant prop- any given LOM-described resource to be linked
erties (Chitwood, 2005). Once created, learning to other resources (Shreve & Zeng, 2003).
objects are stored in an object library (OL) as a
set of elementary resources capable of dynamic Content Description
recombination with other objects under the influ-
ence of the rules of an instructional model. Content description of the objects in an object
Some objects may already be atomic, with little library can be accomplished with metadata derived
or no internal structure and may not be decompos- from existing or custom domain-specific semantic
able into smaller information units. In these cases, markup languages. The domain specific markup
it is sufficient to describe the resource, for example, languages chosen to describe content elements in
a particular image, with metadata and store in the a cognitive-adaptive system would be dependent,
object library. Many other existing instructional once again, on the pragmatics of object library
objects, on the other hand, are information con- use, that is, what the library’s user communities
tainers, with both a complex semantic structure expect to do with the resources and what func-
and a complex internal “document” organization. tions they expect the resources to serve. The tag
That is, they are structurally and semantically names, attributes, and document type descrip-
decomposable. An example of educational content tions or schema provided by a markup language
that would have to be decomposed for use in a directly reflect a domain-specific semantics and
cognitive-adaptive system might be an online pragmatics. Markup languages are the single
biology lesson whose organizational structure most important way that an explicit semantics
would consist of headings, paragraphs, figures, can be applied directly to natural language and
tables, and graphics, and whose content would multimedia resources (Shreve & Zeng, 2003).
have to be decomposed into special vocabulary or Cognitive-adaptive systems will undoubtedly
terminology, concepts, concept relations, proper leverage many existing semantic (content) markup

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languages, depending on the field of the educa- the empirical observation of the actual behavior
tional materials to be delivered (for instance, of cognitively impaired user-learners.
MathML the mathematics markup language or It is not uncommon for sensory impairments
GML (geography markup language). Markup to be dealt with by information system actions
languages to represent the user profiles and other based on user profiles. For instance, “visual
elements of the cognitive-adaptive system will profiles” for low-vision computer users meet the
have to be borrowed or customized. need to account for visual impairments of acuity,
contrast sensitivity, color perception, and field of
User Profiles: Determining view when designing human-computer interfaces
Individual Learning Needs (Jacko, Rosa, Scott, et al., 2000). Although ex-
isting systems can use profiles to alter elements
Assuming an object library is successfully created, of the user interface including site navigation,
the next step in designing a cognitive-adaptive organization, and content to support visually im-
system would involve acquiring and storing user paired users, more flexibility, and innovation is
models or profiles. Current research in adaptive needed in order to remediate less visible cognitive
hypermedia systems (De Bra, 1999), user model- impairments. Few if any studies have focused on
ing (Brusilovsky, 1994; Fink, Kobsa, & Schreck, building systems that integrate more complete and
1997; Hothi & Hall, 1998), and Web accessibil- complex cognitive impairment user profiles with
ity (Velasco & Mohamad, 2002) has provided online information systems.
useful guidance in designing systems to make Successful cognitive-adaptive systems are
instructional content more accessible to learning dependent on robust user profiles to generate the
disabled students. This research emphasizes the parameters for determining the specific compen-
importance of coupling user profiles with adap- satory modifications to be made at the computer-
tive information system design. Current adaptive human interface, for example, the architecture of
approaches typically modify navigation support the presentation or display, as well as to control the
and document content for individuals or target re-packaging of educational content delivered in
populations based on a user model most often digital documents. Cognitive user profiles could
developed empirically by observing patterns of be based on combinations of online and in-person
use and browsing behavior (De Bra, Brusilovsky clinical and educational assessments of learners
& Houben, 1999; Wu, de Kort, & De Bra, 2001). diagnosed with cognitive impairments and specific
However, because this approach implicitly pre- learning disabilities. The assessments, consist-
sumes that cognition is within normal limits, it ing of neurocognitive and educational screens,
cannot account for and differentiate user behaviors will measure, among other capacities, memory,
that are due to cognitive impairment, as opposed executive function, and cognitive information
to simple preference or idiosyncratic work style. processing. The assessments could also include
We propose an approach based on specify- measures of mood, anxiety, computer aptitude,
ing a set of empirically-derived “best practice” and creative or divergent thinking.
adaptations (a prescription, if you will), offered
by cognitive and educational remediation experts Automated User Profile Development
after evaluating the results of educational and neu-
ropsychological assessments. This prescription A significant issue in the design of adaptive
can (and should) be later refined with a customiza- systems is determining exactly what remedial or
tion wizard and modified with data gained from compensatory actions to take for a given set of
impairments and how to derive the actions and

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their representations in a practical, automatic man- adopt the broad model described by Velasco and
ner. Initial test systems will have to rely heavily Mohamed, who suggest storing user profiles as
on standard educational and clinical empirical XML schema, with the exception that we specify
research with prototypes in the hope of gathering CDA conformance. The authors also suggest merg-
data that can be used to establish principles that ing user information with device information in
would enable systems to do online assessment, a single schema that follows, where possible, the
generate user profiles, and then automatically guidelines for device profiles.1
generate action models.
User profile acquisition could be accomplished Action Models and Compensatory
by the development of a modeling wizard to Action Heuristics
acquire additional user cognitive/sensory impair-
ment data from online dialogs and/or browser Once a user profile is generated from an assessment
modeling and represent it in a machine-usable battery, it remains to specify the set of adaptive
XML-based metadata format. The wizard could compensatory actions the system should take for
elicit educational and clinical profile information specific configurations of impairment or skill
to supplement the data collected in off-line assess- deficiency. The pairing of neurocognitive assess-
ments. The wizard would also process the data in ments with information system action is a com-
off-line assessments and convert it to XML data. plex scenario referred to as a cognitive-adaptive
The profiles generated by the wizard provide a “action model” and characterizes the relationship
basis for determining optimal adaptive informa- between cognitive impairment and remedial or
tion delivery and display. The wizard might also compensatory system actions (Diamond, Shreve,
include some “exemplars” of differently presented & Johnston, 2001).
or formatted online information to gauge user The heuristics of the cognitive-adaptive action
reactions and preferences. An important research model are represented as rules. In the database
objective will be to determine the optimal require- they are stored as XML statements that express
ments and content for a cognitive profile wizard the relationship between configurations of edu-
including the correct mixture of cognitive-sensory cational assessments and compensatory action in
assessment and exemplar presentation. general production rule form: IFthis-educational-
The results of neurocognitive and educational resultTHENthis-adaptive-action. The head of the
assessments would be stored in an XML-based rule is an XML- expressed cognitive impairment
user profile, using, where possible, data elements pattern and the tail is a set of actions also expressed
derived from the clinical document architecture in XML, including attachment to XML-Event be-
(CDA) (Health Level Seven, 2002). In cases haviors, CSS, XSL and other stylesheet rendering
where appropriate data elements do not exist, they technologies. The use of production rules for this
would be developed as subsets or extensions to purpose is an adaptation model as described by
the CDA. In any case, an ongoing area of research Cannataro and his colleagues (2002).
in cognitive-adaptive systems will be working The action recommendations in the action
with the neurocognitive and educational assess- models are linked to specific adaptive system
ment community to develop a markup language actions via the adaptive control language (ACL),
to represent the relevant data. (i.e., the set of conventions that express the produc-
The representation and storage of user profiles tion rules). The heuristics underlying the action
are well discussed in the literature (Fink, Kobsa, & models are stored in cognitive adaptation (CA)
Schreck, 1996; Kules, 2000; Velasco & Mohamad, and sensory adaptation (SA) databases that con-
2002) and a variety of approaches are offered. We tain action instructions describing generic system

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Cognitive-Adaptive Instructional Systems for Special Needs Learners

actions and adaptations addressing impairments Compensatory Actions, Cognition,

in a variety of cognitive/sensory domains. These and Educational Applications
adaptations provide instructions for how learning
objects are to be expressed, organized, configured, Individuals with short-term memory impairments,
formatted, and manipulated for the benefit of a for instance, could be expected to experience
specific class of user impairments or disabilities. difficulty in memory of previously-visited links
There are also instructions that inform the system or for the content of dropdown menus and their
how to react to particular events in the document/ submenus. A CA-stored instruction for such cases
user interface. would spell out the “performance implications”
The ACL connects the results of the cognitive of this class of impairment and detail the general
profiles generated by the user profile wizard to system steps that could be taken, such as alterna-
the adaptive heuristics of the CA/SA databases tive presentations for links or dropdown menu
and to the set of educational objects (resources) information.
to be displayed. The heuristics are expressed by In order to help improve learning and acces-
the ACL at the system level by XSL (eXtensible sibility, the relationships between impairments and
Stylesheet Language) transformations of XML- the ability to use an information system need to be
based object / action representations derived from delineated. Diamond et al. (2003) demonstrated
the CA/SA databases as modified by the profile that there are important relationships between
wizard. The ACL produces system responses such the severity and nature of cognitive impairments
as reorganization of the user interface; changes in and the ability to use information technology.
rate of presentation of visual materials; dynamic The most important finding in their study was
selection, presentation, and linking of content; that while all participants learned how to use a
alteration in the configuration and organization telerehabilitation system (referred to as the VRC
of “information units;” and so on. or Virtual Rehabilitation Center), the rate of
Taken together, the ACL specifies the relation- learning or the number of “trials to acquisition”
ship between cognitive, sensory or functional
impairment and remedial or compensatory system
actions (Diamond, Shreve, Bonilla, et al., 2003; Figure 1. Schematic of an adaptive system
Diamond et al., 2001). To the extent that users
with similar impairments may require similar
adaptations, it should be possible to group adap-
tive rules into categories reflective of clusters of
recommended actions for particular user groups,
creating what Brusilovsky has called user stereo-
types (1996). To this point there has been little
attempt in the user modeling community to address
automated mechanisms for deriving adaptation
models appropriate for complex cognitive and
sensory impairment conditions. Other approaches
that could be applied include deriving stereotypes
(Rich, 1979) and inferring dynamic modeling
rules from the data using acquisition heuristics
as discussed by Ardissono and his colleagues
(Ardissono, Console, & Torre, 1999).

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varied among participants with traumatic brain speeds could be integrated into computer-based
injuries. Individuals who needed more trials to learning systems so that information could be
acquisition were more impaired in visuo-spatial presented to student users in ways that enhance
construction, reasoning-similarities and language their processing and performance accuracy.
repetition. Interestingly, 50% of those individuals The REY-organizational and extended memory
who required fewer trials to acquisition and 75% (R-OEM) protocol (Diamond, DeLuca, & Kelley,
of those who required more trials to acquisition 1997) used an “executive prosthetic” (i.e., a cogni-
exhibited impairments in memory. Thus, memory tive assistive technique) that helped individuals
impairments were pervasive, but memory alone with learning and executive impairments learn and
did not account for all of the differences in learn- recall complex visual information. This assistive
ing and accessibility. technique helped enhance performance. It did so,
The relationship between identified areas of by first guiding the decomposition of text, images,
cognitive impairment and performance on the and graphics into simpler, more atomic elements,
VRC may be due to the implicitly normative and then providing organizational structures or
information architecture of the VRC and other schemas for re-organizing the graphic and textual
internet and computer-based systems that require information in new ways that more effectively
impaired users with deficits in working memory tap explicit and implicit memory. Generally, the
and executive function (e.g., reasoning and orga- decomposition of complex objects or behaviors,
nization) to process and store visual and auditory with the subsequent reintegration and synthesis
information (i.e., text, graphics, embedded or of the parts into a whole, increases instructional
streaming audio and video) using displays that are effectiveness in treatment subjects and predicts
ill-suited to them. Overall, the authors found that the magnitude of treatment outcomes for higher-
impairment in cognitive domains reflecting visual- order cognitive functions (Swanson, 1999). In
spatial integration, memory, language processing, clinical tests, the R-OEM generated alternative
and executive-type functions inhibited learning displays of information that allowed amnesiacs
efficiency and accessibility. The work under- to retain information over a 30-minute delay, a
scored the need to link system design intended performance comparable to that of non-amnesiacs
for differently-abled populations to individualized (Diamond et al., 1997).
adaptations and compensatory actions. In a cognitive-adaptive information system,
Recent research has supported the contention analogues of R-OEM-based techniques could be
that adaptations informed by clinical and educa- used to implement a stylesheet-based “executive
tional assessments can be effective in improving function” facilitator that displays complex text
task performance. Diamond, DeLuca et al. (2000) and images dynamically by building them up
showed that using special software individualized from simpler graphic and textual elements. These
processing speeds could be computed and used to decomposed learning objects, stored as XML data,
help older adults achieve levels of performance could then be rendered by an XSL stylesheet to
accuracy that did not significantly differ from that produce a synchronized multimedia integration
of younger adults. These results demonstrated language (SMIL) document where relative posi-
that a cognitive neuroscience-derived software tioning, and attributes and tags such as begin and
tool could be used to help suggest efficacious <sequence>, as well as SMIL events (begin event,
compensatory actions that enhanced the ability end event) could be manipulated to dynamically
of seniors with moderate cognitive and sensory construct more complex presentations according
impairments due to age, to process information to the results of the protocol. SMIL presentations,
more efficiently. Similar optimal processing essentially dynamically constructed multimedia

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presentations, could dynamically present informa- in the fields of neuropsychology and behav-
tion in the manner prescribed by an R-OEM-type ioral neurology (i.e., prosopagnosia and visual
informed representation schema. agnosia, or the inability to recognize familiar
Another example of adaptive, computer-based faces and objects, respectively). Diamond and his
techniques derived from cognitive and clinical colleagues describe another adaptive approach
neuroscience work are the auditory threshold serial using the semantic activation protocol (SAP)
addition test (ATSAT), visual threshold serial addi- protocol, where faces or objects drawn from
tion test (VTSAT) and the dual task (DT) protocol similar semantic categories helped enhance and
(Diamond et. al., 1997; Diamond, DeLuca, et al., activate aware memory in a prosopagnosic patient
2000). These protocols quantify processing speed (Diamond, Valentine, Mayes, & Sandel, 1994). In
while controlling accuracy and they have been this research, it was shown that clustering faces/
implemented with clinical populations (stroke, objects according to semantic categories induced
traumatic brain injury, chronic fatigue syndrome, a sense of familiarity and recognition. Similar
and multiple sclerosis). These programs measure types of semantic activation techniques could be
speed and accuracy and determine the optimum used in educational systems to optimize learning
speeds at which both visual and auditory informa- and memory.
tion can be presented while maintaining a given For example, a cognitive-adaptive information
level of performance accuracy. Dual task software system could enhance memory for images and
is used to measure a subject’s ability to process objects by visually clustering or navigationally
simultaneous streams of information presented linking information stored in XML-based semantic
in both the visual and auditory modes. Taken network representations or content schema. Using
together, these programs assesses the impact of XSL stylesheet-generated SMIL documents, items
the single and dual processing of information could be dynamically clustered in visual regions
streams on working memory, sustained attention, of a presentation using the SMIL <layout>, <root-
accuracy of performing arithmetic operations, and layout> and <region> tags. Similarly, semantic
on reaction time. These techniques could be used categories (semantic information would have to
to enhance a user’s processing speed and accuracy be stored in the content schema) could be used
by incrementally altering the computed optimum to organize links between dynamically created
speeds and stimulus parameters of, for instance, displays to capitalize on semantic similarity.
the presentation of text online or the speed at Perceptual priming protocols can also play a
which voice or video information is displayed. role in cognitive-adaptive systems. These proto-
In other words, information could be both visu- cols are based on the observation that informa-
ally and aurally presented at individualized and tion (words or images) that have been previously
optimized speeds of presentation, thus enhancing experienced can exert an effect on subsequent
processing efficiency. The dynamic adaptation behavior or physiology (Diamond et al., 1994).
of a display, including speed/duration of text, Thus, while the specific learning episode may
graphic, or auditory information display could be not be remembered, information can still be en-
controlled by using XSL stylesheets to generate coded and subsequently alter performance (i.e.,
multimedia SMIL documents and then control- perceptual fluency) (Johnston, Dark, & Jacoby,
ling the value of the SMIL duration attribute for 1985). Improvement in performance as a result
individual page elements to control how long they of prior exposure can be measured by reaction
appear on the screen. time protocols that indicate changes in saliency of
Adaptive action models based on semantic learning (i.e., faster reaction time with learning)
activation techniques also arise out of research or faster relearning of material. In a cognitive-

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adaptive system, a priming reaction time (PRT) color, font, and so on; (g) modality: text, image,
protocol could be used to measure the saliency voice, and (h) dynamic selection of page elements
of implicit and explicit learning as well as the from underlying content. The system could also
speed of making perceptual-semantic decisions alter the rate at which information is presented;
by determining if RT decreases or information select memory and executive prosthetics; and
processing speed increases following instruction. alter the manner in which content and learning
The results could be used to create XSL-generated objects are to be expressed, organized, configured,
“priming pages” for important content elements, formatted, and manipulated. The following is an
which over repeated presentation and display could example of an online scenario:
assist special needs learners in representing and A student who is taking an online course in
storing information. biology has had a mild brain injury. The current
There are also modality-based processing topic is the concept of action potential (AP). This
differences between individuals that have an topic includes information involving a variety of
important bearing on the design of adaptive sys- constituent concepts described in text (e.g., ion
tems for the cognitively impaired learner. Some movements, resting potential, electrophysiological
individuals display faster visual versus auditory and concentration gradients, threshold of excita-
processing speed and some display reverse pat- tion, depolarization, hyper- polarization, and chan-
terns (Diamond et al., 2000). A cognitive-adaptive nels/gates), numerical and statistical information
system could provide modality-specific options. (tables, calculations), and visual material (images,
Similar content could be presented as text, as im- movies, animations). The events that constitute
age, or as speech using the relevant multimedia the AP process occur in a specified sequence,
SMIL tags and attributes. For instance, using and the event is usually described in narrative
the SMIL <parallel> tag, parallel text and voice and then illustrated schematically in the typical
streams could be simultaneously presented in a textbook or Webpage. This static and normative
document and selection between modalities could presentation might not be the optimal display for
be offered to the user. a brain-injured student.
However, if the AP lesson document is first
An Online Educational Scenario decomposed and described using an XML-based
markup language, it would be possible to gain
Clearly, a variety of tools and technologies are control of the appearance and presentation of
currently available for use in online instructional the material in the lesson down to the level of
communities. These technologies, implemented in individual words, sentences, paragraphs, illustra-
a cognitive-adaptive instructional system, can sig- tions, text, images, tables, and animations. This
nificantly enhance the responsiveness and adapt- enhanced level of control could be used to opti-
ability of online learning environments to special mize the individual learning experience if then
needs students. Systems could allow instructors to connected to individual user profile information.
provide dynamic control over most aspects of an The user profile information would allow: (a)
online display, including: (a) speed and duration for system presentation adaptations that would
of information unit presentation; (b) organizational dynamically organize the visual and textual mate-
structure or layout of the page; (c) placement and rial in the lesson in ways that would compensate
clustering of visual or typographic elements; (d) for executive dysfunction (i.e., deconstructing
sequence of presentation of visual elements; (e) information into simpler units); (b) compensate for
adaptive navigation and linking to other content/ visual-conceptual integration deficits (i.e., simpler
displays; (f) graphic or typographic features: size, arrangement and sequencing of information via

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Cognitive-Adaptive Instructional Systems for Special Needs Learners

alternative schematics or custom animations); (c) data drives specific adaptive “compensatory”
alter the modality of textual presentation in order information system behaviors at the human
to compensate for reading disorders (i.e., use computer-interface. Such adaptive interfaces act
auditory-based text); (d) alter the rate of informa- dynamically to modify information architecture
tion presentation (visual and auditory) in order to and display in ways that address higher level cog-
compensate for slower processing (often observed nitive processing deficiencies as well as altering
in individuals with learning disabilities and brain formatting and presentation in order to address
injury) or ; (e) provide linkages to specially de- sensory-based needs. Using adaptive informa-
signed learning objects with built-in memory cues tion systems to deliver educational content and
(i.e., clustering of semantically-related objects) to services can make online learning environments
compensate for deficiencies in working memory. and communities more accessible to individuals
Overall, control over these elements would provide with inherited or acquired learning problems.
a range of compensatory and remedial actions The implementation of an adaptive approach
to help improve the educational performance of to instructional modeling offers a number of ad-
students with special needs. ditional advantages. It affords both instructor and
students a great deal of flexibility. The approach
is practical and cost-effective from a technology
CONCLUSION standpoint. That is, the system can be implemented
on any information system that implements the
Adaptive information systems provide an op- core World Wide Web (W3C) data formats and
portunity to broaden the participation of cer- protocols. Because content is not rigidly linked to
tain classes of differently-abled populations in format, once heuristics and cognitive user profiles
learning environments that depend heavily on are developed, instructional content of all types
information technology, such as Web-based and can be automatically and dynamically adapted to
distance learning. The challenges in developing an individual user’s special needs.
instructional models for online adaptive systems Overall, the cognitive-adaptive approach we have
serving special needs learners with cognitive described enhances and expands our understanding
and sensory impairments are considerable. The of how computer-assisted and online instructional
instructional models must deal not only with the systems can be more effectively designed for special
diverse learning problems such users confront in needs learners. As such, it makes a new contribution
“traditional” classroom environments, but also to an important area of online instructional modeling
with the new challenges presented by online in- for special populations. Cutting-edge, cross-disci-
struction. Adaptive systems must integrate new plinary work will help inform the development of
online technologies in ways that provide unique instructional models that enable cognitively impaired
opportunities to enhance individual instruction and learners to acquire, remember, and manipulate infor-
learning through the use of highly personalized mation more effectively. Such systems will broaden
pedagogical models. the participation of this underrepresented group in
Adaptive online instructional systems achieve education and in knowledge-based communities. In
the goal of personalizing the content and delivery this age of global communication, educators have an
of information to the needs of individual learners obligation to equip as many individuals as possible
by integrating educational and clinical evaluations with the tools that will allow them to participate
of a user’s cognitive and sensory impairments in the educational, social, and political fabric of
with instructional heuristics. The combination contemporary societies. By integrating adaptive
of specialized heuristics and clinical assessment instructional system concepts into the broader area

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of online instructional modeling, we can help em- assessments, compensatory heuristics, and adaptive
power differently-abled individuals to more fully system action. Application research needs to focus
use information technology and participate in an on the goal of incorporating “universal access”
increasingly global educational community. principles that will help foster greater inclusiveness
and system accessibility for special needs user by
allowing for the creation of localized, personalized
FUTURE RESEARCH information system interaction and display. Finally,
empirically based, randomized placebo controlled
Future research must address a number of multi- (RPC) trials need to be developed and executed in
disciplinary issues involving clinical research with ecologically valid environments in order to evaluate
special populations, accessible information system the efficacy of adaptive models and identify areas
design, and models of online instruction for special of future research and development.
needs learners. Scholars in cognitive neuroscience,
neuropsychology, and online and special educa-
tion need to conduct empirical research focusing ACKNOWLEDGMENT
on information technology usage and the human-
computer interface. The research should detail how The authors wish to acknowledge Amy C. Moors
cognitive and sensory deficits associated with a for her editorial assistance.
variety of inherited and acquired neurological and
learning disorders might be mitigated by adapting
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Velasco, C., & Mohamad, Y. (2002, May). Web Wu, H., de Kort, E., & De Bra, P. (2001). A
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1
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CCPP-19990727.

This work was previously published in Understanding Online Instructional Modeling: Theories and Practices, edited by Robert
Zheng and Sharmila Pixy Ferris, pp. 203-222, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 1211

Chapter 5.6
Animated Computer Education
Games for Students with ADHD:
Evaluating Their Development and
Effectiveness as Instructional Tools

Kim B. Dielmann
University of Central Arkansas, USA

Julie Meaux
University of Central Arkansas, USA

ABSTRACT for this population. Specifically, the FIDGE model

and Gagné’s Nine Events of Instruction are evalu-
Children and adolescents with Attention Deficit ated for their contributions to understanding the
Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) have difficulty unique technological needs of the ADHD learner.
maintaining attention, controlling their activity
level, and they typically demonstrate poor in-
terpersonal relationships skills. Because of their INTRODUCTION
challenges, educational performance tends to
suffer. Paradoxically, when seated in front of a Current estimates indicate Attention Deficit
videogame or computer program they enjoy, the Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) affects 4% to
performance of individuals with ADHD becomes 12% of U.S. children (Froehlich et al., 2007).
similar to non-ADHD peers. The purpose of this Longitudinal studies suggest children who are di-
chapter is to present a conceptual framework for agnosed with ADHD continue to have difficulties
understanding the factors that affect the outcome with organization, time management, impulsive
of individuals with ADHD, and to demonstrate thoughts and actions, stress management, emo-
how instructional design models can be used to tional regulation, interpersonal relationships, and
guide the design and implementation of animated academic skills such as reading, studying, and test
computer education games as instructional tools taking as adolescents and as young adults (Barkley,
Fischer, Smallish, and Fletcher, 2006). Children
and adolescents with ADHD often struggle in
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch506

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

traditional classrooms. Many fidget and have involve computerized technology offer a wider
difficulty remaining in their seats, thus causing range of options for learning. The benefits of
disruption to the classroom as well as to the child’s computerized presentation of information include
own education. Even when children with ADHD the use of multiple senses, the breakdown of
are able to sit quietly, they often require multiple material into smaller pieces, provision of immedi-
repetition in order to retain information they ate feedback, and the limitation of unnecessary,
hear. Most teachers cannot pause to emphasize distracting features (DuPaul & Weyandt, 2006).
each individual fact to a child with ADHD while According to several studies, children and adoles-
the rest of the class has grasped the material and cents with ADHD are more attentive to computer-
moved on. As a result, adolescents with ADHD ized programs or interventions than to traditional
are more likely to drop out of high school and fail instruction methods (Shalev, Tasal & Mevorach,
to complete college compared to their non-ADHD 2007; Farrace-Di Zinno et al., 2001; Carroll &
counterparts. Lower educational achievement Bain, 1994). They also seem to respond better to
often leads to underemployment, poor social interactive instruction than when they serve in
adjustment, and decreased overall quality of life. more passive roles as listeners or viewers (Shaw
To address these problems, a more engaging and & Lewis, 2005; Klingberg et al., 2005). Shaw,
personalized education format is necessary for Grayson & Lewis (2005) found students with
children and adolescents with ADHD. ADHD performed better and were more engaged
According to DuPaul and Stoner (2003), stu- by information presented in a game format than
dents with ADHD are educated more effectively if by regular computerized instruction. In addition,
multiple mediators (peers, computers, and parents) Farrace-Di Zinno et al. (2001) observed how
are involved. They also recommend the interven- students with ADHD were more similar to their
tion strategies be individualized particularly since peers without ADHD with regard to the amount
the ADHD population is heterogenious. According of motor movement and distractability during
to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention computer video game play.
(September 2, 2005), 56% of all children ages four According to Fister (1999), computer games
to 17 years diagnosed with ADHD were taking can be used for primary learning of different
stimulant medications. Though medication is the subjects rather than just for review and reinforce-
most widely used treatment for ADHD, a combina- ment. Ota and DuPaul (2002) evaluated the ef-
tion of self-monitoring and self-reinforcement may fects of a game-based math software program on
have longer lasting effects. Barkley, Copeland, and the performance of ADHD students. They found
Sivage (1980) found this combination improved increased math performance, decreased off-task
task-related attention, academic accuracy, and peer and disruptive behavior, and increased active
interactions. DuPaul, Rutherford and Hosterman engagement in the computer-based instruction
(2008) suggested the use of self-monitoring and compared to the traditional classroom lesson.
self-reinforcement particularly at the secondary Mautone, DuPaul, and Jitendra (2005) found
level because there are fewer opportunities for this similar math improvements in ADHD students.
age group for token reinforcement, contingency Oral reading fluency has also been the target of
contracting, or response cost. research using computer-assisted technology with
Technological advances and the increased ADHD students. Clarfield and Stoner (2005)
availability of technological resources afford most found improvements in oral reading fluency and
schools the ability to incorporate different types subsequent engagement in the activity when a
of instructional technology into the classroom. computer-assisted reading program was used.
For students with ADHD, educational tools that While data suggest students with ADHD may

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Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

benefit from the use of computerized educational 2008). Despite their nomenclature, the generation
tools, it is important to understand what and how of learners today is vastly different from previous
to appropriately integrate gaming technology into generations. Prensky developed ten cognitive
the classroom to improve learning outcomes for traits (Table 1) to describe the differences between
these students. In addition, it is imperative edu- children of the game generation and children of
cators evaluate the appropriateness of such tech- previous generations.
nology for use with all students. In this chapter, Twitch speed refers to the fast speed at which
a conceptual framework for understanding the the game generation wants information presented.
intervening factors that affect outcomes for people Classroom lectures and independent seatwork that
with ADHD will be discussed along with models occur at a slower pace can be frustrating and bor-
to help educators design and evaluate the quality ing to this group who are accustomed to rapid
of computerized games for education purposes. presentation of information. Parallel processing
refers to the randomness of responding, such as
surfing the internet or completing game chal-
THE “GAME GENERATION” lenges in no specific order. The historic rules of
reading textbooks and conducting research follow
Prensky (2001a) describes the most recent genera- a sequential order and require systematic ap-
tion of children who integrate videogames into proaches. The game generation of children can
their daily activities as the “game generation.” become inattentive and disruptions may result.
He also coined the term “Digital Natives” to Graphic representations stimulate the game gen-
describe this generation’s approach to learning. eration, while reading text may provide little in-
Digital Natives routinely manage large amounts spiration for learning. The game generation wants
of information at one time, find alternative ways to be connected at all times and they often feel as
to acquire knowledge, and seek solutions through if they are a part of a community of gamers
different means previously unavailable. Prensky rather than lone players. This sense of intercon-
(2001b) compared the digital natives to previous nectivity can also stimulate negative behavior,
generations, who he named “Digital Immigrants”. such as cheating in school, because of the diffu-
The primary differences between the groups lie
in how they approach learning. Digital natives
Table 1 Differences in cognitive traits between
prefer to multi-task. They prefer to “leap around”
children of the game generation and more tradi-
as they learn rather than sequentially process in-
tional learners (Prensky, 2001a).
formation (Prensky, 2001c). According to Prensky
(2001c), children of this game generation “have Game Generation Traditional
been adjusting or programming their brains to Twitch speed Conventional speed
the speed, interactivity, and other factors in the Parallel processing Linear processing
games” (pp.3). This generation of learners has Graphics First Text First
also been referred to as “Generation M” for the
Random access Step-by-Step
group between the ages of 8-18 years who have
Connected Stand alone
never known a time without media (Rideout,
Active Passive
Roberts, & Foehr, 2005). Other labels given to
Play Work
this generation of learners include “Generation I”
Payoff Patience
to represent the influence of the internet in their
Fantasy Reality
lives or “Generation Z” to denote the generation
Technology as friendly Technology as foe
following Generation Y (Schmidt & Hawkins,

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 Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

sion of responsibility that accompanies. They are concluded that aggressive personality types and
active participants who can impose change on exposure to family violence were greater predic-
their environments, and can become easily frus- tors of violence than simply exposure to violent
trated when placed in an environment where they video games.
have no control. Within the game environment, The largest concern associated with video game
they experience immediate payoff, and many of play seems to be the addictive properties associ-
these activities are fantasy-based. They do not ated with it. Chan and Rabinowitz (2006) found a
simply use technology as a tool—they are im- positive correlation between the amounts of time
mersed in it as an extension of themselves. Edu- spent playing video games daily and the number
cators who are born of generations past (Digital of ADHD symptoms present. Furthermore, Bio-
Immigrants) have to engage the game generation ulac, Arfi, and Bouvard (2008) found increased
with a different set of tools than what they learned addictive tendencies for video games in ADHD
in school (Prensky, 2001a). children compared to their non-ADHD peers.
Students with ADHD have always used cogni- Results suggest children who play video games
tive traits similar to those described by Prensky. for extended periods of time may be prone to more
Yet, their approaches were viewed as disruptive complications and more ADHD symptomology
to the learning environment. Twitch speed was than those who play them less frequently.
considered hyperactivity and impulsivity. Paral- Several positive effects from video game play
lel processing was viewed as disorganization. have also been noted. Okagaki and Frensch (1994)
Connectedness was seen as attention-seeking. found positive effects associated with repeated
Play was considered inattention. Children with play of the game TetrisTM. Adolescents involved in
ADHD needed more from the learning environ- the study enhanced their visual-spatial and visual
ment than was available. Now, the needs of the reasoning skills through playing the game. They
game generation may actually be consistent with suggested game playing may actually influence
the needs of children with ADHD. performance IQ scores. Ferguson (2007) con-
Caution has been stressed to adults who are firmed these findings and concluded that playing
interested in using gaming technology to teach violent video games can actually increase visuo-
children. There have been negative effects associ- spatial cognition. Other positive effects include
ated with video game use reported in the research. increased problem-solving, increased motivation,
Increased aggression has long been associated and accelerated learning (eg., de Freitas & Lev-
with the degree of violence in the game (Gentile ene, 2004; Garris, Ahlers & Driskell, 2002; Gee,
& Anderson, 2003; Gentile, Lynch, Linder & 2003; Hays, 2005).
Walsh, 2004; Porter & Starcevic, 2007). Gentile et These benefits could level the playing field
al. (2004) found children who play violent video for children and adolescents with ADHD. Educa-
games are more prone to increased aggression, tors who use gaming technology can more easily
confrontation with teachers, fights with peers, and accommodate many different types of learners.
decreased academic achievement. However, in a Games can adjust to the skills and needs of their
meta-analysis of the effects of violent video-game players, allowing the same product or software to
playing, Ferguson (2007) found no evidence to meet the needs of all students. However, before
link playing violent video games with increases educators adopt the “one size fits all” policy for
in aggression. Additionally, Ferguson et al. (2008) educational games, they need to understand the
found that when family violence was controlled specific learning styles associated with the ADHD
for, there was no correlational or causal effect of learner.
violent video games on aggression. The authors

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Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

ADHD LEARNERS AND Intervening Factors:

EDUCATIONAL GAMES
• Personal factors are features of life that are
Mediating Factors that not a part of ADHD but can impact other
Challenge the ADHD Learner levels of function. Some personal factors
are not amenable to change such as gender,
Students with ADHD have difficulty because their race, social background, familial factors,
core symptoms of inattention, impulsivity, and comorbidity, severity of symptoms, and
hyperactivity affect their ability to manage daily predominant learning styles. Other personal
life. ADHD affects the person at three interacting factors such as knowledge of the disorder
levels: (a) body functions, (b) activities, and (c) and medication use can be affected by
participation in society. The impact of ADHD on intervention. While stimulant medications
these three interacting levels is also moderated by are effective in decreasing the primary
environmental and personal factors. A conceptual symptoms of ADHD, few adolescents take
framework (Figure 1) adapted from the Interna- them routinely (Marcus, Wan, Kemner, &
tional Classification of Functioning, Disability, Olfson, 2005). Since games are adaptable to
and Health (ICF) developed by the World Health the needs of the individual students, they can
Organization identifies how symptoms of ADHD be implemented as educational interventions
can impede school, social, and home functioning regardless of personal factors. An estimated
(Ustun, 2007). 30% of students with ADHD have read-
The ICF framework provides the basis for ing or math disabilities (Capano, Minden,
understanding the learning and behavioral needs Chen, Schachar, & Ickowicz, 2008; Faraone,
of the students with ADHD. Biederman, Monuteaux, & Seidman, 2001).
Learning becomes more challenging for this
large minority of students. Games can be
presented in high text formats (where users

Figure 1. Conceptual framework for ADHD students adapted from the International Classification of
Functioning, Disability, and Health Conceptual Model (Ustun, 2006)

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 Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

must read a substantial amount to complete) individuals to learn vicariously. According

and low text formats (where users navigate to Barkley (1997), individuals with ADHD
more through pictures and limited reading) have difficulty with behavioral reconstitu-
thereby reducing the need for assistance by tion. They frequently have to experience the
special educators with reading and compre- consequences of their own behavior in order
hension of the material. to shape new behavior patterns. Videogames
• Environmental factors consist of physical, can allow the player to become the character
social, and attitudinal factors in which people in the game; therefore, the player serves as
live and conduct their lives (Ustun, 2007). his or her own model for behavior change.
A major focus of ADHD management for Bandura in his social learning theory (1971)
young children is modification of the class- emphasizes people can learn by observing a
room environment in order to improve be- model. Seeing the self successfully perform a
havior and performance. Research indicates skill provides information about how to best
that during videogame play, hyperactivity perform that skill, strengthens self-efficacy,
and impulsivity decrease for students with and reinforces learning.
ADHD while attention and learning increase • Activities are defined as the execution of
(Farrace-Di Zinno et al., 2001). Providing tasks or actions. General activities of daily
opportunities for integrating videogame living are included in this category, such as
technology into the learning environment learning and applying knowledge, general
is a simple way to address the behavioral tasks and demands, communication, mobil-
and academic needs of these students. ity, self-care, and interpersonal relationships.
Symptoms of ADHD are known to cause
Outcome Factors: inconsistency and persistent problems in
adaptive functioning for general activi-
• Body functions are defined as physiological ties of daily living. Research indicates the
and psychological functions, and they in- symptoms of ADHD significantly impact
clude the core symptoms of ADHD – inatten- academic performance and learning. Frazier,
tion, hyperactivity, and impulsivity (Ameri- Youngstrom, Glutting, and Watkins (2007)
can Psychological Association, 2000). conducted a meta-analysis that included 72
Neuroimaging studies indicate differences studies of academic achievement in children
in the size and activation of the prefrontal and adolescents with ADHD and found
cortex during cognitive processing tasks in moderate to large discrepancies between
individuals with ADHD compared to those achievement scores of those with and without
without ADHD (Epstein et al., 2007; Kon- ADHD. Adolescents with ADHD have per-
rad, Neufang, Hanisch, Fink, & Herpertz- sistent problems with adaptive communica-
Dahlmann, 2006). Secondary impairments tion skills (Clark, Prior, & Kinsella, 2002)
of ADHD, such as verbal and nonverbal as well as difficulties with interpersonal
working memory, emotional regulation, and relationships and social situations (Barkley,
behavioral reconstitution (Barkley, 1997), 2006; Maedgen & Carlson, 2000). Com-
are also considered body functions according puter technology and virtual reality can be
to ICF coding. Behavioral reconstitution is used to create social situations and model
the ability to shape behavior or learn new interpersonal relationships in order to shape
behavior patterns based on cues provided behavior and reinforce learning.
by models in the environment, and it allows

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Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

• Participation is defined as involvement in gesting games are viewed as fun, have specific
life situations, which include education, goals, provide structure through rules, and include
employment, and community activities. a competitive component that assumes the player
Typically, compared to their peers without will either win or lose. Using this interpretation,
ADHD, adolescents with ADHD experience Prensky suggested that simulations can also be
more difficulty moving through and succeed- games if they are designed as such. He went as
ing in educational programs, obtaining and far as to say simulations “simulate” reality, which
retaining work, and even being involved in could be boring to the player. By adding game-like
community, social, and civic life (Spencer, components to the simulation (components that
Biederman, & Mick, 2007). Games that are unrealistic), players may enjoy playing and
simulate real-world situations could teach at the same time be able to generalize the skill to
these students how to participate by provid- an aspect of real life (Prensky, 2001a). Educa-
ing them with immediate feedback about tors must be mindful of these differences when
their actions without having to expose them introducing an educational game or simulation
to potentially harmful situations. into the lesson. A game may be fun with limited
learning associated with it. A simulation may have
the potential for learning, but it may not be fun.
Students with ADHD need educational opportu- Prensky suggests the best situation may be to give
nities that are purposeful yet fun and engaging. the player real choices, but to “include enough
The advancements in gaming technology, as they humorous or even outrageous possibilities” to
relate to the instructional environment, are prom- make it fun (Prensky, 2001a). The goal is to keep
ising. However, the quality, format, and purpose even the most inattentive and distractible players
of technological mediums vary widely and it is interested and motivated to continue.
important to evaluate and select the most appro-
priate medium for the desired learning outcomes.
VIDEOGAME PERFORMANCE
OF CHILDREN WITH AND
EDUCATIONAL GAMES VS. WITHOUT ADHD
EDUCATIONAL SIMULATIONS
Research has found mixed results regarding
Research differentiates between educational videogame performance of children with ADHD
games and educational simulations. According compared to their non-ADHD peers. Continu-
to Price (1990), the purpose of an educational ous Performance Tests (CPT) are typically used
video game is to teach and provide practice. A to evaluate speed of responding, sustained at-
simulation, on the other hand, has been described tention level, motor movements, and executive
as something that mirrors real life and requires functioning in individuals with ADHD. These
the player to act (Tessmer, Jonassen, & Caverly, computer-based assessments require individu-
1989, p. 89). According to Gredler (1996), games als to respond to a correct target sequence and
are typically linear, requiring correct responses refrain from responding to an incorrect target
before advancing to the next level. Simulations are sequence or distractor. People with ADHD are
non-linear, allowing for flexibility in movement more restless, inattentive, and talkative than their
within the modules based on decisions made pre- typically developing peers when completing
viously. Prensky (2001a) expanded on Gredler’s CPTs (Barkley, Grodzinsky, & DuPaul, 1992).
interpretation of games and simulations by sug- In addition, children find them aversive (Smith,

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 Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

Barkley, & Shapiro, 2007). These assessments EVALUATING INSTRUCTIONAL

lack the criteria suggested by Prensky that would GAMES AND SIMULATIONS
engage and motivate the individual during the
task. Tannock (1997) conducted an assessment Instructional development has been the term most
of motor movement in boys with ADHD using used to describe the activities of educators. With
the Pacman™ videogame; a two-dimensional, the increased need to integrate educational games
repetitive, restricted player-interface game with into the instructional environment, educators are
a non-variable background, and also found a pat- taking on more instructional design responsibili-
tern of restlessness, inattention, and talkativeness ties. Design models help educators understand
compared to boys without ADHD. To paraphrase how to create and evaluate the quality of a game
Prensky, these tasks are not fun and are not based or simulation. Educators can use the design models
on real-life experiences. to understand the needs of ADHD students as well
Farrace-Di Zinno et al. (2001) and Lawrence as those of the game generation. One useful design
et al. (2002) designed their studies for children is the FIDGE model (Akilli & Cagiltay, 2006).
with ADHD around an interactive adventure FIDGE stands for “Fuzzified Instructional
videogame (Crash Bandicoot™, 1996), which Design Development of Game-like Environ-
requires response inhibition, motor control in- ments.” Ironically, the word fidge, or in more
volving visiospatial skills, and eye-hand coordi- current vernacular, fidget, means “to move rest-
nation skills. The videogame requires the player lessly” or “a condition of restlessness manifested
to negotiate hazards along a jungle path while by nervous movements” (American Heritage
viewing the journey from the character’s perspec- College Dictionary, 2000). The model was de-
tive. The game depends on the player’s ability to signed to address the eagerness and physical
move quickly under some circumstances and to tension associated with the game player. The
refrain from responding when certain hazards are model is non-linear and includes consideration
presented. Rolling wheels, killer skunks, snap- and evaluation of several components: (a) par-
ping plants, and the risk of falling off cliffs are ticipants; (b) game-player experience; (c) socio-
some of the challenges the player faces during cultural environment; (d) dynamic elements of
the adventure. The player must apply the rules the game; (c) change; (e) management; (f) tech-
in order to get from the beginning of the path to nology; and (g) use. An example of the application
the end. These tasks mirror real-life skills, but of the FIDGE model for educators would be the
include fun and unrealistic components. Unlike design of a computer game to teach a concept to
earlier studies involving CPT and Pacman™, elementary students using a simple PowerPoint
the researchers found children with ADHD were application.
more similar to children without ADHD during
the interactive adventure videogame. They at- • Participants are the users of the game and
tributed the variability in results to the differences the experts involved in the development
in the videogame presented to the children. The and evaluation of it. The ADHD learner and
adventure videogame provided the player with peers who are members of the game genera-
immediate visual and auditory feedback and the tion are similar, but the added challenge of
responses were self-paced. Children could slow potential learning disabilities could create
down or speed up the action depending on their a unique set of challenges for educators in
individual needs. CPTs and games like Pacman™ the presentation of curricula. One way edu-
are not so adaptable. cators can ensure the needs of the ADHD
learner and other subpopulations of learners

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Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

Figure 2.The eight components of evaluation for computer games or simulations. (Akilli & Cagiltay,
2006) recommend educators evaluate the needs of their learners and the presentation of the game to
ensure there is a match before introducing the game to the players

are included in the curricula is to develop learning and skill levels of players. Provid-
focus groups. Educators may not understand ing multi-sensory experiences can support a
the unique digital needs of the learners, but diverse group of learners. de Freitas (2004)
the learners know what appeals to them. found that games and simulations can sig-
By creating focus groups to help educators nificantly support differentiated learning.
choose educational games or simulation When selecting game-like environments for
material, educators may better understand learning, educators need to ensure the qual-
the needs of the learners. In the example of ity of the game or simulation is adaptable to
creating a computer game for teaching the all learning styles represented. The use of
Bill of Rights, educators would first select a PowerPoint does not limit the multi-sensory
heterogeneous group of students from their experiences available. Sound, visual cues
classes to serve as the focus group. This group and touch if a Smart board or touch screen
would discuss their needs in regards to the computer is used will add to the learning
learning environment. Such discussions may experience for these students.
include what the group identifies as inter- • Socio-cultural environment involves an
esting or boring. The responses may differ understanding of the environment in which
significantly for the ADHD learner group the game will be played, the change in rel-
compared to the non-ADHD counterparts. evance from year to year, and the transfer of
• Game-player experience requires the skills from one activity to another. Educators
need to consider the differences in styles of are creating games that are important to the

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 Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

current student population, but they do not choice in characters can enhance the obser-
want to have to re-create these instructional vational learning opportunities (making the
tools from year to year. When developing behaviors of the characters more identifiable
your PowerPoint presentation, you may need with the players).
to find links, sounds, or graphics that can • Technology relates to the compatibil-
transition from one group to the next. It’s ity with systems and suitability within the
probably not a good idea to choose current educational environment. Due to budgetary
trends as examples. issues, schools face difficulties remaining
• Dynamic elements of the game include apace with the most current technological
challenge, fantasy, and creativity. Research advances. For students to be able to access
indicates a similar abnormal brain pattern in programs, the programs should be compat-
creative individuals (Herrmann, 1981; Tor- ible with the technology utilized by the
rance, 1984) and individuals with ADHD preponderance of schools.
(Hynd, Hern, Voeller & Marshall, 1991). In • Use refers to the actual implementation of
fact, Shaw (1992) found ADHD children use the game. One limitation of this model is a
a magnitude of imagery in problem-solving lack of research support for how individuals
similar to creative individuals. By including with challenges in self-regulation (i.e., atten-
dynamic elements in the games, educators tion, hyperactivity, or impulsivity) respond
can stimulate not only the attentional needs, to games designed using this model.
but also the creativity needs of the ADHD
learner. Integrating video clips, puzzles, Though the FIDGE model was developed
or competition into the presentation can for designers of computer games, educators can
enhance the learners’ interest in it. benefit from understanding its unique instructional
• Change refers to requirements for growth design components. Since the thoughts of the
and the need for continuous evaluation game generation and the ADHD learners jump
components built into the game curriculum. from idea to idea, they require flexibility in ap-
As students demonstrate understanding of proaching their curricula in the same mode. The
certain components, the game should pro- FIDGE model can serve as a guide for educators
vide more advanced curricula. Hyperlinks as they prepare their digitally-based instructional
within the slides can allow for previous materials.
responses to guide future ones. It could also
provide different ways of addressing the
same construct if the student fails to grasp CHOOSING INSTRUCTIONAL
it correctly on the first try. ADHD students GAMES AND DEVELOPING LESSON
may not respond correctly because of how PLANS FOR THE ADHD LEARNER
the information is presented rather than from
a lack of knowledge about the information. Gagné’s “Nine Events of Instruction” theory of
• Management includes the player’s degree design development for instructional games (1985)
of control over time, characters, and pace. is based on learning and instructional principles.
As previously stated, the opportunity for the The areas included in the theory are: (a) gaining
students to select their character increases the attention (reception), (b) informing learners of
modeling effect. Given the characteristics of the objective (expectancy), (c) stimulating recall
the “game generation,” the management of of prior learning (retrieval), (d) presenting the
the game is critical to its success. Providing stimulus (selective perception), (e) providing

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Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

learning guidance (semantic encoding), (f) elicit- the K-W-L instructional design to help learners
ing performance (responding), (g) providing feed- identify what they already Know about the sub-
back (reinforcement), (h) assessing performance ject, what they Want to learn about the subject,
(retrieval), and (i) enhancing retention and transfer and what they actually Learn as they study the
(generalization). The FIDGE model addresses material. The development of a graphic organizer
the components developed, whereas the “Nine helps the learner chart this information. Computer-
Events of Instruction” assess how interesting and mediated instruction offers learners a playground
functional the program will be to its users. where they can attach websites, pictures, sounds,
The ADHD learner has difficulty maintaining video, and more to their knowledge base about the
attention, remaining still and focused, or both. topic. Titles and topic headings can be presented
These children can make impulsive decisions, and using Flash technology so they stand out to the
require additional attention from teachers, staff, reader. Informing learners of the objectives can be
and peers. When making choices about ways to more interactive, thereby stimulating the interest
present a concept, teachers are trained to consider of individuals with ADHD.
the needs of the learners. Gagné’s Nine Events of
Instruction can support teachers’ efforts to evaluate Event 3: Stimulate Recall of
these needs when the presentation of material is Prerequisite Learning
technology-based. Specific to the ADHD learner,
these nine events can target how material should Individuals with ADHD can have difficulty retain-
be presented to engage and motivate the student, ing information. According to Barkley (1997),
and assess the mastery of the information: deficits that would impair an individual with
ADHD from retrieving previously learned material
Event 1: Gain Attention to solve new problems include those involved in
executive functioning. Working memory, activa-
With any task, gaining the attention of the ADHD tion, arousal, and effort, and complex problem
learner is critical to the success of the instructional solving are critical to processing new information.
medium. Since inattention is a major challenge Skowronek, Leichtman, and Pillemer (2008) found
for most individuals with ADHD, gaining their individuals with ADHD demonstrate strengths
attention can be difficult. Gagné suggests add- in long-term episodic memory. This means
ing color or sound to the material that highlights when they have to retrieve information based on
specific information and does not overshadow personal experiences they perform better than
that which must be learned (Gagné, Briggs, & average. Attaching meaning to information could
Wager, 1992). Shaw and Lewis (2005) found enhance the learning for individuals with ADHD.
children with ADHD demonstrated more on-task Animated computer education games can allow
behaviors when animated stimuli were presented users to choose a character that represents them.
rather than simple text. Computerized animation The events can be organized in such a way so they
can provide a wealth of options for stimulating simulate real life experiences, thus improving the
the attention of these learners. chance they will be retained. Zentall, Cassady, and
Javorsky (2001) suggest using voice-overs to ask
Event 2: Inform Learners users to recount previous social situations relevant
of the Objectives to the material to help improve problem-solving
strategies. This strategy capitalizes on the use of
This event addresses the need to provide a learn- sound to maintain attention and episodic memory
ing map of the material. Ogle (1986) developed to enhance retention and recall.

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 Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

Event 4: Presenting the Content can practice the skill. Teachers may struggle with
motivating ADHD learners to start tasks, let alone
The presentation of content should vary according getting them to complete the tasks. However, we
to the learning style and age of the user. Learning have learned when individuals with ADHD are
should be focused on showing the learner how to interested in the material, they are more likely to
organize the information in the correct sequence. elicit a response. Opportunities for active learning
According to Kataria, Hall, Wong, and Keys will increase the likelihood of a response.
(1992), the use of rehearsal, mnemonics, imagery,
and organizational strategies can improve reten- Event 7: Providing Feedback
tion. The developmental stage of the learner would
influence the sophistication of the mnemonics and As stated previously, immediate feedback can
the detail involved in the imagery. Mayer (1987) improve the task performance of ADHD learners
suggests that younger children may require sup- (DuPaul & Weyandt, 2006). Furthermore, Cod-
port to create the image since they have fewer ding, Lewandowski, and Eckert (2005) found
experiences on which to draw. feedback increased performance when the stu-
dents actually set their own performance goals.
Event 5: Providing Videogames and other computer education games
Learning Guidance can allow users to set realistic goals and receive
immediate feedback on their performance.
Learning guidance can be provided for the ADHD
learner through clearly labeled navigational tools, Event 8: Assessing Performance
verbal instructions are repeated throughout the
activity, and interactive help menus. The appeal- Any lesson plan should include methods for
ing nature of videogames is the technology-driven assessing learning. For ADHD learners these
emphasis rather than staff-driven. More students methods should occur frequently and not only
receive one-on-one learning guidance without assess learning of material, but also assess on-task
requiring more teachers or paraprofessionals to behavior. Computer education games are capable
be present. ADHD learners respond to one-on-one of tracking responses of the user and adjusting
instruction where the material introduces the use the presentation of material to accommodate the
of multiple senses, the breakdown of material into user’s specific needs.
smaller pieces, provision of immediate feedback,
and the limitation of unnecessary, distracting Event 9: Enhancing
features (DuPaul & Weyandt, 2006). An example Retention and Transfer
of learning guidance that meets these criteria is
the use of interactive case studies where users When individuals can take what they have learned
must experience a scenario familiar to them, and apply it to new situations, learning has taken
problem-solve responses to the scenario, and place. The skills learned during videogame play
receive feedback as to their accuracy at the end (planning, organization, problem-solving, adapt-
of the presentation. ability, and processing speed) can easily transfer
to other tasks. Since many ADHD learners have
Event 6: Eliciting the Performance deficits in many of these prefrontal activities, it is
encouraging that a medium of task presentation can
Inattention can increase response time. The goal generate skill growth in these areas. A bonus may
is to get a response to the material so the learner

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Animated Computer Education Games for Students with ADHD

be lowered levels of hyperactivity and impulsive with ADHD. The unique challenges of the learner
responding, and increased on-task behavior. and educators to create a fertile and stimulating
By using Gagné’s Nine Event of Instruction, environment that individualizes the learning needs
educators can choose computer games that offer of those with ADHD and limits the distractions for
the best chance for success in teaching the material non-ADHD students can be daunting. Animated,
to the ADHD learner. They also guide educators dynamic elements of computer education games
in lesson plan development by dividing the lesson are ripe for meeting those demands. Educators
into measureable goals; i.e., from preparing the willing to improve their technological skill-sets
student for learning to generalizing the skills to and integrate computer games into the instructional
new material. environment in a purposeful way offer the best
chance for the ADHD learner to succeed.

FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS

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This work was previously published in Design and Implementation of Educational Games: Theoretical and Practical Per-
spectives, edited by Pavel Zemliansky and Diane Wilcox, pp. 235-251, copyright 2010 by Information Science Reference (an
imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 5.7
Barriers to and Strategies for
Faculty Integration of IT
Thomas M. Brinthaupt
Middle Tennessee State University, USA

Maria A. Clayton
Middle Tennessee State University, USA

Barbara J. Draude
Middle Tennessee State University, USA

INTRODUCTION Depending on level of faculty expertise, asking

them to increase the time and effort they put into
At most institutions of higher education, faculty their teaching might reduce the time and effort
members wear many “hats.” Among other re- they can devote to research, service, and other
sponsibilities, they are expected to teach, conduct institutional requirements and responsibilities.
research, and participate in institutional and public Why should they, especially if there is very little
service. Within the teaching realm, faculty mem- acknowledgment or tenure/promotion credit given
bers have always had multiple responsibilities. for incorporating IT into their teaching? This is,
For example, in addition to being content experts, in part, why many faculty members may have to
they may need to become course design, assess- be dragged “kicking and screaming” into using
ment, communication, community or interaction these technologies.
experts. Instructors can be described as architects,
consultants, resources, reviewers, and role mod-
els (Oblinger & Hawkins, 2006). It is primarily BACKGROUND
(though not exclusively) in the teaching realm
where instructional technology (IT) is relevant. To address the predicament faced by faculty, it
The more that faculty utilize IT, the more the would be helpful to provide some guidelines on
non-content aspects of teaching become salient. how to balance multiple roles (and the time and
effort required). However, there do not appear to
be any models that deal with this challenge. One
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch507

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

way to help understand the process of IT adoption curve. Table 1 presents a developmental model of
is to consider the different roles or positions of in- faculty integration of IT loosely based on Moreland
dividual faculty members. For example, non-users and Levine’s (2000) group socialization model.
of IT face a much steeper learning curve than do Both non-users and prospective users of IT
instructors who have partially or fully integrated may not adopt it for several reasons. They may
IT into their teaching. Learning to use IT might, negatively evaluate the use of IT, lack the time
therefore, be thought of as a socialization process. and effort necessary to commit to its use, or fear
In their model of socialization to groups, psy- the steep learning curve that awaits their efforts
chologists Moreland and Levine (2000) highlight to integrate IT into their teaching. New IT users
the importance of the processes of evaluation, are more likely to evaluate its use favorably and
commitment, and role transition. In particular, to have more commitment to using it, yet will still
in order to acquire a new identity as a group have a steep learning curve. Of course, if new
member, an individual must pass from being a users’ initial experiences are negative, they will
prospective member to a new member to a full be less likely to increase their commitment to and
member. This passage is a function of how both use of IT. Experienced users will typically show
the group and individual evaluate each other, their positive evaluations, high levels of commitment,
respective levels of commitment to each other, and and less steep learning curves. However, with
the eventual transition in roles as the individual each of these roles, there are potential barriers
passes into and through the group. that limit the initial or continued integration of IT
For purposes of this chapter, we assume that into faculty members’ teaching.
higher education faculty go through a similar
socialization process with IT integration. In par-
ticular, they must first evaluate the IT options PERCEIVED BARRIERS
available to them and determine if using those
options is feasible. If their commitment to inte- Even assuming adequate levels of training, sup-
grating IT into their teaching is high enough, they port, and access, there are many barriers to faculty
may begin learning about those options, depending members’ adoption and integration of instructional
on the support and resources of their institution. technologies. Table 2 lists some of the major
This learning process might shift the instructor’s technology-related and academic-related barriers
role from a prospective user to a new user and to IT use in higher education.
eventually to a full user of IT. The barriers to IT Prospective IT users may have the misconcep-
integration vary depending on the user roles that tion that they should learn about and use IT because
faculty play in this socialization process, how they it makes teaching and learning more convenient.
evaluate IT, their own and their institution’s levels This may be true to some extent, but it is no more
of commitment to its use, and their IT learning true than the claim that instructors use a textbook

Table 1. Developmental model of faculty integration of IT

Role Evaluation Commitment Learning Curve

Non-user Negative or neutral Low Very Steep
Prospective user Negative, neutral, or positive Low to medium Very Steep
New user Negative, neutral, or positive Medium to high Steep
Experienced user Positive High Moderately steep

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 Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

Table 2. Major barriers to IT integration in higher

student-centered learning environments (active
education
learning) (Duhaney, 2005; Groves & Zemel,
Wide range of IT Options 2000). However, the dual role required of them
Technology-
Role Conflict
has proven daunting for many. Exactly what is
Related
Pace of IT Improvements & Innovations
the faculty’s role—IT or content expert? There is
Time & Effort
no clear definition of the roles required to teach a
course that takes the emerging technologies into
Academic Quality of Courses
Academic- account. Important questions to consider include
Incentives & Compensation
Related to what extent and how often a faculty member
Tenure & Promotion
revises and re-designs a course and who helps with
Job Security
those processes. This potential role conflict or role
ambiguity may inhibit non-users from transition-
ing to prospective IT users. New IT users will
for convenience. In this sense, there is nothing
need to negotiate their new roles actively. On the
special about new instructional technologies.
other hand, most experienced users have probably
Whether one is talking about a pencil, a textbook,
resolved the conflict or ambiguity associated with
a whiteboard, or a 21st Century classroom, these
the new roles required by the integration of IT.
are all tools along a continuum. Even if faculty
Closely related to these issues is the constantly
members do not see it this way, their Net Gen-
changing nature of IT. With technology changing
eration students increasingly look at many of these
often and quickly, why should faculty spend time
new technologies as “pencils” (Oblinger &
and effort learning something that may be radi-
Oblinger, 2005), and those students use the tech-
cally changed or even obsolete in a few years?
nologies for multiple purposes (Donlevy, 2005).
For example, an institution may be moving from
However, for faculty, this is one of the most obvi-
individually created faculty course web pages to
ous barriers when facing emerging technolo-
the adoption of a common learning management
gies—the ever increasing, wide range of options.
system LMS) platform. Alternatively, there may
Even when they evaluate the use of IT favorably
be a conversion to a different LMS platform or
and are committed to integrating it into their
to a new version of the existing one. Finding the
teaching, they quickly become alarmed at how
time to stay current in their discipline, to bring in
many different pencils they need to sharpen! The
new material, or to update to a new text is made
fear of failing to master these applications is also
more difficult when time must also be devoted
quite real (Beggs, 2000). Even for instructors who
to staying current with instructional technologies
are experienced IT users, learning to use addi-
(Beggs, 2000). Recognizing the need to adjust to
tional existing or new technologies can be a
IT improvements and innovations might decrease
formidable challenge.
the likelihood that prospective users will increase
The content realm is probably valued most
their evaluation of and commitment to using IT.
highly by the majority of faculty members. How-
This barrier is also an issue for experienced users
ever, when new technologies are added to the
who may need to learn to use revisions of the IT
changing characteristics of students, non-content
that they have already mastered.
aspects of teaching become more important, and at-
In addition to these technology-based bar-
tention is diverted from the content focus. Faculty
riers, there are several faculty-related barriers
might accept the fact that proper IT integration
to integrating IT. Investment of time and effort
ideally results in a shift from faculty-centered
pose one such barrier (Beggs, 2000). In fact, this
instruction (passive learning) to constructivist or
expenditure is at least implied within all the barri-

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Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

ers we discuss. From training, to decision-making users may be unable to take advantage of those
about which IT options are applicable to a specific opportunities due to teaching load, departmental,
discipline, to actual implementation, becoming or other university demands. Additionally, when
proficient enough to use IT effectively calls for materials using IT are created, issues of intellec-
a significant commitment. “Why,” ask faculty, tual property and uncertainty created by loosely
“should I make this investment?” Even the most defined copyright policies (Duhaney, 2005) pres-
committed new and experienced IT users, who ent yet another issue for faculty.
know the answer centers around improvements All these barriers culminate in concerns over
in learning, are aware of the heavy costs in time the tenure and promotion (T/P) process, an issue
and effort. This barrier probably has the strongest of utmost importance for faculty. It is widely held
negative effect on the evaluation and commitment that efforts in IT integration, although undeniably
of non-users and prospective users. linked to teaching, do not fit into the traditional
Some faculty also worry about the academic teaching, research, and service categories of the
quality of courses that integrate IT (Davis, 2005; T/P process (Davis, 2005; Hagner & Schneebeck,
Duhaney 2005), with suspicions of bells and 2001; Seminoff & Wepner, 1997; Young, 2002).
whistles being used for their sake alone. Barone Many faculty are waiting for tangible recognition
(2005) suggests that “Some traditional academics for the substantial time and effort investment
feel that the habits of the Net Generation result required for IT integration, and it can come in no
in a superficial grasp of their discipline and do other way than by “having a positive impact on
not embody the gravitas of an ‘educated’ person” tenure, promotion, and salary decisions” (Hagner
(¶ 9). Duhaney (2005) points out that even more & Schneebeck, 2001, p. 4).
careful planning is required for a course that inte- Closely related to the T/P issue, and equally im-
grates technologies than for a traditional course. portant, is faculty concern over job security. Many
In addition, most higher-education faculty are higher education institutions have moved towards
not specialists in course design. They are teach- the creation or development of master courses by
ing because of their content expertise. In many ranking, qualified faculty. These courses are then
disciplines, it is uncommon for faculty to receive taught in multiple sections by individuals with
pedagogical training while they are graduate or without tenure, often receiving lower salaries
students. Determining how to integrate IT forces and no benefits. Some faculty feel that this trend
faculty to examine curricular design, something heralds the erosion of the academic profession as
that they are often not used to doing. Because of faculty currently know it. It could also be viewed
this state of affairs, non-users may resist integrat- as a challenge to the traditional notion of faculty
ing IT because it also requires that they specify autonomy, a privilege faculty will be very reluc-
learning objectives and outcomes of their courses. tant to give up (Hagner & Schneebeck, 2001).
Another important barrier to faculty’s willing- As Beggs (2000) puts it, “devaluation of their
ness to embrace IT integration is the perceived lack profession and the possible elimination of their
of substantive incentives and compensation. While job” (¶ 9) constitute a serious suspicion about and
release time, grants, and awards (if available) are obstacle to faculty involvement with IT.
a good start towards helping faculty get started
and feeling that their efforts are recognized and
respected, they are often not sufficient to offset OVERCOMING BARRIERS
the necessary amount of time and effort invested
in training and implementation. Sometimes, even What can be done to overcome these many bar-
when such incentives are offered, prospective riers and to encourage faculty to participate in

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 Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

the “new academy” (Barone, 2005)? As Mitterer are most relevant to their interests, expertise, or
(2006) notes, the explosion of digital technologies discipline. If the general overviews could be
represents “a veritable Trojan horse of pedagogy” delivered by experienced faculty users within the
(p. 60) for higher education. Non-users and department (or if there were an IT support person
prospective users need to be convinced of the familiar with the discipline), new users may more
wisdom and necessity of incorporating IT into readily see how technology fits into their and their
their courses. As the list of barriers indicates, discipline’s values. Because they are often not
this is a very challenging task. Table 3 presents familiar with a faculty member’s discipline, IT
an overview of key strategies to attain greater trainers and consultants may have a more difficult
faculty engagement with and use of IT. job when they lack the credibility of a faculty
First, IT is not a single thing that can be used member’s peers.
in the convincing process. Different faculty will To reduce the learning curve for and time
be interested in different kinds of technologies needed with the new technologies, faculty who
(Beggs, 2000). Thus, one strategy might be to are inexperienced with IT could be encouraged to
provide faculty with very general overviews of simply use those tools. Trying to integrate them
the different technologies and what can be done into their course more fully could be something that
with them, especially within their disciplines. occurs later. By taking “baby steps,” these faculty
Faculty who are exposed to this information might might not get as frustrated or overwhelmed by the
convince themselves of its worth and pursue time and effort demands, yet they still might begin
more-specific training on those technologies that to see some advantages and opportunities that those

Table 3. Strategies for overcoming the major barriers to IT integration in higher education

Barriers Strategies
Provide General Overviews of Options
Encourage Small Steps
Wide range of IT Options
Support for basic as well as advanced
Technology- technologies
Related Foster Support & Training from Peers
Role Conflict
Departmental Roundtables
Pace of IT Improvements
Emphasize Student Need & Demand
& Innovations
University & Departmental & Course-Specific
Time & Effort LMS Templates
Departmental Standards & Requirements
Greater Emphasis on Pedagogy
Academic Quality of Emphasis on Course Design & Redesign
Courses Using IT
Academic-
Related Peer Review of Courses Using IT
Incentives & Compensation Increased Reward Structure for IT Integration
Increased Guideline Definitions & Clarity
Tenure & Promotion
Greater Emphasis on Quality Control
Greater Value, support, & reward for
Job Security
collaboration

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Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

technologies offer (Villano, 2006; Beggs, 2000). To some extent, students are the force of change
At the same time, IT support staff could calibrate for faculty members (Donlevy, 2005). As more
their efforts to teach the basic technologies to instructors utilize IT in their courses, students
new users and the more advanced technologies will come to depend on those technologies and
and integration possibilities to experienced us- might also complain about it when instructors
ers. Working around faculty members’ schedules do not include them. Thus, as more faculty and
(rather than having set times for training) would students rely on IT, the demand for incorporating
also increase receptivity to learning about new IT into courses escalates. Faculty will increasingly
technologies. find that they must begin incorporating these
With regard to the potential role conflicts that technologies, or they will figuratively, or literally,
can inhibit the integration of IT, experienced lose their students. A good strategy might be to
users can assist in clarifying the roles that new recruit students to increase faculty use of IT. For
technologies enable or require. One strategy to example, survey data (e.g., Kvavik & Caruso,
combat role conflicts might be to hold regular 2005) can be used to show faculty what students
roundtable discussions within departments to help like or expect. Students should be encouraged to
faculty identify and articulate discipline-specific be more proactive regarding their education, at
ways to achieve academic and IT integration. least in terms of how their instructors integrate
Another option is to create intra-departmental technology into courses, by requesting specific
training programs that rely on experienced IT technologies or applications from their instructors
users helping prospective or new users (Clayton, (Hagner & Schneebeck, 2001), particularly those
2005; Efaw, 2005). These approaches might show that prepare them for the workplace (Beggs, 2000).
faculty how they can gain knowledge or expertise They could also participate in IT roundtables and
without taking on a new teaching role. It is also serve on IT-related committees at their institutions.
possible that experienced faculty members within When turning to the more academic-related
departments will assume specific technology- barriers, ways of overcoming the issue of time and
related roles. These departmental experts can be effort becomes a prominent question. One simple
an important source of support and training for solution is the development of departmental and
both new and experienced users. course-specific templates within the institution’s
Because so many faculty members consider LMS platform (Clayton, 2005). Such templates al-
themselves to be instructional technology novices, low less-experienced faculty members to minimize
efforts to increase IT integration must focus on their learning curve with the LMS. They would
encouraging and nurturing the non-users and pro- also allow student access to standardized resources
spective users. Efaw (2005) described a 3-phase and materials for multiple sections of a course.
approach to facilitating faculty integration of Another possible route to overcoming the time
technology. The phases include learning about and effort barrier is the development of univer-
and becoming more favorable towards avail- sity and departmental standards or requirements
able technologies, practicing with and receiving (Seminoff & Wepner, 1997). For instance, some
feedback on those technologies, and continuing to institutions have begun to identify the minimal
develop expertise through workshops, discussions, technology tools that all faculty members need
and mentorships. In each phase, this approach to have. It may be that faculty members do not
relies heavily on the experiences, modeling, and need to become technology experts. Some could
feedback of veteran technology users in the so- argue, for example, that because the IT support
cialization of new users. staff are the experts, instructors do not need to
learn the new technologies. However, if faculty

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 Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

will be using these technologies, there most likely experienced users improve their pedagogical
needs to be some minimal level of understanding expertise. Thus, developing a peer review process
in order to troubleshoot and use them effectively. is an excellent way to improve academic quality
It is very likely that faculty will need to develop for users with different levels of experience. All
at least some level of expertise with the tools they of these strategies (as well as the ones we have
use. Institutions might, for example, require a listed in previous sections) can foster an institu-
Web-presence for all their courses. At minimum, tion’s education about and exposure to IT. As this
all faculty could present their syllabi and instruc- process increases in frequency, concerns over
tor contact information online, preferably through academic quality should be ameliorated.
an LMS. Institutions may also want to mandate As we mentioned earlier in this chapter, even
the use of an LMS. Although institutions have if incentives and compensation are available to
begun to address these questions, few consistent help faculty learn about and integrate IT, time and
standards or recommendations have yet to emerge. effort demands must still be addressed. Increasing
This is a critical need. the size of these “carrots” might encourage some
To overcome concerns about academic quality, faculty members to become new IT users (Semi-
institutions will need to demonstrate the ways that noff & Wepner, 1997). However, efforts must also
IT improves the quality of courses that integrate be directed to increasing the perceived value and
IT. This effort must parallel institutional attention necessity of incorporating IT into teaching. Not
to accreditation standards, the development of only must faculty members be convinced, but
learning outcomes, assessments and benchmarks, department chairs, deans, and chief academic
and course design and redesign efforts. Non-users officers must also be brought on board.
and institutional decision-makers must be edu- As long as faculty members get little or no
cated about the pedagogically-sound ways that “credit” for re-assessing their pedagogy through
courses can implement and integrate IT (Semi- course design and redesign efforts that incorporate
noff & Wepner, 1997). One strategy is to set up new instructional technologies, they will continue
centers focused on learning and teaching like the to be resistant to changing their tried-and-true
Learning, Teaching, and Innovative Technologies teaching methods (Beggs, 2000). Thus, another
Center at Middle Tennessee State University or way to increase the perceived value of IT is for
the Technology Assisted Curriculum Center at the institutions to increase the credit given to IT users
University of Utah. These Centers provide faculty by promotion and tenure committees (Bombard-
with resources, training, and expertise on the use ieri, 2006; Hagner & Schneebeck, 2001; Seminoff
of IT. They strive to move faculty toward thinking & Wepner, 1997; Young, 2002). Young (2002)
about sound pedagogical IT integration by helping points to the seldom heard phrase, “‘Teach well
“faculty members gain a better understanding of or perish’”! (¶ 57). Unless more value is placed
technology and incorporate it into their lesson on these endeavors, some faculty may feel it is
plans . . . [to] meet their education objectives . . more advantageous to wait until they have been
. ” (Villano, 2006, p. 32). tenured to learn about and to incorporate the new
Another strategy is to incorporate peer reviews instructional technologies. The efforts to ensure
of courses using IT, not only to help to improve greater academic quality discussed earlier can help
the quality of those courses, but also to clarify the T/P committees to develop appropriate guidelines
criteria that constitute best practices (Bombardieri, that reflect best practices. Hagner and Schneebeck
2006). When they receive peer reviews, new IT (2001) recommend that clear articulation of the
users are provided with developmental guid- parameters for scholarship and activity in the
ance and feedback. By conducting such reviews, area of IT, which can lead to T/P, be presented

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Barriers to and Strategies for Faculty Integration of IT

to faculty in writing. Failure to articulate those REFERENCES

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to prospective IT users and prospective users from Barone, C. (2005). The new academy. In Oblinger,
transitioning to new users. D. G., & Oblinger, J. L. (Eds.) (2005). Educating
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offer a good beginning. Faculty need a forum, be it ers to the adoption of instructional technology.
special sessions of a faculty senate or an even more Proceedings of the Mid-South Instructional Tech-
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Hagner, P. R., & Schneebeck, C. A. (2001). Young, J. R. (2002, February 22). Ever so slowly,
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This work was previously published in Encyclopedia of Distance Learning, Second Edition, edited by Patricia L. Rogers,
Gary A. Berg, Judith V. Boettcher, Caroline Howard, Lorraine Justice and Karen D. Schenk, pp. 138-145, copyright 2009 by
Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 1237

Chapter 5.8
Social Psychology and
Instructional Technology
Robert A. Bartsch
University of Houston - Clear Lake, USA

ABSTRACT thoroughly process them. Examples are provided

illustrating each of these concepts. The author
This chapter examines how principles in social hopes by examining the field of social psychology,
psychology can be applied to instructional tech- new ideas, new understanding, and new areas of
nology. Two areas are discussed to explain why research can emerge in the field of instructional
individuals would have a positive attitude towards technology.
instructional technology but not engage in con-
sistent behaviors. Social psychological research
demonstrates attitudes do not necessarily cor- INTRODUCTION
relate with behaviors. Factors that moderate this
relationship include attitude extremity, attitude It is often useful for outsiders to examine another
importance, attitude accessibility, direct experi- discipline and suggest ways their field can apply.
ence, attitude specificity, habits, and social norms. Therefore, as a social psychologist, I would like
Additionally, if individuals cannot comprehend to glance at instructional technology and attempt
messages, they cannot develop their knowledge to illustrate how research from social psychol-
of instructional technology even if they wanted. ogy can help instructional and other educational
To comprehend messages, individuals have to technologists better understand their domain. I
have the ability (i.e., both knowledge and time) to will give a brief definition of social psychology
along with its contribution of the idea of situ-
ationism. Then I will give an example of how
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch508

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Social Psychology and Instructional Technology

social psychology can be applied to a perplexing individuals relate to people versus objects (Fiske
question in instructional technology, why people & Taylor, 1991). As an individual perceives and
who like and support instructional technology do interacts with others, others perceive, judge, and
not maximize their knowledge of or efficient use respond in return. Although objects may interact
of their instructional technology systems. I will with people and respond to their actions, objects
demonstrate that social psychological research on do not richly interact, are less likely to change, and
attitude-behavior consistency and the theoretical are not perceived as causal agents. Nevertheless,
idea that people are motivated tacticians help there are several areas of psychology, especially
explain this counterintuitive behavior. ones focusing on intra-individual processes such
as social cognition and attitudes that would be
most relevant to instructional technology.
BACKGROUND A key component of social psychology that
relates to many issues in instructional technology
Social psychology is defined as “the scien- is the idea of situationism. Situationism (Ross &
tific attempt to understand and explain how the Nisbett, 1991) is the perspective that a major cause
thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of individuals of social behavior is the situation. Although many
are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied types of psychology relate to the importance of
presence of other human beings” (Fiske, 2004, p. the individual, Lewin (1951), often considered
4). A typical social psychology textbook includes the father of modern social psychology, theorized
chapters on social cognition, person perception, behavior is a function of both personality and
self, attitudes, prejudice, social influence, relation- environment. Social psychologists recognize the
ships, helping, and aggression. Issues relating to importance of the person, but they also recognize
gender and culture are examined in each chapter. the importance of the situation and are familiar
Theories and research from social psychology have with research that demonstrates how many people
helped create and expand the areas of industrial/ underestimate the strength the situation has on
organizational psychology, health psychology, people’s behaviors (Jones, 1990).
forensic psychology, and political psychology. This idea of situationism has allowed social
Given that a main theoretical perspective in psychologists to explain why people often behave
social psychology is sociocultural (Taylor, 1998), counterintuitively such as being willing to give
the theoretical paradigm in instructional technol- electric shocks in near lethal doses to individuals
ogy that social psychology would most closely (Milgram, 1974), deliberatively changing their
relate to is situated learning theory (Reiser & answer just to go along with a group (Asch, 1956),
Dempsey, 2002). In addition, along with the rest and not helping a person who clearly needs assis-
of psychology, social psychology underwent a tance (Darley & Latané, 1968). In each case, the
cognitive revolution in the 1970s with social cog- situation was powerful enough to override how the
nition emerging as a main theoretical perspective individual personality would be prone to behave.
(Taylor, 1998). Therefore, social psychology may To demonstrate how social psychology could
also have applications to instructional technology relate to instructional technology, this chapter
that have its roots in information processing. explores two examples of why people may not
As the definition and the main topics illustrate, maximize their knowledge and efficient use of their
social psychology examines how people interact instructional technology system. Specifically, the
with other people. However, information technol- chapter examines why a college instructor would
ogy often examines how individuals will interact not have a Web site for their course, and why
with objects, and there are differences in how people do not use many of the available shortcuts

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Social Psychology and Instructional Technology

on their computer. For example, in Microsoft Of- indicated when attitudes are more likely to predict
fice, CTRL-S can be used to save a document; behavior. Factors that have been shown, through
however, many people exclusively use the mouse this research, to moderate the relationship between
to save. Although this keystroke saves time, many attitudes and behaviors include attitude strength,
people do not to use it. attitude specificity, habits, and social norms.
There are many reasons why somebody would Several properties relate to the strength of an
not be interested in instructional technology. attitude (Krosnick, Boninger, Chaung, Berent,
Not surprisingly, people who are not interested & Carnot, 1993). One might believe strength in
in new technology or people who are afraid of attitudes relates only to the extremity of the at-
new technology would likely not be motivated titude (Prislin, 1996). That is, a strong positive
to maximize their knowledge and efficiency of attitude towards instructional technology means
their system. Rather, they would avoid using the the person is extremely in favor of it. However,
technology altogether. This behavior would be in- stronger attitudes can also be strong because they
tuitive although perhaps not productive. Therefore, are more important, accessible, or based on direct
to examine how social psychology can explain experience. Importance is defined as how deeply
counterintuitive behavior, these examples will the individual cares about the attitude object.
assume the person is interested in instructional Accessibility relates to whether the attitude is
technology and wants to learn and develop their routinely salient (i.e., prominent) in a person’s
skills and be a more effective teacher. Therefore, mind. For example, in a national election, people’s
the examples used in this chapter concern a col- political attitudes will likely be more accessible.
lege instructor who wants to develop a course Direct experience means people have had en-
Web site but does not and a person who wants to counters with the object themselves as opposed
learn Microsoft Office shortcuts but does not. To to getting information about the object from a
illustrate how people who have positive attitudes secondary source. For instance, a person may
about instructional technology may not behave in have a stronger attitude about a specific brand of
ways congruent with that attitude, the following car if they have driven the car themselves rather
sections discuss research on attitude-behavior than listening to a friend about his or her driving
consistency and the theoretical idea of people as experience.
motivated tacticians. Based on the ideas of attitude strength there are
many situations in which a person has a positive
attitude about instructional technology, but does
ATTITUDE-BEHAVIOR not act like it. Obviously, if an instructor only has
CONSISTENCY a slightly positive (i.e., very low on extremity) atti-
tude towards creating a course Web site, then there
Attitudes are the “overall evaluation of persons will be little motivation to complete that task. As
(including oneself), objects, and issues” (Petty another example, although a person may believe
& Wegener, 1998, p. 323), and behavior is the they should use the Microsoft Word shortcut, they
action related towards the person, object, or is- perceive the consequences as being minimal and
sue. Early social psychological research LaPiere not affecting their values. Therefore, the attitude
(1934) indicated people’s attitudes do not always has low importance. Also, if their attitude about
match their behavior. In fact, an early review of educational technology is not accessible during
the literature demonstrated typically small cor- an important planning period, possibly because
relations, usually less than .30, between attitudes other topics are competing for attention, then
and behavior (Wicker, 1969). Later research has behavior may not be predicted from a positive

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attitude. Finally, if the person who has a positive about instructional technology; however that at-
attitude about course Web sites does not have any titude may be too general to predict the person’s
direct experience with them, then their attitude behaviors related to instructional technology.
may be weaker than if they have previously had For example, an instructor may have a positive
a course Web site. attitude towards instructional technology, but that
Based on this analysis, there are several attitude would likely not predict whether the person
methods to increase positive behaviors toward would create a course Web site. Rather, measuring
instructional technology. (1) Increase the extrem- a matching attitude about creating course Web
ity of the attitude. Probably the most permanent sites would better predict behavior. Although this
way of changing an attitude would be to create insight does not provide recommendations for
quality arguments in favor of the instructional getting individuals to use instructional technology
technology and give them repeatedly to the audi- more effectively, it does provide insight into how
ence (Cacioppo & Petty, 1985; Petty, Haugtvedt, to measure attitudes about instructional technology
& Smith, 1995). (2) Emphasize the importance that better predict a desired behavior.
of the attitude. For example, a person does not Attitudes may not relate to behaviors due to
likely care about wasting 2 seconds using a mouse habits. For instance, a person may have a nega-
instead of a shortcut. However, pointing out how tive attitude about biting one’s fingernails, but
many shortcuts exist and how much time could continues to bite them out of habit. Research
be saved over an extended period may increase indicates habits are automatically activated based
the attitude’s importance. (3) Create an environ- on a goal (Aarts & Dijksterhuis, 2000). For ex-
ment such that people will recall their attitude ample, a person may have a habit of using the
at a crucial time. For example, instructors could computer mouse that is activated by the goal of
be presented with information about course Web saving the Microsoft Office document. Because
sites and reminded of their attitude right before there is no controlled processing, the attitude of
they begin planning the next semester. (4) Finally, using instructional technology efficiently is not
provide direct experience. Providing resources to accessed. This factor could be quite problematic
instructors to allow them to create a course Web in the realm of instructional technology because
site, could increase the likelihood they would, in adapting to new instructional technologies likely
the future, create another course Web site on their means discarding old habits.
own. However, care needs to be taken to make A final reason why attitudes may not predict
sure creating a course Web site does not make the behavior has to do with social norms. Social norms
instructor begin to have a negative attitude about are cultural rules about how to behave and not
course Web sites. behave. Social norms are often powerful enough
Another reason why attitudes do not necessarily to affect behavior. For example, a salesperson
predict behaviors is that the measured attitude is may have a negative attitude about a customer,
too general to predict a specific behavior (Kim & but it is unlikely the salesperson will behave in a
Hunter, 1993). For example, a person may have way that lets the customer know their dislike. A
a positive attitude about the United Way but not teenager may only smoke because it is the social
make any yearly donation. Measuring the person’s norm of their peer group. Social norms can easily
attitude towards, not the United Way as a whole, prevent a person from adopting positive behaviors
but rather towards making donations to the United relating to instructional technology even if they
Way will give a better indication of whether the have a positive attitude. If people do not receive
person will make a donation to the United Way. approval from important others, or in fact receive
Likewise, many people have a positive attitude disapproval from these important others, then

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Social Psychology and Instructional Technology

even a positive attitude will unlikely produce a likely not spend much cognitive energy choos-
congruent behavior. These important others can ing which groceries to purchase. Rather, various
be peers, upper administration, students, and so shortcuts would be used such as what has been
forth. For positive attitudes about course Web sites bought in the past, what is on sale, what is very
to relate to behavior, the administration would convenient to get, and so forth. However, when
have to make sure the social norms approve of a person purchases a car, they often spend much
course Web sites. more time and energy determining if it is a good
purchase. Although they may still use shortcuts
(e.g., whether their friend likes the car or not), it is
PEOPLE AS MOTIVATED difficult to imagine a person being more cavalier
TACTICIANS choosing a car than choosing cereal.
Evidence indicates people process informa-
The social psychological idea that people are tion thoroughly when they have both motivation
motivated tacticians also illustrates why indi- and ability to expend cognitive energy (Petty &
viduals may have a positive attitude towards Cacioppo, 1986). Motivation to improve one’s
instructional technology but not have matching knowledge about instructional technology would
behaviors. However, instead of directly examining likely be present if one has a positive attitude about
behavior, this idea focuses on whether a person instructional technology. However, if a person
can become more knowledgeable about a topic. does not have the ability, that person will be forced
With the cognitive revolution in psychology and to process information heuristically (i.e., using
social psychology, researchers initially theorized shortcuts). Ability includes both knowledge and
people were cognitive misers (Fiske & Taylor, time. If a person does not understand instructional
1984). That is, people would only process the technology, they will likely not be able to make
minimal amount of information needed about good decisions concerning its use. For example, if
a concept and would naturally conserve their the person does not have enough experience with
cognitive resources. Being a cognitive miser is the technology to understand the help documen-
oftentimes beneficial. With all the stimuli and tation, then when they encounter a problem, that
decisions people are presented with everyday, person will not be able to think carefully or easily
people must have processing shortcuts to be able expand their knowledge. Similarly, if a person
to successfully relate to the world around them. does not have enough experience with a type of
However, if people were consistently cognitive technology, instruction could easily be “over their
misers, it would be very difficult for them to learn head” and not useful. Likewise, if a person does not
new instructional technologies. People would rely have enough time to think carefully about a topic,
on tricks used with previous systems and would be they will likely not be able to learn more about it.
less likely to adapt to new technology or even new All of these problems can occur even if they are
versions of existing technology. Rather, cognitive interested in learning about the technology. An
resources would be saved for other uses. instructor who wants to create a course Web site
Social psychological theorists realized people without enough ability would likely not be able
do not always act as cognitive misers. Rather, to develop the knowledge necessary to facilitate
they pick and choose when to expend significant the creation of a quality Web site. Consequently,
cognitive energy and when to be cognitive misers. for an instructor to be able to create an effective
In other words, researchers theorized individuals course Web site, they must have the time and
are what are called motivated tacticians (Fiske enough knowledge to proceed.
& Taylor, 1991). For example, a person would

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FUTURE TRENDS factors include social norms. Although there are

a greater number of person than situation factors,
Although it is important to become familiar with personality is not necessarily more relevant than
one’s own discipline, oftentimes other disciplines the situation in determining how individuals will
can shed light on important topics. Clearly instruc- behave. Rather, the environment of the group
tional technology applies to many different fields (e.g., organization, classroom) can greatly affect
from the military to business and from higher edu- not only situational factors but also many of the
cation to health care (Reiser & Dempsey, 2002). person variables. An organization can provide
Undoubtedly, as instructional technology becomes time and encourage direct experience. Likewise,
more and more relevant, the frequency of potential an organization through its culture can increase
applications will only increase. Hopefully, at the attitude accessibility and the importance of cer-
same time instructional technology will continue tain attitudes. As indicated by research in social
to incorporate research into their discipline from psychology, the situation is more important than
other fields. In this chapter I have suggested social most people realize.
psychology be at the forefront of disciplines that
can be useful for instructional technologists to
explore so they may better understand their own REFERENCES
discipline. I would like to mention another benefit
of examining social psychology. Although the Aarts, H., & Dijksterhuis, A. (2000). Habits as
examples used in this chapter assumed individuals knowledge structures: Automaticity in goal-
would be positively motivated to develop their directed behavior. Journal of Personality and
knowledge concerning instructional technology, Social Psychology, 78, 53–63. doi:10.1037/0022-
that assumption is often not realistic. Research and 3514.78.1.53
theories from social psychology can also show how Asch, S. E. (1956). Studies of independence and
to persuade people to believe they need to gain a conformity: A minority of one against a unanimous
greater appreciation of instructional technology. majority. Psychological Monographs: General
This deep body of knowledge has already been and Applied, 70, 1–70.
applied to other situations in which a person is
often not motivated, such as helping health psy- Cacioppo, J. T., & Petty, R. E. (1985). Central and
chologists study how doctors can get patients to peripheral routes to persuasion: The role of mes-
obey instructions (Sadava, 1997). sage repetition. In L. F. Alwitt & A. A. Mitchell
(Eds.), Psychological processes and advertising
effects (pp. 91-111). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
CONCLUSION Darley, J. M., & Latané, B. (1968). Bystander
intervention in emergencies: Diffusion of re-
Research and theories from social psychology
sponsibility. Journal of Personality and Social
demonstrate how individuals may have a positive
Psychology, 8, 377–383. doi:10.1037/h0025589
attitude about instructional technology but not
have a corresponding behavior. The factors this Driscoll, M. P. (2002). Psychological foundations
chapter has examined can be broken down into of instructional design. In R. A. Reiser & J. V.
person factors and situational (i.e., environmental) Dempsey (Eds.), Trends and issues in instructional
factors. Person factors include attitude extremity, design and technology (pp. 57-69). Upper Saddle
attitude importance, attitude accessibility, direct River, NJ: Pearson Education.
experience, habits, and knowledge. Environmental

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Fiske, S. T. (2004). Social beings: A core mo- Petty, R. E., & Wegener, D. T. (1998). Attitude
tives approach to social psychology. Hoboken, change: Multiple roles for persuasion variables.
NJ: Wiley. In D. T. Gilbert, S. T. Fiske, & G. Lindzey (Eds.),
Handbook of social psychology (4th ed., Vol. 1,
Fiske, S. T., & Taylor, S. E. (1984). Social cogni-
pp. 323-390). New York: McGraw-Hill.
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Prislin, R. (1996). Attitude stability
Fiske, S. T., & Taylor, S. E. (1991). Social cogni-
and attitude strength: One is enough to
tion (2nd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
make it stable. European Journal of So-
Jones, E. E. (1990). Interpersonal perception. cial Psychology, 26, 447–477. doi:10.1002/
New York: Freeman. (SICI)1099-0992(199605)26:3<447::AID-
EJSP768>3.0.CO;2-I
Kim, M., & Hunter, J. E. (1993). Attitude-behavior
relations: A meta-analysis of attitudinal relevance Reiser, R. A., & Dempsey, J. V. (Eds.). (2002).
and topic. The Journal of Communication, Trends and issues in instructional design and
43, 101–142. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1993. technology. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson
tb01251.x Education.
Krosnick, J. A., Boninger, D. S., Chuang, Y. Ross, L. R., & Nisbett, R. E. (1991). The person
C., Berent, M. K., & Carnot, C. G. (1993). At- and the situation: Perspectives of social psychol-
titude strength: One construct or many related ogy. New York: McGraw-Hill.
constructs? Journal of Personality and Social
Sadava, S. W. (1997). Social psychology of health
Psychology, 65, 1132–1151. doi:10.1037/0022-
care. In S. W. Sadava & D. R. McCreary (Eds.),
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Applied social psychology (pp. 68-92). Upper
LaPiere, R. T. (1934). Attitudes vs. actions. Social Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Forces, 13, 230–237. doi:10.2307/2570339
Taylor, S. E. (1998). The social being in social
Lewin, K. (1951). Field theory in social science psychology. In D. T. Gilbert, S. T. Fiske, & G.
(D. Cartwright, Ed.). New York: Harper. Lindzey (Eds.), Handbook of social psychology (4th
ed., Vol. 1, pp. 58-98). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to authority. New
York: Harper and Row. Wicker, A. W. (1969). Attitudes versus actions:
The relationship of verbal and overt behavioral
Petty, R. E., & Cacioppo, J. T. (1986). The
responses to attitude objects . The Journal of
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Social Issues, 25, 41–79.
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social psychology (Vol. 19, pp. 123-205). New
York: Academic Press.
KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Petty, R. E., Haugtvedt, C. P., & Smith, S. M.
(1995). Elaboration as a determinant of attitude Ability: Ability is having the resources (e.g.,
strength: Creating attitudes that are persistent, knowledge, time) to accomplish a task.
resistant, and predictive of behavior. In R. E. Attitude Strength: Attitude strength is the
Petty & J. A. Krosnick (Eds.), Attitude strength: stability of an attitude and the impact the attitude
Antecedents and consequences. Hillsdale, NJ: has on information processing and behavior.
Erlbaum.

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Attitude-Behavior Consistency: the use of their cognitive resources and when to

Attitude/behavior consistency is whether an at- engage in effortful processing of information.
titude (i.e., overall evaluation) does or does not Situationism: Situationism is the theory that
correspond with behavior (i.e., action). situations are a major determinant of individual
Cognitive Miser: Cognitive miser is the idea behavior.
that people minimize the use of their cognitive Social Psychology: Social psychology is the
resources. scientific study of how individuals relate with and
Motivated Tactician: Motivated tactician is are influenced by other people.
the idea that people choose when to minimize

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 944-951, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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Chapter 5.9
Addressing Emotions within
E-Learning Systems
Valentino Zurloni
CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy

Fabrizia Mantovani
CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy & ATN-P LAB, Istituto Auxologico Italiano, Italy

Marcello Mortillaro
CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy & CISA - University of Geneva, Switzerland

Antonietta Vescovo
CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy

Luigi Anolli
CESCOM, University of Milan - Bicocca, Italy

ABSTRACT vices that interact with learners in a motivating,

engaging, and helpful way. Secondly, within the
Emotions are attracting growing attention within of the framework affective computing paradigm,
the instructional design research community. the different modalities for detecting emotions in
However, clarification is still required as to how instructional technology contexts will be system-
exactly to address emotions within the field of atically reviewed, and the strengths and limits of
e-learning. The aim of this chapter is twofold. each will be discussed on the basis of the most
Firstly, we will focus on the reasons for includ- up-to-date research outcomes. Finally, a tentative
ing emotions within the instructional technology architecture for emotion recognition in computer-
domain, and in particular, on the relevance of based learning will be proposed, focusing on the
emotions to computer-based learning. The need adoption of a multimodal approach to emotion
for specific theory in this regard is heightened recognition, in order to overcome the limitations
by the current drive to design instructional de- and the difficulties associated with individual
modalities.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch509

Copyright © 2011, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
 Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems

INTRODUCTION the need to consider emotions in e-learning en-

vironments, it seems that, with the exception of
The Role of Emotions in Learning computer anxiety, the emotions experienced dur-
ing computer-based learning have not yet been
There is growing recognition that emotions and analyzed in depth (Pekrun, 2005). Thus, there is
affect play an important role in learning. The a great need for e-learning projects to take the
learning process is influenced by factors con- role of emotions in learning into account and to
nected to the person, the task, and the context integrate this understanding into their pedagogi-
as well as the learner’s own on-going evaluation cal approach.
of the process itself. Situational characteristics
and individual appraisals can trigger emotions Affect and Emotions in
(Efklides & Volet, 2005). In turn, as stated by E-Learning Design
Barrett and Salovey (2002), affect in learning
facilitates the development of persistence and Very often, e-learning implies the presentation
interest in a topic. Emotions can also influence of information and material on a very rational
learning through information processing activity basis, overlooking the role of emotions. Yet,
and organization of recall (Pekrun, Goetz, Titz, & computer-based learning can be affected by a
Perry, 2002). Furthermore, emotions can provide range of emotions, including some which do not
information about the learner’s own evaluation occur within face-to-face learning, such as emo-
of the learning process, since they are linked to tions directed at technology. Nowadays almost all
control- and value-related appraisals within a Web-based training platforms allow computer-
learning environment (Gläser-Zikuda & Mayring, mediated communication, where e-learning can
2003). For instance, positive emotions generally take place within either solo or social situations.
indicate that successful task control and interest In solo learning, self-directed, task-directed, and
have been experienced. Our learning, therefore, technology-directed emotions have been identi-
is heavily dependent on the emotional state we fied. In social online learning, further emotions
are in (LeDoux, 1998), and on the dynamic pat- have been observed, such as emotions directed at
tern of positive and negative emotions occurring another learner, at the group the learner belongs to,
in a given time period within a learning context or at another group of learners that his/her group
(Sansone & Thoman, 2005). is interacting with (Wosnitza & Volet, 2005).
The role of emotions can be relatively easily Moreover, as O’Regan (2003) has pointed
recognized and managed within face-to-face learn- out, there has been little exploration to date of
ing, where they have been shown to be significantly the extent, nature, and significance of affect and
related to student motivation, learning strategies, emotions in e-learning design. If emotions are es-
cognitive resources, and achievement (Pekrun et sential to human thinking and learning processes,
al., 2002). What is worth considering is the role virtual platforms and learning environments need
of emotions when students are remote from their to cater to the emotional factor in order to be
teacher—even when computer-based education successful. In particular, the computer graphical
can be supported by a human tutor, the latter is interface should not treat humans like informa-
likely to have a lesser awareness of the emotional tion processing machines, but should take their
state of students, and may thus more easily fail emotions into account. Therefore, it is critical that
to provide a responsible teaching presence and system designers consider the range of possible
appropriate leadership and direction (Wosnitza affective states that users may experience while
& Volet, 2005). Despite general awareness of interacting with the system.

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The key problematic issue remains how to DETECTING EMOTIONS

address emotions in human-computer interac- WITHIN INSTRUCTIONAL
tion: This topic is currently the focus of a specific TECHNOLOGY DOMAIN
research field defined as affective computing
(Picard, 1997). All studies with the aim of in- The first step towards the integration of emotional
cluding emotions within information technology intelligence is the ability to detect users’ emotions.
design can be ascribed to this domain, which deals Two main emotion detection approaches can be
specifically with three different levels of emotion identified within e-learning environments—that
integration: the detection of user emotions, the carried out by a human tutor, or teacher, participat-
expression of emotions by computers, and ulti- ing in the learning environment, and that carried
mately, the possibility for a computer to “have” out by the e-learning system itself, termed auto-
emotions. All three levels of emotion integration matic. The first is largely similar to the emotion
can greatly enhance the interaction of users with recognition taking place in traditional learning
computer programs. Thus, software can nowadays environments and may also be used in computer
be provided with a kind of emotional intelligence, supported learning, although the human tutor may
conceived of as one of the most critical character- have reduced access to emotional information. The
istics for successful human interaction (Salovey second demands a more defined and specific basis
& Mayer, 1990). The current chapter will mainly and is more suitable for autonomous e-learning
focus on the issue of detection. systems.
With specific reference to educational research, When addressing automatic emotion recogni-
according to Picard et al. (2004), new technolo- tion, researchers must answer two main questions:
gies can play a double role: On the one hand, they First, when in the course of the learning interac-
can help provide new types of research data on tion the system should be emotionally aware, and
the role of affect in learning, laying the bases for second, how it should recognize emotions, that
new approaches to education, and on the other, is, based on which signals.
can provide enhanced computer-based learning With regard to the timing issue, emotion
environments to support the user more effectively recognition processes may be activated in three
through his/her learning process. different periods vis-à-vis the learning path: (1)
This chapter introduces the preliminary ques- measurement immediately before and/or after
tions needing to be addressed in order to carry out the learning process, (2) measurement during the
emotion assessment within learning environments. learning process, and (3) stimulated recall mea-
Such questions highlight the need for wider use surement of emotions after the learning process
of recognition instruments. Subsequently, after (Wosnitza & Volet, 2005).
reviewing a number of possible channels of Measuring emotions just before or after the
emotion detection in e-learning applications, a learning process, on the one hand does not inter-
multimodal approach is recommended in order to rupt the learning experience but, on the other,
increase reliability of recognition outcomes. On requires specific pre-scripted moments to be
the basis of this multimodal approach, a tentative integrated that may irritate the user and may lose
architecture for automatic emotion recognition is efficacy due to the delay between the emotional
outlined. Inclusion of a cognitive component is experience and the emotional assessment. The
suggested, in order to integrate the outcomes from delay factor also impairs the effectiveness of the
different channels, as well as the registration of “emotional coping” that the system should ideally
meaningful events experienced by the user during carry out. Similar, but amplified, drawbacks apply
the learning experience. to stimulated recall measurement.

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 Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems

Emotion recognition during the learning pro- studies have been carried out on the link between
cess may be a better solution. This involves real- emotional states and modifications in each of the
time emotion assessment, with the potential to be following channels: physiological correlates, fa-
time effective when an emotionally relevant modi- cial expressions, gestures, verbal communication,
fication occurs. On the other hand, real-time emo- vocal non-verbal communication.
tion automatic recognition faces greater technical Physiological correlates of emotions have been
challenges than the other possible timing options, considered a reliable means of detection since the
and furthermore needs to be as truly automatic as work of James (1884). Ekman, Levenson, and
possible so as not to disrupt the learning process. Friesen (1983) suggested that the identification
In consequence, a balanced recommendation is of distinct emotions on the basis of autonomic
for real-time emotion recognition to take place in nervous system (ANS) activity requires taking into
specific and critical learning moments. account different indices simultaneously. Various
In regards on how to detect emotions, a num- instruments for the detection of physiological
ber of channels are described in the next para- signals (e.g., blood volume pulse, respiration,
graph. Before outlining individual modalities it skin conductance, electromyography, neurological
is worth mentioning that considering emotion to response) are already in existence and are subject
be a componential process (Scherer, 1984, 2001) to constant enhancement, particularly in order
enables simultaneous inclusion of many different to make them less intrusive by integrating them
measures (Pantic & Rothkrantz, 2003). This ap- into more natural seeming devices, for example,
proach enhances the likelihood of recognizing an incorporation of sensors in a mouse or wearable
emotional state, and partially reduces the risk of jackets. The main problem is recognized to be the
distortion due to factors such as social desirability extreme variability of these signals across people
and deliberate control of emotional expression and situations and even within the same person.
(Pekrun, 2005). Each channel presents its own This is borne out by the fact that few studies have
limitations, but these may be partially overcome indicated the existence of specific patterns of auto-
by the adoption of a multimodal approach to nomic activity for specific emotions (for a review
emotion recognition, which integrates informa- see Cacioppo, Berntson, Larsen, Poehlmann, &
tion from multiple sources and may be regulated Ito, 2000). The search for an invariant relationship
depending on the context of use. between emotions and physiological responses
should be abandoned in favor of the analysis of,
A Multimodal Approach to under what conditions, and for which emotions,
Emotion Recognition differential physiological activity is observed
(Cacioppo et al., 2000).
Providing e-learning systems with the ability A number of attempts at automatic emotion
to recognize user emotions is a prerequisite for recognition from physiological measures have
the enhancement of computer-based learning by been made. Some researchers have tried to directly
integrating emotional experience. Recognition link a set of values to a set of emotions via various
systems face two core challenges: (1) detection statistical algorithms (Nasoz, Alvarez, Lisetti, &
of the emotion-related signals provided by the Finkelstein, 2004). Others, using a dimensional
users and (2) inference of the emotional state of model of emotion (where emotions are represented
the user according to the signals detected. along some main axes, typically arousal and va-
With regard to modes of detection, in addition lence) have tried to use each physiological measure
to self-report measures, a number of channels as an index of a single dimension (Picard, Vyzas,
are considered emotion sensitive. For instance, & Healey, 2001; Prendinger, Mori, & Ishizuka,

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Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems

2005). What emerged from most of these studies In any case, the FACS model is not free of
is that physiological measures alone cannot pro- problems. Although prototypic expressions of
vide enough information for emotion recognition: some emotions, for example happiness, are natural,
other information is needed (Scheirer, Fernandez, they occur infrequently in everyday life, since
Klein, & Picard, 2002). In addition, awareness of people tend to communicate more through subtle
the context can have critical significance for the facial actions. In addition, emotions like confu-
interpretation of physiological data (Stemmler, sion, boredom, and frustration do not have cor-
2003; Ward & Marsden, 2003). responding prototypic expressions. Furthermore,
Facial expressions of emotions have been in- this method lacks temporal and detailed spatial
vestigated in depth. According to Ekman (1994), information (Russell & Fernàndez-Dols, 1997).
each emotion goes with a specific pattern of facial Gestures are not generally linked to specific
actions, as predicted by the Facial Action Cod- emotions. Although some studies have identified
ing System (FACS) (Ekman & Friesen, 1978). expression of emotional meaning through body
Although this bi-univocal link has been severely movements (Wallbott, 1998), psychologists gener-
criticized, most of the research on automated ally maintain that the meaning of gestures is mainly
emotion recognition is based on the FACS model. determined by the specific interaction context.
An early work carried out by Kaiser and Weh- Consequently, it is difficult to assume a direct link
rle (1992) described a procedure for automatic between gestures and specific emotional states.
detection of facial behavior independently of The situation with regard to posture is even
individual physiognomic differences, through more complicated, since in the field of nonverbal
the use of plastic dots affixed to predefined facial behavior research there is no established and gen-
regions. A pattern-recognition algorithm identi- eralized criterion about how to classify postures
fies dot patterns that are classified according to or about the association between posture and
the FACS by an artificial neural network. More emotional state. However, some attempts have
recently, Cowie et al. (2001) outlined a system for been made to automatically detect emotion from
the recognition of facial expressions by identify- postures and gestures. Mota and Picard (2003)
ing Facial Animation Parameter Units defined presented a system for recognizing naturally oc-
in MPEG-4 standard, but the system is still not curring postures and associated affective states,
fully automatic and requires human assistance. relating to the interest level of children while
Conversely, Kapoor, Qi, and Picard (2003) pro- performing a learning task on a computer. The
posed a fully automatic framework that requires system is capable of two kinds of recognition: (1)
no manual intervention to analyze and recognize recognition of a static posture position and (2) rec-
upper facial actions, corresponding to the regions ognition of a sequence of postural behaviors. The
of eyes and eyebrows. Tian, Kanade, and Cohn system is not fully automatic because it requires
(2000) developed an automated system to analyze preliminary selection and coding of posture action
subtle changes in facial expressions, based on both units by human observers. Similarly, affective
permanent (brows, eyes, mouth) and transient states linked to postures have to be selected and
(deepening of facial furrows) facial features in labeled manually by observers.
a nearly frontal image sequence. The system is The verbal communication of emotions con-
based on multi-state templates that require manual cerns terms and words produced in concurrence
set up in the first frame of the sequence; thus the with an emotion, and it takes into account the
system is not fully automatic. cultural differences reflected in the terms adopted
and in their meaning (the so-called emotional lexi-

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con). The language-emotion relationship has been theoretical and scientific to application based.
studied from various perspectives: lexicographic The first category focuses on acted speech and
research on words that refer to emotions, highly on a broader range of emotions, while the sec-
related to the universality or culture-relativity of ond includes, for instance, work on speech from
human emotions (Wierzbicka, 1995); syntactic automatic call centers (Batliner et al., 2000) and
research focusing on emotion verbs like to fear, research on detection of stress during driving
and so forth; investigation of certain types of (Fernandez & Picard, 2003). As pointed out by
language use, such as hyperbole, repetition, the Oudeyer (2003), research on automated vocal
use of strong metaphors; conversational analysis, production and recognition of emotion has only
which studies the rules regulating the occurrence been carried out for a short number of years. As
of emotionally expressive behavior in interaction. well as systems aimed at automatically detecting
Attempts at automatic emotion recognition some basic emotions independently of context,
based on verbal communication can be grouped systems have been developed to focus on one/two
into a number of categories: (1) keyword spotting, target emotions, of particular relevance to specific
where text is classified into affect categories based application fields. For example, Batliner et al.
on the presence of fairly unambiguous affect words (2000) proposed a system for the recognition of
like distressed, enraged, and happy, for example, anger to enhance the effectiveness and usability
affective reasoner (Elliott, 1993) and Ortony’s af- of automatic dialog processing.
fective lexicon (Ortony, Clore, & Collins, 1988); Self-report measures have also been proposed
(2) lexical affinity, detecting more than just obvious to detect emotions. Some researchers have de-
affect words, the approach assigns arbitrary words veloped questionnaires to be administered to
a probabilistic “affinity” with a particular emotion; participants in order to obtain information about
(3) statistical natural language processing, that is, their emotional experience (Russell & Mehrabian,
by feeding a machine a learning algorithm with a 1977; Scherer, 1988). Besides questionnaires,
large training corpus of affectively annotated texts, other self-report measures based on nonverbal and
it is possible for the system to learn the affective pictorial methods (e.g., Self Assessment Manikin
valence of affective keywords as well as that of Scale; Bradley & Lang, 1984) were put forward;
other arbitrary keywords (as in the lexical affinity here users choose the images that best represent
approach), punctuation, and word co-occurrence their emotional states, partially overcoming the
frequencies. limits inherent to linguistic and verbal expression.
The vocal-nonverbal communication of emo- This means of detection, on the one hand is
tions deals with the differences that can be identi- non-intrusive, fast and cheap, but, on the other,
fied in some phonatory variables (e.g., intensity, can be affected by distortion due to social desir-
tone, rhythm) when an individual is, for example, ability factors and to the potential inability of the
expressing happiness or sadness: Some patterns of user to correctly express his/her own emotional
vocal sopra-segmental traits have been described experience.
(for a review see Juslin & Laukka, 2003; Scherer, What emerges from this review is that each
2003). Several studies have shown that each emo- channel has its own strengths and weaknesses
tion is associated with a distinctive vocal profile that should be taken into account when trying to
in a systematic way. implement an automatic recognition model. Table
A growing research corpus about automatic 1 provides a brief critical assessment of the differ-
recognition of emotions from voice can be found ent channels reviewed, both from psychological
in scientific literature. It should be pointed out that and implementational viewpoints.
the motivations behind these studies range from

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Table 1. Assessment of different detection channels

CHANNEL EVALUATION INTRUSIVENESS TECHNICAL PRICE / COSTS

COMPLEXITY
Physiological Advantages: Rapid and synchronous Very high. Hardware difficul- Medium-high
measures modifications. Biological foundations. Future development of ties: Integration of for physiological
Uncontrollable by the participant. wearable devices may specific devices. detection device.
Limits: Easily influenced by non- reduce it. Software difficulties:
emotional events and environment. Wide (1) real-time data
variations across people, situations, and processing; (2) rec-
even within the same individual. ognition algorithms.
Facial expres- Advantages: Relatively spontaneous; Medium. Hardware difficul- High for cameras
sions, gestures, easy to observe; objective. People can be annoyed ties: Integration of and AU recogni-
and posture Limits: influenced by non emotional by cameras. Some cameras. tion software.
factors and by environmental events systems require cameras Software difficulties:
(context). May be culturally influenced. positioned on partici- (1) AU extraction;
Gestures are linked to conversation. pants’ head. (2) posture tracking
and extraction; 3)
real-time processing.
Speech (verbal) Advantages: Non intrusive; easy to Low Software difficulties: Low for micro-
collect. Integration of word phone. Medium
Limits: For emotion lexicon, difficult to recognition software for word recogni-
know whether the reported emotion is a and emotional tion software
conceptualisation or the effective state; semantic map.
whereas linguistic indexes require long
conversational sequences to be detected.
Vocal non-verbal Advantages: Link to physiological Low Hardware difficul- Low for the mi-
measures changes; wide research tradition on emo- ties: Integration of a crophone
tional vocal patterns; low intrusivity. spectrograph and for
Limits: Technical difficulties; prob- Software difficulties: spectrograph.
lems in noisy environments; possible (1) real-time data
problems with phonetic variability; processing.; (2) rec-
few results for naturally collected data; ognition algorithms.
recognition rate varies according to the
database (number of emotions, mode
of data collection, number of speakers);
systematic confusion for some emotions.
Self-report Advantages: Simple to administer to the Medium/low. None Low
measures user. Requires definition of
Limits: distortions due to social desir- timing, may disrupt the
ability, errors in the self-monitoring learning process.
process, cultural differences, potential
disruption of learning path.

Guidelines for Designing an various input signals with other elements, so as

Inferential System of Emotion to infer the user’s emotional state.
Recognition Specifically, we propose that a cognitive archi-
tecture of emotions should be designed in order to
Once emotion-related signals have been detected, output a possible emotional state, by working from
the recognition system needs an inferential system four main inputs: (1) individual characteristics,
in order to attribute an emotional state to the users. (2) initial signal profile, (3) real-time signals, and
The inferential system can be defined as a (4) context modeling.
cognitive architecture that is able to integrate the Firstly, the system should profile the user
in terms of different psychological variables in

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order to establish his/her individual personality lacking. Emotions result from both an arousal
characteristics. In other words, the user should component and from a cognitive component, the
be emotionally and motivationally profiled (e.g., latter encompassing the appraisal of arousal and its
Matsubara & Nagamachi, 1996), and these char- attribution to an emotion eliciting event. Appraisal
acteristics, subsequently, should be taken into theories suggest that emotions are elicited and
account to weight the possible outcomes of the shaped by an individual’s subjective evaluation
context modeling. of situations or events that affect the individual’s
Secondly, an initial stage of interaction should needs or goals (Frijda, 1986; Scherer, 1984;
be provided for, in order to detect the baseline val- Weiner, 1986). Environmental or proprioceptive
ues of physiological and vocal nonverbal signals stimuli are evaluated by the individual vis-à-vis
for each user (physiological and vocal profiles). a number of criteria and dimensions linked to
Due to the interpersonal variation for these signals, individual meaning. As a result, the same stimulus
the inferential system needs a period to register can provoke very different emotional reactions
the signal levels of the user at rest: these values among people (Lazarus, 1966), depending on the
will be considered the baseline for modifications outcome of the subjective appraisal.
detected during the interaction (Berntson, Uchino, Appraisal theorists suggest that individuals
& Cacioppo, 1994). use a fixed number of dimensions or criteria for
Thirdly, the inferential system should work on evaluating the significance of the events. These
the outputs of different modality-specific modules criteria can be categorized into four major classes:
(speech: vocal analysis module; visual analysis (1) intrinsic characteristics, such as novelty; (2)
module; physiological signal module; self-report significance for individual’s needs or goals; (3)
measures module; speech: verbal module). Each of ability to influence or cope with the consequences
these has its own limitations, and none can be fully of an event; and (4) compatibility with social or
relied upon to detect emotions in isolation from the personal standards, norms, or values (Scherer,
others, whereas multimodal analysis may at least 1984).
partially reduce problems (Pantic & Rothkrantz, The model of emotions proposed by Ortony et
2003). All the modules provide information about al. (1988) is one of the most used within affective
behavior and physiological variations displayed computing, since it can be implemented in com-
by the user at a certain stage of the interaction: puter software. The authors do not represent affect
Variations should be processed by the inferential as a set of basic emotions nor as emotions defined
system in order to assess emotional state using within a dimensional space, but group emotions
an advanced statistical approach, including dif- according to the eliciting cognitive conditions.
ferent learning and classification algorithms. The inclusion of context modeling to address
To this end, it is critically necessary to define a the cognitive component of emotion may require
training database, as a fundamental prerequisite the definition of an additional module (registry
for developing reliable classification algorithms module). This module would take into account
(Anolli et al., 2005). relevant information about events happening to
Fourthly, context modeling is one of the main the user, pertinent both to the learning context and
features to be included, and it may be one of the learning process, for example, a failure while
the more promising ways to enhance inferential using a certain software or the loss of some data
reliability. If only physiological and communi- due to a system error.
cation measures are considered, distortions and While it is not possible to register what is hap-
mistaken emotional attributions may occur, since pening outside of the concrete interaction, it may
a key component of emotional experience is still be useful to consider the events of the learning

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interaction itself, for example, failure in a test are coming on stream, especially in the field of
phase could be presumed to be negative valenced emotional detection.
and to influence emotional state according to cor- Recently, a number of projects have addressed
responding appraisal criteria. In other words, the the inclusion of affect in learning and education
system could be provided with some appraisal environments (see Kapoor, Mota, & Picard,
criteria that would partially define the emotional 2001; Zhou & Conati, 2002). For instance, as
significance of events occurring to users. cited previously, a preliminary system for the
The cognitive architecture should be able to automatic detection of children’s interest levels
process variations within each modality, integrate during learning situations, based on a combination
them, and attribute a potential meaning to them of posture and facial expressions, was designed at
depending on the initial state and profile of the the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media
specific user and output of the registry module. Lab (Picard et al., 2004).
In this paper we have described a possible
way to enhance an automatic emotion recognition
CONCLUSION system. The key defining characteristics of our
proposal are multimodality, that is, the inclusion
A topic of key interest to educational researchers of multiple detection channels and contextual
is the search for strategies capable of inspiring awareness of events occurring within the learning
the interest and active participation of learners path. Both of these characteristics can contribute
(Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 1999). In tra- to creating a more effective system.
ditional face-to-face learning this hinges on the Nonetheless, some key limitations of the
ability of the teacher. Teasing out and replicating proposal should be discussed. Currently, it is not
all the components of this ability remains a huge possible to identify the optimum combination of
challenge for e-learning designers. One possible real-time measures and other sources of informa-
way forward, according to Picard et al. (2004), is tion required for emotion recognition. A “golden
to approach these learning goals by incorporating truth” is still lacking, both for the individual chan-
affective information into the e-learning path. nels reviewed and how best to combine them. As
This line of enquiry appears all the more feasible, already stressed, each channel presents specific
as a growing number of relevant technologies reliability problems, and some have additional

Figure 1. Ideal representation of a possible emotion recognition system

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 Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems

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Ward, R. D., & Marsden, P. H. (2003). Physiologi- for the most part, is not subject to voluntary con-
cal responses to different WEB page designs. Inter- trol. It is usually divided into sympathetic and
national Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 59, parasympathetic.
199–212. doi:10.1016/S1071-5819(03)00019-3 Computer Anxiety: Computer anxiety is the
individual fear or apprehension of using a com-
Weiner, B. (1986). An attributional theory of puter directly or the anticipation of having to use it.
motivation and emotion. New York: Springer. Emotional Intelligence: Emotional intelli-
Wierzbicka, A. (1995). The relevance of language gence is the underlying general competence that
to the study of emotions. Psychological Inquiry, comprises a variety of emotional skills. Such
6, 248–252. doi:10.1207/s15327965pli0603_13 skills vary according to the different models of
emotional intelligence proposed.
Facial Action Coding System (FACS): FACS
is a system originally developed by Paul Ekman

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 Addressing Emotions within E-Learning Systems

and Wallace Friesen in 1978 to taxonomize hu- measures, vocal non-verbal measures, self-report
man facial expression. It is the most used method measures, facial expressions, posture and gestures,
to measure and describe facial behaviors, coded and verbal content).
through action units (AU). Multimodal Emotion Recognition: Multi-
Modality (of Emotional Detection): Modality modal emotion recognition is where one is in-
is each of the different channels that are consid- ferring an emotional state and integrating inputs
ered to be emotion-sensitive (i.e., physiological coming from multiple emotion-sensitive sources.

This work was previously published in Handbook of Research on Instructional Systems and Technology, edited by Terry T. Kidd
and Holim Song, pp. 803-816, copyright 2008 by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global).

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 1259

Chapter 5.10
Behaviorism and Developments
in Instructional Design
and Technology
Irene Chen
University of Houston Downtown, USA

INTRODUCTION: THE BASICS OF are taught separately, has a powerful influence on

BEHAVIORISM instructional design. Behaviors can be modified,
and learning is measured by observable change
The theory of behaviorism concentrates on the in behavior. The behavior theorists emphasize the
study of overt behaviors that can be observed and need of objectivity, which leads to great accen-
measured (Good & Brophy, 1990). In general, tuation of statistical and mathematical analysis.
the behavior theorists view the mind as a “black The design principles introduced by the behavior
box” in the sense that response to stimulus can theorists continue to guide the development of
be observed quantitatively, ignoring the possibil- today’s computer-based learning. In distance-
ity of thought processes occurring in the mind. education courseware and instructional software,
Behaviorists believe that learning takes place as key behavior-modification principles are used.
the result of a response that follows on a specific For example, a typical course Web site usually
stimulus. By repeating the S-R (stimulus-response) states the objectives of the software; uses text,
cycle, the organism (may it be an animal or hu- visual, or audio to apply appropriate reinforcers;
man) is conditioned into repeating the response provides repetition and immediate feedback; uses
whenever the same stimulus is present. The principles to shape, chain, model, punish, and
behavioral emphasis on breaking down complex award the learners; incorporates a scoring system
tasks, such as learning to read, into subskills that as a part of the system; and provides status of the
progress of the learner. Major learning theorists
associated with behaviorism are the following:
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60960-503-2.ch510

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 Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

• Pavlov Pavlov (1849-1936)

• Thorndike
• Skinner The Russian physiologist Ivan Petrovich Pavlov
• Watson is the precursor to behavioral science. He is best
• Gagné known for his work in classical conditioning
or stimulus substitution. Pavlov’s experiment
The major educational technology develop- involved food, a dog, and a bell. His work inau-
ments in America that can be attributed to behav- gurated the era of S-R psychology.
iorism are the following: Pavlov placed meat powder (an unconditioned
stimulus) on a dog’s tongue, which caused the dog
• The behavioral objectives movement to automatically salivate (the unconditioned re-
• The teaching machine phase sponse). The unconditioned responses are natural
• The programmed instruction movement and not learned. On a series of subsequent trials,
• The individualized instructional Pavlov sounded a bell at the same time he gave
approaches the meat powder to the dog. When the food was
• The computer-assisted learning accompanied by the bell many times, Pavlov found
• The systems approach to instruction that he could withhold the food, and the bell’s
sound itself would cause the dog to salivate. The
Major instructional design theorists associated bell became the conditioned stimulus that caused
with behaviorism are as follows: the conditioned response of salivating (Thomas,
1992). In 1904, he was awarded the Nobel Prize
• Glaser for his research on digestive processes.
• Gagné and Briggs The stimulus and response items of Pavlov’s
• Dick and Carey experiment can be summarized as follows:
• Mager
• Food: Unconditioned Stimulus
• Salivation: Unconditioned Response
BACKGROUND: BEHAVIORISM • Bell: Conditioned Stimulus
AND LEARNING THEORIES • Salivation: Conditioned Response

The advent of behavioral theories can be traced Pavlov also made the following observations
back to the elder Sophists of ancient Greece, (Mergel, 1998):
Cicero, Herbart, and Spencer (Saettler, 1990).
Behaviorism, as a learning theory, can be traced • Stimulus generalization: Once the dog has
back to Aristotle, whose essay “Memory” focused learned to salivate at the sound of the bell,
on associations being made between events such it will salivate at other similar sounds.
as lightning and thunder. Other philosophers that • Extinction: If you stop pairing the bell with
followed Aristotle’s thoughts are Hobbes (1650), the food, salivation will eventually cease in
Hume (1740), Brown (1820), Bain (1855), and response to the bell.
Ebbinghause (1885). Franklin Bobbitt developed • Spontaneous recovery: Extinguished re-
the modern concept of behavioral objectives in the sponses can be “recovered” after an elapsed
early 1900s. More recently, the names associated time, but will soon extinguish again if the
with the development of the behaviorist theory in- dog is not presented with food.
clude Pavlov, Thorndike, Watson, and B. F. Skinner.

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

• Discrimination: The dog could learn to dis- The result is most clearly seen in the effect of
criminate between similar bells (stimuli), increasing the interval between the response and
and discern which bell would result in the the satisfaction or discomfort. Such an increase
presentation of food and which would not. diminishes the rate of learning. Minimum delay in
• Higher order conditioning: Once the dog reinforcement has a crucial impact on the learning
has been conditioned to associate the bell process. What is called attention to the response
with food, another unconditioned stimulus, or knowledge of the results counts also. A slightly
such as a light, may be flashed at the same satisfying or indifferent response made often may
time that the bell is rung. Eventually the win a closer connection than a more satisfying
dog will salivate at the flash of the light response made only rarely.
without the sound of the bell. Thorndike believed that when the response
was positive, a neural bond would be established
Thorndike (1874-1949) between the stimulus and response, and learning
takes place when the bonds are formed into patterns
Another influential contributor to establishing of behavior (Saettler, 1990). This is the origin of
education as a science was Edward L. Thorndike. the linear style using trial and error in laboratory
Thorndike’s laws were built upon the stimulus- research for inquiry-based learning.
response hypothesis of Pavlov. He was also a
strong advocate of educational measurement. Watson (1878-1958)
Around the turn of the century, Thorndike
conducted researches in animal behavior before John B. Watson is credited with coining the term
becoming interested in human development. He behaviorism. Like Thorndike, he was originally
was interested in discovering whether animals, involved in animal research, but later became
such as cats and dogs, could learn their tasks involved in the study of human development.
through imitation or observation. Watson believed that humans are born with a
Thorndike’s laws of learning for humans, based few reflexes and emotional reactions of love
on connectionism, stated that learning was the and rage, and all other behaviors are established
formation of a connection between stimulus and through stimulus-response associations through
response. His behavioral learning theory studied conditioning.
increasing a behavior with the use of rewards, Watson demonstrated classical conditioning
punishment, and practice. Three major laws in in an experiment involving a young child named
Thorndike’s laws of learning are the law of effects, Albert and a white rat. Originally, Albert was not
which suggested that the strength of connection is afraid of the rat. Watson made a sudden loud noise
dependent on what follows, the law of exercise, whenever Albert touched the rat. Frightened by
which suggested that practice strengthens the the loud noise, Albert became conditioned to fear
connection while disuse weakens it, and the law and to avoid the rat. The fear was generalized to
of readiness, which suggested that if physically other small animals. Watson then extinguished
ready, the connection is satisfying for the organism. the fear by presenting the rat without loud noises.
Close temporal sequence is not the only means Research of the study suggests that the conditioned
of insuring the connection of the satisfaction with fear was more powerful and permanent than it
the response producing it. The other equally impor- really was (Good & Brophy, 1990; Harris, 1979;
tant factors are the frequency, energy, and duration Samelson, 1980).
of the connection, and the closeness with which Watson’s work demonstrated the role of condi-
the satisfaction is associated with the response. tioning in the development of emotional responses

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to certain stimuli. This helps to explain certain reinforcer could be verbal praise, a good
fears, phobias, and prejudices that people develop. grade, or a feeling of satisfaction.
• Negative reinforcement: Responses that
Skinner (1904-1990) allow escape from painful or undesirable
situations are likely to be repeated. A nega-
Like Pavlov, Thorndike, and Watson, Burrhus tive reinforcer is any stimulus that results
Friederich Skinner believed in the stimulus- in the increased frequency of a response
response pattern of conditioned behaviors. His when it is withdrawn. It is different from
theory ignored the possibility of any processes aversive stimuli, or punishment, which
occurring in the mind and directly dealt with results in reduced responses (Good &
changes in observable behaviors. In other words, Brophy, 1990).
actual behaviors are the focus of concern in his • Punishment: Responses that bring painful
theory, rather than emotions, thoughts, or other or undesirable consequences will be sup-
hypothetical constructs (Maddux, Johnson, & pressed, but may reappear if reinforcement
Willis, 1992). contingencies change.
Most of Skinner’s research was centered around • Extinction or nonreinforcement:
the Skinner box. A Skinner box is an experimental Responses that are not reinforced are not
space that contains one or more operands, such likely to be repeated.
as a lever, that may be pressed by a rat. The box • The schedules of reinforcement: The
also contained various sources of stimuli. Skinner schedules of reinforcement can govern the
contributed much to the study of operant condi- contingency between responses and rein-
tioning, which is a change in the probability of a forcement and their effects on establishing
response due to an event that followed the initial and maintaining behavior. Schedules that
response (Skinner, 1968). The theory of Skinner depend on the number of responses made
is based on the idea that learning is a function of are called ratio schedules. The ratio of the
change in behavior. When a particular S-R pat- schedule is the number of responses re-
tern is reinforced (rewarded), the individual is quired per reinforcement. If the contingen-
conditioned to respond. Changes in behavior are cy between responses and reinforcement
the result of an individual’s response to events depends on time, the schedule is called an
(stimuli) that occur in the environment. In his early interval schedule.
career, Skinner started with experimenting with
animals such as pigeons and rats. He later turned
his research interests from animals to humans, For an animal to learn a behavior, such as pressing
especially his own daughters. a lever to produce food, successive approxima-
tions of the behavior are rewarded until the animal
Principles and Mechanisms of learns the association between the lever and the
Skinner’s Operant Conditioning food reward. To begin the shaping process, the
animal may be rewarded for simply turning in
• Positive reinforcement or reward: the direction of the lever, then be rewarded for
Behavior that is positively reinforced will moving toward the lever, be rewarded for brush-
reoccur; intermittent reinforcement is par- ing against the lever, and finally be rewarded for
ticularly effective. A reinforcer is anything pawing the lever. If placed in a cage, an animal
that strengthens the desired response. A may take an extended period of time to figure out
that pressing a lever will produce food. Behavioral

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

chaining occurs when a succession of steps needs ed to provide behavioral explanations for a broad
to be learned. Information should be presented in range of cognitive phenomena. For example,
small amounts so that responses can be reinforced Skinner explained motivation in terms of depriva-
or shaped. The animal would master each step tion and reinforcement schedules.
in sequence until the entire sequence is learned.
Due to stimulus generalization, reinforcements Implications for Educational Technology
will generalize across similar stimuli producing
secondary conditioning. Once the desired behav- Skinner’s operant conditioning has been widely
ioral response is accomplished, reinforcement does applied in behavior modifications as well as
not have to be present every single time. In fact, teaching and instructional development, particu-
it can be maintained more successfully through larly in areas such as classroom management and
partial reinforcement schedules. Skinner ex- programmed instruction. His influential book, The
plained partial reinforcement schedules including Technology of Learning (1968), explained how
interval schedules, ratio schedules, fixed-interval classroom instruction should reflect the behavior-
schedules, variable-interval schedules, fixed-ratio ist principles of operant conditioning.
schedules, and variable-ratio schedules. He found Many of Skinner’s instructional techniques are
that variable-interval and variable-ratio schedules still widely used today (Roblyer, 2006). Consider
produce more persistent rates of response because the implications of Skinner’s theory as applied
the learners cannot predict when the reinforcement to the development of programmed instruction
will occur (Milhollan & Forisha, 1972). (Markle, 1969; Skinner, 1968):

Difference between Classical 1. Practice should take the form of question-

and Operant Conditioning answer (stimulus-response) frames that
expose the student to the subject in steps.
Skinner’s work differs from that of his predeces- 2. Require that the learner make a response for
sors (classical conditioning) in that he studied the every frame and receive immediate feedback.
operant behaviors that are voluntary behaviors 3. Try to arrange the difficulty of the questions
used in operating on the environment. The organ- so the response is always correct, resulting
ism can emit responses instead of only eliciting in a positive reinforcement.
a response due to an external stimulus. (Table 1) 4. Ensure that good performance in the lesson
He also emphasized the use of positive rein- is paired with secondary reinforcers such as
forcement in a repetitive manner. Another distinc- verbal praise, prizes, and good grades.
tive aspect of Skinner’s theory is that it attempt-

Table 1. Difference between classical and operant conditioning

Classical Conditioning Operant Conditioning

Uses the term response Uses the term behavior
Main components: stimulus and its response Main components: behavior and its consequence
Cannot be used to shape behavior Can be used to shape behavior
The stimulus causes the response The consequence influences the behavior
Association between stimuli and responses Reinforcement
Based on involuntary reflexive behavior Based on voluntary behavior

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 Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

The general criticism about Skinner is that he 1. Gaining attention

denies the existence of free will or human free- 2. Informing the learner of the objective
dom. Skinner defines these values as self-control, 3. Stimulating recall of prerequisite learning
which he believes humans do not possess. Many 4. Presenting new materials
critics labeled him one-sided because he fails to 5. Providing learning guidelines
consider any options other than what is “easily 6. Eliciting performance
observed and manipulated” (Schellenberg, 1978). 7. Providing feedback about corrections
8. Assessing performance
Robert Gagné (1916-2002) 9. Enhancing retention and recall

Like Skinner, Robert Gagné emphasized the use The Types of Learning
of positive reinforcement in a repetitive manner.
Between 1949 and 1958, when Gagné was the di- The early writings by Gagné, Briggs, and Wager
rector of the perceptual and motor skills laboratory (1974) identified three categories of human fac-
of the U.S. Air Force, he began to develop some of tors that affect the learning event (see Table 2).
his ideas that comprise his learning theory called According to Gagné, each new skill learned
the conditions of learning or cumulative learning should build on previously acquired skills. When
theory. Although Gagné’s earlier work is grounded designing instruction, the prerequisite lower-
in the behaviorist tradition, his current work seems level skills and knowledge required have to be
to be influenced by the information-processing explained for an instructional objective.
view of learning and memory. He has published In the 1990s, Gagné et al. (1992) identified
with David Merrill, Leslie Briggs, Walter Wager, several types of learning behaviors that students
and several other authors. demonstrate after acquiring knowledge:
Gagné is best known for three of his contri-
butions: the events of instruction, the types of • Verbal information
learning, and learning hierarchies (Roblyer, 2003). • Intellectual skill
• Cognitive strategy
The Events of Instruction • Attitude
• Motor skill
Gagné identified the following nine events of
instruction as elements of a good lesson (Gagné,
Briggs, & Wager, 1992):

Table 2. Human factors that affect the learning event

Major Categories Human Factors

External Stimulus • Contiguity: time relationship between stimulus and response
Factors • Repetition: frequency of exposure to a stimulus
• Reinforcement: follow-up to the stimulus
Internal Cognitive • Factual information: from memory
Factors • Intellectual skills: ability to manipulate information
• Cognitive strategies: ability to process meaningful information
Internal Affective • Inhibition: reluctance to react to a stimulus
Factors • Anxiety: tension

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

Learning Hierarchies accepted model used to inform the design process.

He has impacted instructional design for K-12
Robert Gagné developed his taxonomy of learn- schools as well as for business, industry, and the
ing to explore the practice-observable behaviors military.
in 1972. Gagné distinguished the following eight
different classes of intellectual skills in which hu-
man beings learn. These intellectual skills can be MAIN FOCUS: BEHAVIORISM
categorized on a dimension of complexity, rang- AND THE DEVELOPMENTS
ing from simple recognition to abstract processes IN INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN
(Gagné et al., 1974): AND TECHNOLOGY

1. Signal learning: The individual learns to The following major educational technology
make a general, diffuse response to a signal. developments in America can be attributed to
Such was the classical-conditioned response behaviorism (Saettler, 1990):
of Pavlov.
2. Stimulus-response learning: The learner • The behavioral objectives movement
acquires a precise response to a discriminated • The teaching machine phase
stimulus. • The programmed instruction movement
3. Chaining: A chain of two or more stimulus- • The individualized instructional
response connections is acquired. approaches
4. Verbal association: The learning of chains • The computer-assisted learning
that are verbal. • The systems approach to instruction
5. Discrimination learning: The individual
learns to make different identifying re- Behavioral Objectives Movement
sponses to many different stimuli that may
resemble each other in physical appearance. The behaviorist theory is sometimes referred to as
6. Concept learning: The learner acquires a objectivist because the behaviorists emphasize the
capability of making a common response to need for objectivity, which leads to great accentua-
a class of stimuli. tion of statistical and mathematical analysis. They
7. Rule learning: A rule is a chain of two or believe behaviors can be modified, and learning is
more concepts. measured by observable changes in behavior. As
8. Problem solving: This kind of learning of today, learning objectives written by teachers
requires the internal events usually called are still widely recognized and very useful. Here
thinking. is an example of a learning objective:

The more complex kinds of intellectual pro- After having completed the unit, the student will
cessing are based upon these simpler varieties. To be able to answer correctly 85% of the questions.
teach a skill, a teacher has to identify its prereq-
uisite skills and ensure that the student possesses The behavioral objectives movement can be
them. Gagné et al. (1992) called this building traced back to Benjamin Bloom in the 1950s
process “a learning hierarchy.” and 1960s. At a time when the primary learning
Today, Gagné is considered an experimental theory was behaviorism, an approach that viewed
psychologist who is concerned with learning and students as passive recipients of learning provided
instruction. The model he proposed is a widely by their teachers and parents, Bloom presented

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 Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

his taxonomy organization in Taxonomy of Edu- • Responding to phenomena: Active par-

cational Objectives: Book 1, Cognitive Domain ticipation on the part of the learners
(Bloom, Englehart, Furst, Hill, & Krathwohl, • Valuing: The worth or value a person at-
1956). The view was that learning involved pupils’ taches to a particular object, phenomenon,
accumulation and remembering of varied pieces or behavior.
of information. Bloom and his colleagues began • Organization: Organizes values into
development of a taxonomy in the cognitive, af- priorities.
fective, and psychomotor domains. Cognitive is • Internalizing values (characterization):
for mental skills, affective is for growth in feel- Has a value system that controls his or her
ings or emotional areas, while psychomotor is for behavior.
manual or physical skills.
Bloom’s cognitive taxonomy is organized into The psychomotor domain includes physical
six levels: movement, the use of the motor-skill areas, and
coordination. Most of the time, the development
• Knowledge of these skills requires practice, and is measured
• Comprehension in terms of speed, precision, distance, procedures,
• Application or techniques in execution. The major categories
• Analysis listed in order are as follows (Bloom et al., 1964):
• Synthesis
• Evaluation • Perception: The ability to use sensory
cues to guide motor activity.
Bloom’s “learning for mastery” defines mas- • Set: Readiness to act. It includes mental,
tery in terms of specific educational objectives, physical, and emotional sets.
and mastery of each unit is essential for students • Guided response: The early stages in
before they advance to the next one. learning a complex skill that includes imi-
tation and trial and error.
Each teacher begins a new term or course with the • Mechanism: This is the intermediate stage
expectation that about a third of his students will in learning a complex skill.
adequately learn what he has to teach. He expects • Complex overt response: The skillful
about a third to fail or just “get by.” Finally, he performance of motor acts that involve
expects another third to learn a good deal of what complex movement patterns.
he has to teach, but not enough to regard them as • Adaptation: Skills are well developed and
a “good student.” (Bloom, Hastings, & Madaus, the individual can modify movement pat-
1971, p. 43) terns to fit special requirements.
• Origination: Creating new movement pat-
The affective domain includes the manner in terns to fit a particular situation or specific
which we deal with things emotionally, such as problem.
attitudes, motivations, feelings, values, and ap-
preciation. The major categories listed in order are According to Bloom et al. (1971), nearly all
as follows (Bloom, Mesia, & Krathwohl, 1964): students can achieve mastery of material in a course
when given the time and quality of instruction
• Receiving phenomena: Awareness, will- that they need. Therefore, to reach mastery, the
ingness to hear, selected attention student needs to get 80% to 90% of the answers
right. The basic instructional task was to define

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

the course into educational units and find methods 21). Objectives are important because teachers
and material to help the students to reach the set need an objective to find out if learning has been
level. The student would be tested with a forma- accomplished, and students need an objective as
tive test that would either indicate mastery or the means to organize their own efforts toward
emphasize on what still needed to be learned in accomplishment. There is no sound basis for the
order to reach the next level. selection of instructional materials when clearly
By the late 1960s, most teachers were writing defined objectives are lacking.
behavioral objectives (Mergel, 1998). Other names According to Mager, an objective must include
for objectives are “learning targets,” “educational the three major components:
objectives,” and “pupil outcomes.” Virtually all
the tests pupils take in school are intended to 1. Performance: What the learner should be
measure one or more of the cognitive processes, able to do
and instruction is expected to focus on assisting 2. Conditions: Under what circumstances
students attain mastery of some subject area. 3. Criterion: How well it must be done
The learning success may be measured by tests
developed to measure each objective. To develop Later, Gagné and Briggs developed a set of
objectives, a learning task must be broken down instructions for writing objectives that is based
through analysis into specific measurable tasks. on Mager’s work.
Teachers began to write behavioral objectives for
their lessons that were descriptions of specific, Teaching Machines and
terminal behaviors manifested in terms of observ- Programmed Instruction Movement
able, measurable behavior. Cognitive objectives
focus on memorizing, interpreting, and other Although the elder Sophists, Comenius, Herbart,
intellectual activities. and Montessori used the concept of programmed
A good objective states learning objectives in instruction in their repertoire, B. F. Skinner is
specified, quantifiable, terminal behaviors. As of the most current and probably the best known
today, Bloom’s taxonomy is still widely recognized advocate of teaching machines and programmed
and very useful. In a popular textbook used by learning. Other contributors to this movement
teacher-training programs in the United States, include Pressey and Crowder.
Peter W. Airasian wrote, “Although teachers’ Edward Thorndike described the premise of
objectives may be explicit or implicit or clear or computer-based instruction half a century before
fuzzy, it is best that objectives be explicit, clear, the feasibility of such a system became possible.
and measurable. Regardless of how they are stated Thorndike (1912, p. 165) wrote, “If, by a miracle of
and what they are called, objectives are present mechanical ingenuity, a book could be so arranged
in all teaching” (Airasian, 2001, p. 74). that only to him who had done what was directed
Similarly, Robert Mager wrote Preparing In- on page one would page two become visible, and
structional Objectives in 1962, which prompted so on, much that now requires personal instruction
the interest and use of behavioral objectives could be managed by print.”
among educators. In the book, Mager described In his machine, Sidney Pressey sought to
an objective as “a description of a performance incorporate Thorndike’s vision. Noticing that
you want learners to be able to exhibit before objective tests were becoming common in schools,
you consider them competent. An objective in the 1920s, Pressey began experimenting with
describes an intended result of instruction rather a machine for testing and scoring in his introduc-
than the process of instruction itself” (1984, p. tory psychology courses. Soon he recognized its

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 Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

potential for teaching and learning. Pressey (1926, taken, yet in taking it, the student moves
p. 374) stated, “the procedure in mastery of drill closer to fully competent behavior.
and informational material were in many instances • The student must not be able to proceed to
simple and definite enough to permit handling of the following step until the first has been
much routine teaching by mechanical means.” accomplished.
Pressey maintained that the teacher is “burdened • The machine stimulates constant interac-
by such routine of drill and information-fixing.” tion between the program and the user.
Pressey’s teaching machine resembled a
typewriter carriage with a window that revealed This teaching machine has good record-keep-
a question with four answers. The user pressed ing facilities of students’ progress. According to
one of the four keys that corresponded to differ- Maddux et al. (1992, p. 105), “Skinner’s machine
ent answers. When the user pressed a key, the presented the questions in 30 radial frames on a
machine recorded the answer on a counter and 12-inch disk.” They continued, “He called the
then displayed the next question. Once finished, material in the frames the program. Programs
the person scoring the test slipped the test sheet that led each user through the same materials
back into the device and noted the score on the in the same sequence were referred to as linear
counter. Pressey demonstrated his multiple-choice programs.” Skinner thought the success of such
machine at the 1925 American Psychological As- a machine depends on the material used in it. The
sociation meeting (Travers, 1967). learner’s concentration is improved by the use
Despite his confidence that the machine he of these packages addressing the environmental
developed would lead to an “industrial revolution factors that should be inductive to learning. Its
in education” (Pressey, 1932, p. 672), this type other features also free the educator of rote work.
of machine was never widely used. In the same Skinner’s teaching machine required the
year that Pressey predicted the revolution, the learner to compose an answer rather than simply
unemployment rate was over 20% high due to choose from a list of options. Also, the machine
the Great Depression, and new developments in required the learner to proceed through a series
educational technology were delayed until after of steps in a prescribed sequence, or through lin-
World War II. ear programs. Each step had to be small so that
More than 30 years later, among the group everyone would be successful, yet each step had
of farsighted researchers, Skinner had a vision to lead closer to the target behavior (referred to
of machines that could teach. He envisioned the as task analysis; Maddox et al., 1992). Skinner’s
following (1954, 1958): machine was demonstrated in 1954. If used ef-
fectively, these machines would take the role of a
• Machines are able to arrange appropriate private tutor, bringing one programmer (educator)
contingencies of reinforcement by which into contact with a large number of students.
specific forms of behavior could be set up Skinner’s work on teaching machines has
by the use of specific stimuli. stimulated a large body of research. Today,
• The learner should be able to put together his criteria for the teaching machines are still
his or her own response rather than select important components in developing modern
from alternatives. computer-based learning programs (Maddox et al.,
• The learner must pass through a careful- 1992). Even though Skinner’s teaching machine
ly designed sequence of steps. Each step stimulated a large body of interest, the device was
must be small enough that it can always be not widely adopted by educators. However, his

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

idea of a teaching machine has led to programmed psychology courses at Harvard. The first practical
instruction. implementation of programmed instruction was
Later on, Norman Crowder (1959) did not agree achieved in 1960 by Basic Systems Inc. (Mech-
with Skinner that every learner should progress ner, 1977). In the early 1960s, the proponents
in the same sequence. His programs varied the led by Skinner defined programmed instruction
sequence to some learners or omitted certain as using (a) an active response by the learner, (b)
frames for others, depending on learner responses immediate reinforcement of correct responses,
(referred to as branching programs). These mod- and (c) successive approximations toward the
ern programs come in various forms in the current knowledge to be learned, in a sequence of steps
educational software market: computerized drill so small that the learner can take each one without
and practice, simulations, and tutorials. difficulty (1977).
Today, the Education Thesaurus of UNESCO’s The use of programmed instruction appeared
International Bureau of Education (2002) defines in American elementary and secondary schools
teaching machines as, “Devices that mechani- at around the same time (Saettler, 1990). Pro-
cally, electrically and/or electronically present grams have been devised for the teaching of
instructional programs at a rate controlled by the arithmetic, foreign languages, physics, spelling,
learners’ responses.” reading, psychology, and several other subjects
(The Columbia Encyclopedia, 2001-04). Industry
Early Use of Programmed Instruction and the military used programmed instruction
to train personnel. Osguthrope and Zhou (1989)
Sometimes called programmed learning, pro- discussed the popularity of this approach in the
grammed instruction is a book or workbook that 1950s and 1960s.
employs the principles proposed by Skinner in Although many educators agree that pro-
his design of the teaching machine, with a special grammed instruction can contribute to more
emphasis on task analysis and reinforcement for efficient classroom procedure and supplement
correct responses (Maddox et al., 1992). Skinner conventional teaching methods, there has been
was also a proponent of programmed instruction, considerable controversy regarding the merits
and much of the system is based on his theory of programmed instruction as the sole method
of the nature of learning. It is an innovation that of teaching (The Columbia Encyclopedia, 2001-
was more widely accepted in education than a 2004). Programmed learning died out in the later
teaching machine. part of the 1960s (Reiser, 1987). Researchers
Believing that by tightly structuring the en- agreed that programmed instruction did not appear
vironment, students’ behaviors can be shaped to to live up to its original claims (Criswell, 1989;
achieve learning, Skinner envisioned lessons that Reiser; Tillman, & Glynn, 1987). Concerned
use carefully planned steps of stimulus-response developers moved away from hardware develop-
pairing and reinforcement to reach a goal. The ment to programs based on analysis of learning.
lessons are to be administered in small, incre- By the early 1960s, there was a strong backlash
mental steps. against the use of both teaching machines and
Skinner and J. G. Holland experimentally used programmed instruction. Fitzgerald (1970) listed
programmed instruction in the 1920s and 1930s. the rigidity of these devices in skimming as one of
Early use of programmed instruction tended to the overriding disadvantages. He also suggested
concentrate on the development of hardware that both teaching machines and programmed
rather than course content. In the late 1950s, they instruction would lead to dehumanization due to
first used programmed instruction in behavioral over reliance on machines.

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Decades later, Skinner (1986) explained why The Keller Plan

programmed instruction and teaching machines
were never popular: The Keller Plan was developed by F. S. Keller,
his colleague J. Gilmore Sherman, and two psy-
The machines were crude, the programs were chologists at the University of Brazilia. The Keller
untested, and there were no ready standards of Plan is derived from the behaviorists reinforce-
comparison. Teaching machines would have cost ment psychology with influence from teaching
money that was not budgeted. Teachers misunder- machines and programmed instructions The group
stood the role of the machines and were fearful had in mind that students would perform better
of losing their jobs. (p. 105) if they found satisfaction in their work (Buskist,
Cush, & DeGrandpre, 1991). They argued that
Today, the Education Thesaurus of UNESCO’s positive consequences (praise, good grades, feel-
International Bureau of Education (2002) defines ing of achievement) were more important than the
programmed instruction as, “Learning in which negative ones (boredom, failure, or punishment).
the students progress at their own rate using work- Briefly, “those features which seem to distinguish
books, textbooks or electromagnetic resources that (PSI) from conventional teaching procedures” in-
provide information in discrete steps, test learn- clude the following (Reboy & Semb, 1991, p. 213):
ing at each step and provide immediate feedback
about achievement.” 1. Mastery criteria
2. Self-pace
Individualized Approaches 3. Stress upon the written word
to Instruction 4. The use of proctors
5. Lectures used for motivation rather than
Similar to teaching machines and programmed sources of information
instruction, individualized instruction began in
the early 1900s and was revived in the 1960s. The The Keller Plan was developed for higher
Keller Plan (sometimes called Keller Method, education, whereas Bloom’s mastery was to ac-
personalized system of instruction or PSI), indi- complish mastery learning in K-12. A PSI course
vidually prescribed instruction (IPI), program for is divided into units and students have to show a
learning in accordance with needs (PLAN), and mastery of the unit to be able to go ahead. Students
individually guided education are all examples are allowed to individually pace their own learning.
of individualized instruction in the United States The mastery level is usually set at 85% to 100%
(Saettler, 1990). Also similar to the previously results (Buskist et al., 1991). The course is based
mentioned behavioral objectives movement, upon a standard textbook, a study guide, journal
teaching machine phase, and programmed instruc- articles, and other readings. Other common char-
tion movement, the movement of individualized acteristics of PSI are the use of proctors. Proctors
approaches to instruction represents the achieve- are undergraduate students who have successfully
ments for the neo-behaviorist systems approach finished the course and are aware of the problems
to instruction. All had their foundation in the of new students. The proctors assist the students,
behavioral theories and psychological principles score their quizzes, and react as feedback to the
to the technology of education and have shown to instructor of the course in general. The instructor’s
generate a significant educational result. lectures and demonstrations in the PSI plan are
not for instructional purpose but for enrichment
and to provide motivation.

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

Individually Prescribed CAI grew rapidly in the 1960s when federal

Instruction (1964) funding for research and development in educa-
tion and industrial laboratories was implemented.
In 1962, Robert Glaser synthesized the work of To determine the possible effectiveness of CAI,
previous researchers and introduced the concept the U.S. government developed two competing
of IPI in 1962. IPI is an approach where the re- companies, Control Data Corporation and Mitre
sults of a learner’s placement test are used to plan Corporation, who came up with the PLATO
learner-specific instruction. The main features of (Programmed Logic for Automatic Teaching Op-
IPI include prepared units, behavioral objectives, erations) and TICCIT (Time-Shared, Interactive,
planned instructional sequences for various sub- Computer-Controlled Information Television)
jects, as well as a pretest and posttest for each unit, projects. Another significant development in the
and materials to be used to continually evaluate instructional applications of computers during
the learner to meet behavioral objectives (Saet- the 1960s and 1970s was the development of
tler, 1990). The use of IPI dwindled in the 1970s the IBM 1500 computer. Kinzer, Sherwood, and
when it lost funding. Bransford (1986, p. 25) stated that the IBM 1500
was “the only computer ever developed specifi-
Program for Learning in cally for computer-assisted instruction, rather than
Accordance with Needs (1967) as a general-purpose computer for widespread
applications.”
Headed by John C. Flanagan, PLAN was devel- PLATO is the first large-scale project for the use
oped under sponsorship of American Institutes of computers in education. It is a project developed
for Research (AIR), Westinghouse Learning through the partnership between Control Data
Corporation, and several U.S. School districts. Corporation, the University of Illinois’ Computer
The main features of PLAN include selected Education Research Laboratory (CERL), and the
items from about 6,000 behavioral objectives; National Science Foundation. Designed to use a
instructional modules that took about two weeks mainframe-based system, PLATO allowed a size-
of instruction each and was made up of approxi- able library of programs available for students, a
mately five objectives, mastery learning, and sophisticated record-management system to keep
remedial learning plus retesting (Saettler, 1990). track of individual students’ progress, and a large
PLAN was abandoned in the late 1970s because number of simultaneous users (Pagliaro, 1983).
of upgrading costs. The PLATO IV system, introduced during
the early 1970s, enabled up to 600 students to
Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI) simultaneously access educational software
(Alessi & Trollip, 1985). Each terminal serviced
During the 1950s, CAI was first used in education, one terminal display and keyboard. The several
and training with early work was done by IBM. thousand terminal systems served undergraduate
The mediation of instruction entered the computer education as well as elementary school reading, a
age in the 1960s when Patrick Suppes and Richard community college in Urbana, and several cam-
Atkinson conducted their initial investigations puses in Chicago (Office of Technology Assess-
into CAI in mathematics and reading. Developed ment, 1982). During the early 1970s, PLATO IV
through a systematic analysis of curriculum, was introduced, a large time-shared, instructional
Suppes’ (1979) CAI provided learner feedback, system. All data and programs were stored on a
branching, and response tracking. central computer.

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The original PLATO system continued to grow Systems Approach to Instruction or

throughout the 1970s and early 1980s to over 1,000 Instructional Systems Design (ISD)
terminals throughout the country (Alessi & Trollip,
1985). Control Data Corporation starting setting The systems approach involves setting goals
up PLATO systems around 1975. They already and objectives, analyzing resources, devising a
had over 100 PLATO systems operating by 1985. plan of action, and continuous evaluation and
The design principles introduced by Suppes modification of the program (Saettler, 1990). This
continue to guide the development of today’s approach is rooted in the military and business
instructional software. In CAI packages, key world, was developed in the 1950s and 1960s,
behavior-modification principles are used. A typi- and has dominated educational technology and
cal CAI software usually states the objectives of educational development since the 1970s. The
the software; uses text, visual, or audio to apply systems approach to curriculum design is an
appropriate reinforcers; provides repetition and attempt to use a process of logical development
immediate feedback; uses principles to shape, and ongoing monitoring and evaluation to allow
chain, model, punish, and award the learners; continuous evaluation of the curriculum.
incorporates a scoring system as a part of the The onset of World War II introduced the
system; and provides status of the progress of the huge instructional problem of training thousands
learner (Mergel, 1998). of military personnel quickly and effectively.
By using the CAI packages, individual learners The answer at the time was an enormous influx
can master the subject matter on their own time of mediated learning material: films, slides,
and at their own pace. As the student continu- photographs, audiotapes, and print materials.
ally is kept on track of his or her performance, In the 1960s, the military was rapidly infusing
motivation is also enhanced. In contrast to being instructional systems development into their
a mere receiver of information, the learner now standard training procedures. This period was
more actively participates. distinguished by the articulation of components
Despite money and research, by the mid-1970s, of instructional systems and the recognition of
it was apparent that CAI was not going to be the their system properties.
success that people had expected due to the fol- The systems approach to instructional design
lowing reasons (Mergel, 1998): was often accredited to James Finn. Seels (1989)
described Finn as the father of the instructional
• CAI had been oversold and could not design movement because he linked the theory of
deliver. systems design to educational technology and thus,
• Lack of support from certain sectors encouraged the integrated growth of these related
• Technical problems in implementation fields of study. Finn has also made educational
• Lack of quality software technologists aware that technology was as much
• High cost a process as a piece of hardware (1989).
The systems approach views a system as a set
Some researchers also argue that CAI was of interrelated parts, all working toward a defined
very much drill and practice, which is controlled goal. Examples of systems include the human body
by the program developer rather than the learner. and a community. Parts of a system will depend
Little branching of instruction was implemented on each other for input and output. The entire
in the programs (Saettler, 1990). system uses feedback to determine if the goal is
achieved. In 1962 Robert Glaser employed the

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

term instructional system and named, elaborated, Each step receives input from the previous
and diagramed its components. step and provides output for the next step. A sys-
Robert Gagné’s The Conditions of Learning tem is modified if the goal is not achieved. Each
(1965) is a milestone that elaborated the analysis component is carefully linked.
of learning objectives and related different classes In the field of education, the systems-approach
of learning objectives to appropriate instructional model first focused on language laboratories. The
designs. Gagné introduces behaviorist literature instruction can be viewed as a systematic process
into the systems approach. His work has con- in which every component is crucial to achieve
tributed greatly to the field of instructional tech- the goal of successful learning. These components
nology in the aspect of instructional design. A include the learner, instructor, instructional ma-
systems-approach model of designing instruction terials, and the learning environment. The many
is utilized to help learners understand the process components of the system interact to achieve learn-
of instructional design. Gagné also introduced ing. The focus is on what the learner will be able
the idea of task analysis to instructional design. to know when the instruction is concluded. The
Through task analysis, an instructional task could systems approach does not prescribe or promote
be broken down into sequential steps: a hierar- any particular teaching methodology. No one
chical relationship of tasks and subtasks. Gagné method will be appropriate for all objectives or
built on the principles of the systems approach for all students. Rather, it is a vehicle that helps
that Skinner explored in programmed instruction. teachers to think more systematically and logically
The current version of the systems approach about the objectives relevant to their students, and
is a process comprised of a series of phases. the means of achieving and assessing these. These
Sometimes referred to as the ADDIE model, the early efforts of ISD in education led to several ISD
systems approach of instructional design contains models that were developed in the late 1960s at
the following major phases: analysis, design, Florida State University.
development, implementation, and evaluation. Design models can be defined as the visual-
ized representations of an instructional design
• Analysis process, displaying the main phases and their
◦◦ Determine the instructional goal. relationships. Each phase has an outcome that
◦◦ Analyze the instructional goal. feeds the subsequent phase.
◦◦ Analyze the learners and context of Currently, there are more than 100 different
learning. ISD models, but almost all are based on the generic
• Design ADDIE. The more commonly known models are
◦◦ Write performance objectives. the Dick and Carey Model, the Kemp Model, the
• Development ICARE Model, and the ASSURE Model. While
◦◦ Develop instructional strategies. a number of versions of the ISD model exist, the
◦◦ Develop and select instruction. Dick and Carey model is very popular in cur-
◦◦ Develop assessment instruments. rent instructional design programs. The ADDIE
• Implementation model has been in use for training development
◦◦ Implement the system. for several decades. Today, Walter Dick and Lou
◦◦ Revise the instruction if necessary. Carey are widely viewed as the torchbearers of
• Evaluation the approach with their authoritative book The
◦◦ Design and conduct the formative Systematic Design of Instruction (1978).
evaluation of instruction. Dick and Carey’s model, the systems-approach
◦◦ Conduct summative evaluation model for designing instruction, is based on the

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assumption that there is a predictable link between Establishing an instructional goal or goals
a stimulus and the response that it produces in is typically preceded by needs assessment. The
a learner. It describes the phases of an iterative needs assessment is a formal process of identify-
process that starts by identifying instructional ing discrepancies between current outcomes and
goals and ends with evaluation. This model in- desired outcomes for an organization. Dick and
cludes analysis, design, development, formative Carey described the performance objectives as a
evaluation, plus needs assessment in a nonlinear statement of what the learners would be expected
relationship (Dick & Carey, 1978). to do when they have completed a specified course
In a classroom setting, the instructional mate- of instruction, stated in terms of observable per-
rial is linked to the response that it produces in formances. Subordinate objectives are objectives
a learner through the learning of the materials. that must be attained in order to accomplish a
Instruction is specifically targeted on the skills terminal objective; terminal objectives are objec-
and knowledge to be taught, and supplies the tives the learner will be expected to accomplish
appropriate conditions for the learning of these when they have completed a course of instruction.
outcomes. Through the learner and context analysis, key
The Dick and Carey model prescribes a meth- learner characteristics and the context in which
odology for designing instruction based on break- the learning will occur are identified. The informa-
ing instruction down into smaller components. tion provides the basis for developing accurately
The designer needs to identify the subskills the targeted instruction.
student must master that, in aggregate, permit the The designer conducts instructional analysis
intended behavior to be learned, and then select for an instructional goal in order to identify the
the stimulus and strategy for its presentation that relevant skills, their subordinate skills, and in-
builds each subskill. formation required for a student to achieve the
The instructional implication of the model goal. The technique of hierarchical analysis is
is that learning is based on mastering a set of applied for goals in the intellectual skills domain
behaviors are predictable and therefore reliable. to identify the critical subordinate skills needed
This model assumes that the correct instructional to achieve the goal and their interrelationships.
analysis and instruction will lead to demonstrable Formative evaluation is used to collect data and
skills. information that is used to improve a program,
The following is a list of the elements of Dick conducted while the program is still being de-
and Carey’s model explained in The Systematic veloped. And finally, summative evaluation is
Design of Instruction: conducted after an instructional program has been
implemented and formative evaluation completed
1. Determine the instructional goal. to present conclusions (http://www.ic.arizona.
2. Analyze the instructional goal. edu/~teachorg/nlii03/isd.htm).
3. Analyze the learners and contexts.
4. Write performance objectives.
5. Develop assessment instruments. FUTURE TRENDS AND
6. Develop instructional strategy. CONCLUSION: BEHAVIORAL
7. Develop and select instruction. TEACHING AND LEARNING
8. Design and conduct formative evaluation.
9. Revise instruction. Behavioral approaches to teaching generally
10. Use summative evaluation. involve the following:

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Behaviorism and Developments in Instructional Design and Technology

1. The skills and information to be learned are Behavioral teaching and learning tend to focus
broken down into small units. on skills that will be used later. You learn facts
2. Students’ work is checked regularly and about American history, for example, because it
feedback is provided as well as encourage- is assumed that knowing those facts will make
ment (reinforcement). you a better citizen when you are an adult. You
3. Teaching is “out of context.” Behaviorists learn basic mathematics and computational skills
generally believe that students can be taught because you may need them when you get a job.
best when the focus is directly on the content Behavioral learning does not, however, generally
to be taught. Behavioral instruction often ask you to actually put the skills or knowledge
takes the material out of the context in which you learn into use in a “real” or “authentic” situ-
it will be used. ation. That will come later when you graduate
4. Instruction is direct or “teacher centered.” and get a job.
Teachers must direct the learning process. These effects are critical to the effectiveness
5. Learning is passive. of a computer program because they influence the
6. Students must learn the correct response. learning events of a lesson. The behavior theo-
7. Learning requires an external reward. rists give a great deal of attention to individual
8. Knowledge is a matter of remembering responses during interactions with computers.
information. Behaviorists favor software designed for drill
9. Understanding is a matter of seeing existing and practice and tutorial instru